The Swiss Alps

Much of the book Frankenstein by Mary Shelley takes place in Switzerland. Shelley uses the natural beauty of the mountains to depict the wonders of nature and to juxtapose Victor’s need for supernatural miracles. The Swiss Alps are a 68 miles stretch of mountains spanning across Switzerland with the coordinates 46.560842918621724, 8.561335557455875. Filled with several predators and uncharted wooded area, the Alps can be just as confusing and frustrating as Victor was when he first attempted to create his monster and learn his “craft”. As Victor is young and full of hope and a thirst for knowledge, the Swiss Alps are beautiful, but as he descends into madness, the mountains turn into a beast he must conquer. Dreading his journeys to find the monster, Victor embarks on a grueling trek around the world to (in this reader’s opinion), run from his mistakes.  The white swooping hills transformed into an icy battlefield as Victor ventures out of his home in Geneva to find the monster.

Dangers of Nature

The setting of the Swiss Alps was integral to the story with Mary Shelley using the mountain range to show the forces of nature and what happens when you go against it. This is another example of Victor trying to defy the Earth, much like when he brought to life a creature made of the dead. Shelley begins describing the Alps as an oasis-like landscape and then quickly shifts the perspective of the reader to fit the mindset that Victor finds himself in while navigating the dangers it holds. This plot point and location create a juxtaposition of Victor’s internal battles and the reality of the natural world that he could not accept in the death of his mother and the blatant disregard for modern science. Because of his shunning of modern science, Victor must deal with the consequences.

Victor defies nature several times throughout the novel all while traveling across the world to fix the unnatural being that he irresponsibly created. And because Victor turned his back on nature, nature in turn punished him for trying to play God. From almost freezing to death to facing several challenges and encounters with the monster, Victor learns his lesson when the story comes to a head in the Arctic Ocean where he is drifting on an iceberg, suffering in nature as his world has crumbled around him. After the monster takes everything from him, all he has left is the Earth he is living on and even then he is relying on the most dangerous parts of nature to save him. This is an ironic twist that Shelley has added to the story when he was the one who created the most dangerous thing of the supernatural. By positioning Victor’s journey through the Alps, Shelley has put Victor into more turmoil and challenge as he not only has to survive the monster but also Mother Nature taking her toll or revenge on Victor and his deviant actions.