Competitive Misery

I think it is almost comical the continual competition between Victor and The Monster, to prove which of them has suffered the most; they seem much like two children competing to be recognized for their suffering. Ironically they both bring their state of suffering onto themselves by their desire to feel validated in themselves, seeking attention from others, while at the same time believing that no one else could possibly understand what they are going through. In that regard I can see how strongly Shelley’s work ties into the Romantic period, since both Victor and The Monster are so caught up in their own condition to talk about much else. When Victor and The Monster first speak with one another The Monster begins by saying, “I expected this reception. . . [a]ll men hate the wretched; how then must I be hated, who am miserable beyond all living things!” (Shelley 65), and later while Victor talks with Walton he says, “To you first entering on life, to whom care is new and agony unknown, how can you understand what I have felt, and still feel” (Shelley 141); it is little wonder that they both brought destruction to those around them, since they had so little consideration for anything but their own feelings. Shelley’s story has really reinforced the concepts of Passion vs. Reason that we saw in our earlier readings for me, and seems to demonstrate the far extreme of passion much like the story of Candide, just on a individual level rather than societal.