“His Most Abhorred Task”; or The Creature’s Right to Love?

As the story of Frankenstein continues, we hear more of the creature’s story, as he tells it to Frankenstein. The creature eventually tries to win over the favor of the old man in the cottage where he has been hiding out for the past year, but when the other inhabitants return home sooner than expected, they are terrified by the creature’s appearance and leave the cottage soon after. The creature is upset by their reaction and burns the cottage down before setting off for Geneva seeking revenge upon Frankenstein. Upon arriving in Geneva, he happens to find William. After killing Will, he hides the necklace in Justine’s dress before leaving.

After finishing with his story, the creature demands that Frankenstein create a female for him to live with. At first, he refuses, but eventually Frankenstein reconsiders and sets off a few months later with Henry Clerval, under the pretense of going on vacation, to work on his “most abhorred task” (132). It takes three months for them to arrive in London, where the friends separate. Frankenstein sets up a new laboratory on an island and begins work on the second creature. One night, however, Frankenstein has second thoughts again and destroys his work. The creature visits Frankenstein several hours later and threatens him by saying “ ‘I go; but remember, I shall be with you on your wedding-night’” (146).

One thing that I noticed was that the creature refers to having a female companion with whom to live as “ ‘a right which you must not refuse to concede’” (128). Even from his minimal interactions with society, the creature has learned that males and females are “supposed to” form pairs and live together. However, why does the creature believe that this is a right? According to www.m-w.com/, a “right” is defined as “qualities (as adherence to duty or obedience to lawful authority) that together constitute the ideal of moral propriety of merit moral approval.” The creature further emphasizes how he views having a female companion to be a condition owed to him by his existence when he says, “ ‘Shall each man … find a wife for his bosom, and each beast have his mate, and I be alone?’” (146). The creature seems to strongly feel that, if he should have even one person with whom to communicate and in whom he can find acceptance, that it will make up for every other negative experience that he has had thus far.

Another question: why, knowing the way that he was received by the world, would the creature ask for another being to suffer the same negative experiences that he himself has gone through? Even if the creature just feels lonely, why would he feel content to have one other person with whom to communicate for the rest of his life, and why would he be happy to leave Frankenstein alone after this favor (of sorts), if he feels so strongly that all of his misfortune and suffering is Frankenstein’s fault?