The Frankenstein Papers

by Fred Saberhagen

  I have read with care your instructions regarding the investigation you wish carried out of the strange events involving the Frankenstein family of Geneva. I appreciate the fact of your personal acquaintance with the family, and your resulting interest. Naturally I shall do my best.

  Indeed, if it were not for your personal knowledge of some of the participants, and the assurances you give me regarding them, I would be inclined to regard the whole matter—the supposed facts, as you state them—as a hoax. But you are my employer as well as my begetter, and I am sure you do not mean to waste my time or your own upon a chimera.

  When your message reached me, I was already in a convenient location (yes, upon another matter, in which you have an interest; no need to mention it here) and so I proceeded directly to the university town of Ingolstadt. I am writing this in a small rented room in the very house in which the then-student, Victor Frankenstein, conducted his mysterious experiments up until three years ago; and where his supposed monster was created. (I say "supposed" advisedly, Sir; you will no doubt appreciate why, as you read on).

  The town of Ingolstadt is interesting to American eyes, and no doubt worthy of description; but I shall not try your patience much in that regard. Suffice it to say that the old church is as picturesque as claimed for it, and there is here a printing press of the fifteenth century, which you, in memory of your original profession, would no doubt find worthy a visit on some more peaceful and leisurely occasion.

  As the seat of a university of some reputation, Ingolstadt is accustomed to entertaining wander-ing youths of diverse nationalities, and my presence here has evoked a second look from no one. A few preliminary questions, asked in a tavern or two, gained me sufficient information about the location of the house. When I arrived at her door, the landlady, a Frau Bauer, assumed without asking that I was a student. One of the vacant rooms she showed me was, I was sure, the very chamber where he lodged, near the top of the house. (I will give, presently, more on the reasons for my certainty.) Naturally I engaged the room at once.

  From the landing outside its door a small, narrow stair goes up even higher; despite a firm prohibition from Frau Bauer, I have managed to get a look at the single room up there, and am convinced that it is the very chamber where the Frankenstein experiments took place. It contains no real bed, only a long, low table, stained and marble-topped, with drain and sink attached, reminding me of something out of a dissecting-room at medical school—save only that this example is nine feet long. A couple of other tables and some shelves, all empty, and most of them stained as if with powerful chemicals, complete the furnishings. There are certain metal fittings screwed into the woodwork on the walls and at the window, that I found curiously reminiscent, Sir, of some of your own electrical equipment; it was almost as if one of your lightning-conductors had been installed in the room and then partially removed.

  There are marks on the door and frame, suggesting that several locks and bolts once there have also been removed. One lock remains, and it is ordinarily kept secured.

  Once settled into my rented room, I began to ask questions about the young man, Victor Frankenstein, who lived here only a few short years ago. Frau Bauer gave me suspicious looks at that point, and ho real information. I did not press the matter with her, but walked out to see what I could learn among the academics themselves.

  I have heard much conversation from these gentlemen in a brief time, but as to what I have learned… I understood from your letter, Sir, who met the young man once and have long known his father, that this young Frankenstein, if his claims were true, was not only the foremost electrical experimenter in Europe, but absolutely the first in the entire world. From what I have been able to learn so far here at the university, from the men who knew him, he is either one of the world's greatest philosophers, as you suggest—or one of its greatest frauds and humbugs.

  M. Waldman, the first professor that I spoke to, claims to have once met you (I sometimes think that almost every educated man in Europe has done so), and on reading my letter of introduction was at pains to welcome "the son of the distinguished Franklin." His English is far better than my German, and perhaps superior to my French, and so we conversed mostly in English.

  Perhaps you will remember M. Waldman. He is now in his fifties, a man of quiet dignity with an air of sadness about him; short and straight of build, with a pleasant, convincing voice. He has read the Walton account of the Frankenstein affair (which is the same version, I trust, as that which came to your attention in Paris and caused you to write to me). M. Waldman seems to find it difficult to believe that such fantastic events—the reanimation of corpses, etc.—could really have taken place; but evidently he can see no alternative to belief. Or rather, perhaps, he will consider none.

  Matters are quite different with M. Krempe, professor of natural philosophy, who also held that post during the years when Victor Frankenstein was a student here. Krempe also counseled the young man, and says that he remembers him quite well. Krempe like Waldman is short in physical stature, but beyond that it would be hard to find two men who are more different. Krempe's voice is gruff and forbidding, his face—not to mince words—ugly, and his whole personal appearance slovenly to an unusual degree.

  Krempe's first reaction to the name of Frankenstein was a cold stare. "Have you really, young man," were his first words to me, "spent much time and effort in pursuing this story? I advise you strongly to give it up. Victor Frankenstein's work was—"

  The concluding word was spoken in some dialect, an obscure one I think, of German. I heard it but imperfectly at the time, partly because of the explosive violence with which it reached my ears; and I would hesitate to try to set down its orthography; but I fear the precise meaning was unmistakable from the great expression of contempt with which it was uttered.

