This is NOT a quote from Frankenstein's monster : "Fire BAD!!"
This is: "Cursed, cursed creator! Why did I live? Why, in that instant, did I not extinguish the spark of existence which you had so wantonly bestowed? I know not; despair had not yet taken possession of me; my feelings were those of rage and revenge. I could with pleasure have destroyed the cottage and its inhabitants and have glutted myself with their shrieks and misery."
Shelley is brilliant here. You really feel everything that happens to the monster (named Adam), and it is quite powerful. He is not some giant mindless humunculus, he is an ultra intelligent child trying to discover how to get by all alone in the world. At first I thought the book might be an accusation of an absent God that created Man and left him to become wicked and evil when he just wanted affirmation and love.
Later on that thought evolved into a round-about argument FOR organized religion. Adam wanted some sense of acceptance and direction from his creator. If we consider ourselves to be Adam and God to be Frankenstein then it could be said that unlike Frank, OUR creator did did tell us that he loved us. He DID leave a list of instructions for us to follow. It is called the Bible.
I personally think that a lot of what is in the Bible is instructions on how to be cruel and malicious; how to keep women, slaves, and poor people in their place; and whom you can and cannot commit genocide toward. There are also many great stories and examples of caring and goodness and how one really ought to behave in the good book too.. but that's all I will say about that here.
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