Who Is Victor's Relationship In Frankenstein

In Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein, Victor Frankenstein goes against nature and heteronormative roles when he creates a monster out of decayed body parts.

Initially, he does not view his creation with disgust. He had regarded the monster as beautiful when putting it together. Then, the monster came to life and he ran. He did nothing to stop the monster from killing his family and friends. He refused to admit what he had done to the authorities. Victor’s unwillingness to confront the disaster he perpetuated hint at the existence of covert sentiments towards the monster, and towards himself. What Victor does, or doesn’t do, is irrational. He first submerges himself into creating this being, completely neglecting his family for years. Once

it is created, Victor neglects it too and turns back to his family.

In response, the creature kills his family. Victor then, finally begins a pursuit to kill his creation. Victor ignores his family because he is afraid of assuming a heteronormative role, and runs from his creature because he represents his repressed sexuality come to life.

Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein embodies a series of heterosexual relationships that have either been postponed or interrupted. Victor’s father, Alphonse Frankenstein, devotes most of his life to public service before marrying. Victor recalls, “He passed his younger days perpetually occupied by the affairs of his country; a variety of circumstances had prevented his marrying early, nor was it until the decline of life that he became a husband and the father of a family” (23). Like his father, Victor delays his marriage to focus on his work and passions. He

stays at Ingolstadt for six years before returning home (70). And when he does, “a variety of circumstances” also prevent his marriage. Walton, Victor’s friend on the ship, is apparently also uninterested in the prospect of marriage. He is instead deeply in want of a male companion. He writes to his sister saying, “I have no friend, Margaret... I desire the company of a man who could sympathize with me, whose eyes would reply to mine. You may deem me romantic, my dear sister, but I bitterly feel the want of a friend” (8). Walton also tells his sister of the ship’s master, a man whose betrothed loved someone poorer than he. Walton writes that “He had already bought a farm with his money...but he bestowed the whole on his rival...and then himself solicited the young woman's father to consent to her marriage with her lover” (11). The ship’s master not only refuses marriage, but also eliminates his chances of marrying another by giving away his property and fortune. Although Victor never refuses his union to Elizabeth, there is reason to believe he is afflicted by the idea of marriage.
Victor does not refuse his marriage to Elizabeth because the union is expected. of him, and because marrying another would be no different. Victor has been engaged to his cousin since they were children. It was his mother’s dying wish that they be married (26). His father assumes that his avoiding Elizabeth might be due to Victor perceiving her as a sister, rather than a wife. He offers him the option of cancelling the engagement, but only under the pretense that Victor might be infatuated with someone else (170). Victor, as a heterosexual male, is expected to conform to societal norms and get married and have children. He agrees to this fate, but is plagued with anti-romantic nightmares of his soon-to-be wife. Victor recalls, “Delighted and surprised, I embraced her, but as I imprinted the first kiss on her lips, they became livid with the hue of death; her features appeared to change, and I thought that I held the corpse of my dead mother in my arms...” (50). This nightmare accentuates Victor’s sexual repression because he is first happy to see Elizabeth; it is only after he kisses her that she turns into a frightening corpse.
The romance of Elizabeth and Victor is nonexistent, as Victor harbors negative feelings toward Elizabeth.

In his childhood, he regards her as being “docile, good-tempered, and uncommonly affectionate” but he also compares her to being as “playful as summer insect”. He goes further, calling Elizabeth “his favorite animal” (26). Comparing Elizabeth’s character to that of an animal fabricates a clear disparity between Victor’s elevated male status, and Elizabeth’s degraded female mind. They are not the same. Victor says of Elizabeth: “No one could submit with more grace than she did to constraint and caprice” (26). Victor by contrast, does not need to submit to anyone. He is a human with free will and higher intellect, while Elizabeth is a lesser being with constraints. Victor says, “The world was to me a secret, which I desired to discover, to her it was a vacancy” (27). Elizabeth’s lower status, one that is closer to an animal then that of man, is only part of the reason for Victor’s dislike. Victor Frankenstein doesn’t want Elizabeth, because she is a woman, insinuating then, that he would prefer a man’s company