  From my student days I am well aware that disagreements among learned professors are no rarity in universities, and I suppose that Ingolstadt is no exception. But this conflict seems unusually fierce. The one thing all parties are in agreement on is that Frankenstein should not be much talked about at all; and this accord, combined with their evident strong divergence of opinion about the experiments themselves, makes me think that the truth, if I can uncover it, ought to be interesting indeed.

  Now, as to the Walton papers—what Waldman has shown me is an English-language copy of a thick pamphlet, really a book, entitled Frankenstein; or, the Modern Prometheus, that was published in London this summer and seems to be identical to the one you mentioned to me: the production of an English Captain Robert Walton, purporting to contain Victor Frankenstein's true story, as told to Walton aboard his ship. The story is couched in the form of letters from Walton to his sister, a Mrs. Saville, in London.

  Frankly, Sir, I find it, on first reading, an incredible relation. Captain Walton would have us believe that Frankenstein, who had been traveling alone by dogsled, came aboard the captain's ship, the Argo, while she was on the verge of being locked into the Arctic ice last summer. The young philosopher, emaciated and weakened by great hardship, gasped out—at considerable length, and with many digressions—his tale of monsters, murder, and revenge, and then died in the captain's arms.

  Walton also reports a brief visit to his ship by the monster, following the death of Frankenstein, after which the creature was last seen driving another dogsled in the general direction of the Pole. There the nameless "demon" (as his creator often calls him in the book) vowed to die, in some such words as these: "I shall ascend my funeral pile triumphantly, and exult in the agony of the torturing flames… my ashes will be swept into the sea by the winds."

  Yes Sir, all in all, I certainly have my doubts. If there were no other obstacle to arouse them, the improbability of anyone planning to arrange a "funeral pile" in that wasteland of ice and water would be enough.

  I would send you a copy of the whole Walton relation as it exists here, so that you could be sure it is identical to the version you have already seen; but I have
at the moment only M. Waldman's own copy, which he has been kind enough to let me borrow—your name, Father, is one to conjure with, here in Ingolstadt as elsewhere. In any case, my own first hurried look at the story assures, me that it rambles and wanders into many digressions. It will be easier for both of us, I think, if I assume your familiarity with the general matter of it. I will copy directly for you only those passages that seem to bear most directly on that central topic in which you are interested—the existence or nonexistence of the monster—and his true origins, nature, and behavior if he does exist. Thus we may be sure we are considering the same supposed events.

  In this publication of letters from the pen of Walton, then, Victor Frankenstein is quoted as describing briefly his childhood and early youth in Geneva, as a member of that prominent family with whom you, Sir, are acquainted.

  The book says that Victor's interest in natural philosophy, and in electrical phenomena in particular, was sharply awakened at age fifteen, when a giant tree was "shattered in a singular manner" before his eyes during a thunderstorm.

  On this occasion (his journal continues) a man of great research in natural philosophy was with us, and excited by this catastrophe, he entered on the explanation of a theory which he had formed on the subject of electricity and galvanism, which was at once new and astonishing to me…

  I suppose, Sir, you have no difficulty in recognizing yourself in this, as the "man of great research." I had none, having heard, years ago and from your own lips, the anecdote of the riven tree and the fascinated Genovese youth. Might it be that you now feel some responsibility for young Victor's later philosophical endeavors? If so I hope that you do not concern yourself unnecessarily.

  To this extent, then, the Walton relation is confirmed. But we have barely started.

  It was two years after the incident of the riven tree that young Frankenstein went off to the university, having wasted much of the intervening time in studying, for some reason, such ancient and long superseded authorities on nature as Paracelsus, Cornelius Agrippa, and Albertus Magnus. As to why he then chose the university at Ingolstadt, or why, perhaps, his father chose it for him, I can discover no clue in the Walton papers. Perhaps the reason can be unearthed elsewhere.

  At Ingolstadt the young student "attended the lectures and cultivated the acquaintance of the men of science," who soon disabused him of the ideas he had gained from Albertus Magnus and other half-wizards of the past. M. Waldman and M. Krempe are the only two faculty members mentioned by name in Walton's letters, both rather favorably. But as you may know, Sir, there is also at Ingolstadt a medical school of no little reputation. Frankenstein does not mention enrolling in that school, and there is no record that he did so. Still he may have attended certain classes. It may have been then that he found his attention "peculiarly attracted" to "the structure of the human frame."

  Whence, I often asked myself, did the principle of human life proceed? It was a bold question, and one which had never been considered as a mystery; yet with how many things are we upon the brink of becoming acquainted, if cowardice or carelessness did not restrain our inquiries.

  He was not long at the university before determining to "apply himself more particularly to those branches of natural philosophy which relate to physiology."

