Now that Victor has created the monster, does he feel better or does he feel ashamed that the monster forced him to create ANOTHER monster? I'm doing a literature unit on Frankenstein by Mary Shelley.

On a chill night of November, Victor finally brings his creation to life. Upon the opening of the creature's "dull yellow eye," Victor feels violently ill, as though he has witnessed a great catastrophe. Though he had selected the creature's parts because he considered them beautiful, the finished man is hideous: he has thin black lips, inhuman eyes, and a sallow skin through which one can see the pulsing work of his muscles, arteries, and veins.

The beauty of Frankenstein's dream disappears, and the reality with which he is confronted fills him with horror and disgust. He rushes from the room and returns to his bedchamber.

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In this chapter, Victor's scientific obsession appears to be a kind of dream ­ one that ends with the creature's birth. He awakens at the same moment that the creature awakens ­ the moment the creature's eyes open, Frankenstein's own eyes are opened to the horror of his project. He is wracked by a sickness of both mind and body; this reflects the unnatural character of his endeavor, in which he attempted to take the place of god.

The narrator's sentences become abbreviated, abrupt, indicating his nervous, paranoid state. It is significant that Victor dreams of his mother and Elizabeth: as women, they are both "naturally" capable of creation (through giving birth). With their deaths, the natural creation and earthly virtue they represent dies as well. Victor's kiss is the kiss of death, and his marriage to Elizabeth is represented as being equivalent to both a marriage to his mother and a marriage with death itself.

At the moment of his birth, the creature is entirely benevolent: he affectionately reaches out to Frankenstein, only to have the latter violently abandon him. Despite his frightful appearance, he is as innocent as a newly-born child ­ which, in a sense, is precisely what he is. Victor's cruel treatment of the creature stands in stark contrast to both his parents' devotion and Clerval's selfless care: he renounces his child at the moment of its birth. The reader begins to recognize the profoundly unethical character of Frankenstein's experiment ­ and of Frankenstein himself.

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Victor cannot be ashamed that he is forced to create a companion because that never happens in the book. The monster asks for a companion, he never receives one.