instead.
Victor Frankenstein creates the monster because he subconsciously wishes he could possess another male. He runs from it because coming to terms with his homosexuality is too unpleasant. Victor becomes obsessed with studying the human frame, or more specifically the male body. Victor recalls, “darkness had no effect upon my fancy; and a church-yard was merely a receptacle of bodies deprived of life…I was led to examine the cause and progress of this decay, and forced to spend…nights in charnel houses” (43). For nearly two years, Victor deprives himself of rest and good health; his sole purpose becomes his pursuit of being able to “infuse life into an inanimate body” (50). While the creature is still lifeless, Victor regards him as a “beautiful” being with proportionate limbs, yellow skin, lustrous black hair, and pearly white teeth (49). It is only after the creature awakens that Victor becomes revolted. Victor says, “ But now that I had finished, the beauty of the dream vanished, and breathless horror and disgust filled my heart” (50). Victor’s immediate switch of fondness to horror represents the recognition of his homosexual identity. While the monster was still inanimate, Victor’s desires were still a fantasy, and could be repressed. Now that the monster is alive, Victor can repress his sexuality no longer; it is right in front of him, depicted as something disgusting and monstrous.
A less monstrous characterization of Victor’s hidden desires can be observed in his relationship with Henry Clerval. Henry and Victor have been friends since childhood. Henry’s presence makes up for Victor not having male siblings his age (27). It is Henry who nurses Victor back to health when he is on the cusp of madness (54). They are close friends, much closer than he and Elizabeth were. Victor describes Henry using affectionate, and romantic terms. He says, “Clerval! Beloved friend! He was a being formed in the ‘very poetry of nature’” (176). While Elizabeth’s mind is “vacant”, Victor describes Henry as having a “soul overflowed with ardent affections”. “His wild and enthusiastic imagination was chastened by the sensibility of his heart... his friendship was of that devoted and wondrous nature that the world-minded teach us to look for only in the imagination” (176). Henry and Victor’s relationship is more intimate, and less static than Victor’s relationship with Elizabeth. When the monster kills Elizabeth, Victor refrains from embracing her corpse deciding that the “Elizabeth (he) had loved and cherished” and ceased to be anyways (227). By contrast, when Henry Clerval dies, Victor throws himself on top of his corpse in a fit: “I gasped for breath, and throwing myself on the body, I exclaimed, "Have my murderous machinations deprived you also, my dearest Henry, of life? ...other victims await their destiny; but you, Clerval, my friend, my benefactor..." (203). Victor is decidedly more shaken by Henry Clerval’s death as he is carried out of the scene in convulsions, and then lies in bed for “two months on the point of death” (204). He cannot believe that “this gentle and lovely being lost forever” (204). Although Victor’s relationship with Henry can only with certainty be classified as a strong male bond, there is reason to believe otherwise on account of their intimacy, and by Victor’s not being repulsed by Henry’s mangled male corpse.
Moreover, Victor’s repressed sexuality is evident in his refusal to create the female monster. Victor was able to create a male body out of decayed corpse, but not a female one. The creation of the female corpse proves to be more difficult for him. Victor recalls, “I found that I could not compose a female without again devoting several months to profound study and laborious disquisition” (167). He destroys what he had created thus far, unleashing the wrath of the monster who vows for revenge. Victor says to destroy the female out of fear that she might be unruly and harm his family and others (155). However, in refusing to create her, he condemns his entire family. It makes sense then, that Victor has an ulterior motive for denying his monster love and affection: if he creates a female for him, he will leave with her, and he will become disconnected from the personification of his hidden sexuality. Although Victor attempts to run from the monster, and deny its existence to the authorities and to his family, he still needs the creature to be lurking in the shadows. This is because his sexuality can also only exist in the shadows; it must be repressed, yet present.
In essence, Victor sacrifices his family at the expense of keeping and concealing his homosexual identity that is embodied through the monster. He is more moved by Henry’s death, than Elizabeth’s. He doesn’t embrace Elizabeth’s body, but he does so for Henry. He is able to create a male monster, but not a female one. He neglects his family, a heteronormative unit, and fittingly, it is this heteronormative unit that is destroyed by the monster. The monster is the epitome of sexual repression; it’s hideousness serves as the representation of Victor’s self-hate and disgust.