Frankenstein by Mary Shelley

"Oh! No mortal could support the horror of that countenance. A mummy again endued with animation could not be so hideous as that wretch. 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.

I passed the night wretchedly. Sometimes my pulse beat so quickly and hardly that I felt the palpitation of every artery; at others, I nearly sank to the ground through languor and extreme weakness. Mingled with this horror, I felt the bitterness of disappointment; dreams that had been my food and pleasant rest for so long a space were now become a hell to me; and the change was so rapid, the overthrow so complete!"

(Shelley, pg. 58-59)

Through Shelley's use of allusion and extreme exaggeration, the reader gets a rich sense of Frankenstein's lack of responsibility. In this excerpt the reader is told what Frankenstein has made, and how he feels about this creature that he has brought to life. This creature that he spent the better part of two years on, once fully created is his own personal hell and is now horrendous in his eyes. Shelley uses allusion to describe how this is his hell, "it became a thing such as even Dante could not have conceived". This is Shelley alluding to Dante Alighieri's "The Divine Comedy" in which he describes several layers of hell all called the inferno. Shelley is also making Frankenstein exaggerate his extreme horror, he states how hideous this creature is and how disappointed he is about this creature. Frankenstein is once again not disappointed in himself, only furthering the assumption of his selfishness the reader already had. With this excerpt, Mary Shelley uses both allusion and exaggeration to simply further the readers idea of Frankenstein's "all for self" attitude.