I quite enjoyed this story, though it’s very different from what I expected. Rather than the horror story pictured in dozens of movies, TV shows, and who knows what else, it’s actually a truly fascinating pre-Victorian character study.

The hero, it turns out, is really the villain, and vice versa - at least to my thinking. In part the way we see Dr. Frankenstein and the creature he creates is a matter of how much we believe the creature’s tale of woe, for which there is really very little in the way of independent verification. To my thinking he is reasonably credible, and I think he’s right to be so angry at the doctor - indeed, the surprise is that he’s not so much angrier with the world at large, and that his vengeance, terrible and unjust though it may be, is constrained in so many ways to the doctor’s sphere. (That said - this creature is pretty twisted, and he does some truly vile things in the name of revenge. So calling him a hero is maybe a bit over-shooting.)

On the other hand I have very little sympathy for Dr. Frankenstein, whose actions at nearly every turn are kind of craven and uninspiring. I lost count of the number of promises he broke and the number of people he disappointed. His one saving grace, I suppose, is that he seems to have some feeling for his responsibility to society at large, although it’s difficult to say how altruistic he is since in large part that feeling is tied up with his hesitation to do something he finds to be unpleasant. (And anyway, he is so endlessly selfish with his own friends and family that it’s hard to see him as any sort of humanitarian.) He’s a rather untrustworthy, unaccountable, and selfish person on the whole.

One interesting thing that I’ve been thinking about is the way Shelley chooses her settings. Her novel actually spans a fairly large swath of geography, and it’s curious that she chose the Arctic for the climactic scene at the end. I suppose that is meant to heighten the drama, or perhaps to bring the conflict between humanity and nature into sharp relief - I don’t know exactly.

Certainly, this book is groundbreaking in science fiction, and a fascinating look at morality, accountability, and the debt that we owe to one another and to those who come after us. Definitely worth a read.