  To examine the causes of life, we must first have recourse to death. I became acquainted with the science of anatomy, but this was not sufficient; I must also observe the natural decay and corruption of the human body. In my education my father had taken the greatest precautions that my mind should not be impressed with supernatural horrors. I do not remember ever to have trembled at a tale of superstition or to have feared the apparition of a spirit. Darkness had no effect upon my fancy, and a churchyard was to me merely the receptacle of bodies deprived of life, which, from being the seat of beauty and strength, had become food for the worm. Now I was led to examine the cause and progress of this decay, and forced to spend days and nights in vaults and charnel houses. My attention was fixed upon every object the most insupportable to the delicacy of human feelings…

  His studies continued until:

  After days and nights of incredible labor and fatigue, I succeded in discovering the cause of generation and life; nay, more, I became myself capable of bestowing animation upon lifeless matter.

  How he managed to perform this feat, he never says. There are only a few scattered hints throughout the book.

  I have quoted all this, so far, Sir, without comment. But now let me state my own opinion more bluntly than before. It is that M. Krempe's evaluation of Frankenstein's work may well be right.

  In your letter to me you say you "have good reason" to believe there is some truth in even "the strangest of these events," though you do not disclose the reason. So you will not agree, at least unconditionally, with my first assessment; and you may of course rest assured that I shall continue to do my best, whatever my personal opinion, to find out the exact truth.

  One point, that continues to add fuel to my suspicions, is my failure so far to discover any witness in Ingolstadt who will admit to actually having seen the monster with his own eyes, though several, like Professor Waldman, are convinced of the truth of its existence. One witness in particular whom I have so far sought in vain is a peasant known only as Karl, or Big Karl, who frequented the lower quarters of the town, and is said by some of the townsfolk to have been employed as a laborer by Frankenstein, and sometimes seen in his company. Big Karl apparently left Ingolstadt at about the same time—three years ago—as Frankenstein himself.

  To return to the Frankenstein (or at least the Walton) account. Here is the young philosopher's description of his own reactions when he realized he had discovered how to create life:

  When I found so astonishing a power placed within my hands, I hesitated for a long time concerning the manner in which I should employ it. Although I possessed the capacity of bestowing animation, yet to prepare a frame for the reception of it, with all its intricacies of fibres, muscles, and veins, still remained a work of inconceivable difficulty and labor. I doubted at first whether I should attempt the creation of a being like myself, or one of simpler organization; but my imagination was too much exalted by my first success to permit me to doubt of my ability to give life to an animal as complex and wonderful as man… as the minuteness of the parts formed a great hindrance to my speed, I resolved, contrary to my first intention, to make the being of a gigantic stature, that is to say, about eight feet in height, and proportionately large.

  After arriving at this decision, Frankenstein "spent some months in successfully collecting and arranging his materials." The proximity of the medical school and its suppliers, who must have a stock of bodies constantly available for dissection, would, I suppose, have been of some help to him at this point. So might the sturdy Big Karl, whose comings and goings were sometimes noticed, though only when they took place in daylight.

  Who shall conceive the horrors of my secret toil as I dabbled among the unhallowed damps of the grave or tortured the living animal to animate the lifeless clay?

  This, sir—if we are determined to take the matter seriously—I believe to be the most direct hint in the entire relation, as to exactly what means Frankenstein used to achieve animation—somehow the "torture," by some means, of a living animal, was essential. But not sufficient.

  I collected bones from charnel-houses and disturbed, with profane fingers, the tremendous secrets of the human frame. In a solitary chamber or rather cell, at the top of the house, and separated from all the other apartments by a gallery and staircase, I kept my workshop of filthy creation; my eyeballs were starting from their sockets in attending to the details of my employment.

  And so were mine, dear Sir, I assure you, when I first glanced over this horrific record. But then I soon grew doubtful.

  Fortunately for our purposes—and no doubt for Frankenstein's as well—Frau Bauer is somewhat deaf, and suffers a stiffness in the joints that makes her unable to climb t
o the small topmost room within her tall old house. She is a touch nearsighted too, I think. The small handful of other lodgers are as elderly and harmless as herself. So it is perhaps possible that such researchers as those described by Frankenstein could have been carried out inside her house without her knowing it. I ought to mention that the house, and the rear stairway, are easily accessible from an alleyway in the rear. For Big Karl or anyone else to come and go unseen by night would have been perfectly easy.

  The job of "filthy creation," according to Walton's quotation of Frankenstein, took him at least an entire year.

  It was on a dreary night of November that I beheld the accomplishment of my toils. With an anxiety that almost amounted to agony, I collected the instruments of life around me, that I might infuse a spark of being into the lifeless thing that lay at my feet. It was al-ready one in the morning; the rain pattered dismally against the panes, and my candle was nearly burnt out, when, by the glimmer of the half-extinguished light, I saw the dull yellow eye of the creature open; it breathed hard, and a conclusive motion agitated its limbs.

  But success, so long sought and long delayed, brought only "horror and disgust" to the experimenter.

  Unable to endure the aspect of the being I had created, I rushed out of the room and continued for a long time traversing my bedchamber, unable to compose my mind to sleep. At length lassitude succeeded to the tumult I had before endured, and I threw myself on my bed in my clothes…

  And slept. But not for long.