Victor Frankensteins Journal

A dreary night of November, 17__,

3:00am.
This entry is enrolled, because it must be. The vow that I took to authenticate every single moment of the endeavor prevents me from quitting the task though it lacks support of my feeble mind and ill conceived health. I dont know whether I will be able to witness the first rays of the sun or not. Ah! Will this night never end? What is that sound? Seems like a groan! Is it him?! Gracious lord! He is after me..

3:30am.
My chamber of filthy creation. My asylum for almost the last two years! Tonight is the very last night of my self induced confinement. With the chirping of the morning birds, who announce the arrival of dawn, I will be free. Either dead or alive, a happier being in any of the cases. Free??!! Happy??!! A hoax! Will I ever be free? Ever be happy? Even after the curse that I have bestowed on man kind? I was almost about to parallel God in his creation. But instead, now I find myself chained in the pool of fire. A dungeon horrible, and there is no light, but rather darkness visible! Misuse of power leads to no where but destruction. As I sit here in this room, imprisoned, with no light but this dim radiance of taper, more like a disciple of darkness; no sound but the dismal patter of the monotonous rain which has been pouring (for God knows how long!), epiphanic images of my 1st conceived thoughts mock me! How happy and excited I was! Life and death appeared to me ideal bounds, which I should first break through, and pour a torrent of light into our dark world. A new species would bless me as their creator and source; many happy and excellent natures would owe their being to me. No father could claim the gratitude of his child so completely as I should deserve theirs. If I could bestow animation upon lifeless matter, I might in process of time renew life where death had apparently devoted the body to corruption. The imaginings that I might bring my mother back to life hovered somewhere in my subconscious, though I knew that it wouldnt be possible. The thunder brings me back to my confinement. It was another thunder which shattered everything! Broke my frenzy. Let me begin from the beginning. It was already one in the morning. The continuous pouring created a sense of melancholy. The instruments of life were collected around me, that I might infuse a spark of being into the lifeless thing that lay at my feet. Suddenly I was blinded by a lightning. A stream of fire dissected the sky. In that light I looked at the THING lying in the ground. Great

god! Am I the father of this surplus lump of flesh knit together and scarcely covered by the yellow skin! The inanimate thing was unbearable! I grasped the edge of the table in front of me to prevent myself from falling down. My body weight collapsed in the chair just beside the table. In the solitary cell at the top of this house, almost separated from human world, there I was. And there lied my creation. The fiend at whom I couldnt but refrained to look at for more than a few seconds continuously. Is it a human that I have created? Theres no doubt that I intended to create one but the thing lying in front of me was in no ways even close to be referred as a species of homo sapiens. Almost 8 ft in height, a figure distorted, deformed, debased. His muscles and arteries were like open wounds of a brutally slaughtered pig, filthy. The pale, yellow, patched dead skin was enough to provoke a vomiting tendency. A stale smell of morgues filled the room (or was it only my assumption?). The limbs joined to the body artificially lacked the magnificence and perfect ness of an artist. His hair was of lustrous black and flowing, stains of baldness here and there. His teeth were of a glittering pearly whiteness, not fully covered by his disproportionate black lips. His watery eyes seemed almost of the same color as the dun white sockets in which they were set. His appearance evoked a monstrous fear in me. In the half extinguished light of the almost burned out candle, I saw the dull yellow eye of the creature open; it breathed hard, and a convulsive motion agitated its limbs. The different accidents of life are not so changeable as the feelings of human nature. I had worked hard for nearly two years, for the sole purpose of infusing life in an inanimate body. For this I had deprived myself of rest and health. I had desired it with an ardor that far exceeded moderation; but now I had finished, the beauty of the dream vanished, and breathless horror and disgust filled my heart. I ran away! Someones banging the door! Is it him this time??

4:30am.
Am I awake? Or amidst a dream? Layers of dreams one after another. I had been living in a trance. From the very moment when my mind was impregnated with the thought of creation, I had been living in a trance. I have neglected my friends, my family, even myself. As if a film of dreams had veiled my eyes. Now I feel that I have lost everything. I have lost my reality. As the creature breathed his first, my trance was broken. But did I awake? Or am I dreaming still? I feel even now also I am in a surrealistic world surrounded by unreal objects and events. Escaping from my solitary cell I went to my bed chamber. I endeavored to seek a few moments of forgetfulness. I slept. Only to be disturbed by the wildest of dreams. I thought I saw Elizabeth. I was standing in the middle of a street. The entire city of Ingolstad was deserted. I was, perhaps searching someone. There was not a glimmer of light to be seen except a faint yellow light which made everything feebly visible to me. It was raining. The same monotonous rain irritated me even in my dream. I again saw Elizabeth. Passing a narrow lane, quickly crossing me unnoticed. I called out her name. She didnt answer. I was restless. I tried to follow her. I got lost. All the roads led me to my starting position. I was trapped in Ingolstad. The empty deadness of the city chocked me. I shouted her name. Her inviting laughter filled my ears. I saw her. Delighted and

surprised, I embraced her. But as I imprinted a kiss on her lips, a lightning struck. I heard a glass breaking sound. As I lifted my head, I saw the sky cracking. The sky cracked, the buildings cracked, and the entire image of the city collapsed as if it were painted on a window pane which broke to pieces. I looked at Elizabeth. Her lips became livid with hue of death. Her features appeared to change. I was loosing her. Felt very much afraid. As I looked around, I found myself in a graveyard. The figure I held in my arms was that of my dead mother. Her lifeless eyes were disturbingly white. Her watery eyes seemed almost of the same color as the dun white sockets in which they were set. As I looked at her, tears gushed out of my eyes and an unexplainable pain almost numbed my senses. The rain drops pouring on me felt like thorns of sorrow. A shroud enveloped her form, and I saw the grave worms crawling in the folds of the flannel, quite a number of them. They started climbing up my hands and covering me. My hands! How terrified I was to see my hands! The pale yellow, patched dead skin and the limbs of distorted length! I was the monster! Gasping for breathe; I started from my sleep with horror; a cold dew covered my forehead, my teeth chattered, and every limb became convulsed; when, by the dim and yellow light of the moon, as it forced its way through the window-shutters, I beheld the wretch . He held up the curtain of the bed; and his eyes fixed on me. He uttered some inarticulate words. He might have spoken, but I did not hear. He had his one hand stretched out, seemingly to detain me. That hand! That same hand I saw in my dream! My own hand! Empathy with this wretched fiend? I escaped my bed chamber and ran downstairs. And now here I am, waiting for dawn. I think I wont survive that long. I can already feel my body burning with fever. If the creation encounters the creator, I wont be able to do anything but surrender to him and die. Will he kill me? I had gazed on him while unfinished; he was ugly then; but when those muscles and joints were rendered capable of motion, it became a thing such as even Dante could not have conceived. Ah! I feel disappointed, cursed, excommunicated from humanity. Dreams that had been my food and pleasant rest for so long a space, has now become a hell to me! There again those sounds! He is angry! Will he seek revenge? On whom? Me? My family? Or mankind?! I cant go on writing any more. My cursed future befalls me. All hope is lost.