Letters 1-3 (Frankenstein (Full Cast))

01I.

02Frankenstein.

03Characters.

04Robert Walton.

05Read by Chuck Williamson.

06Victor Frankenstein.

07Read by Bob Neufeld.

08Master.

09Read by Elizabeth Clett.

10Lieutenant.

11Read by Carrie Rae Clark.

12Caroline Frankenstein.

13Read by Ariel Lipshaw.

14Alphonse Frankenstein.

15Read by Todd.

16The part of Monsieur Krempe.

17Read by Anthony.

18Monsieur Waldman.

19Read by Martin Gieson.

20Henry Clerval.

21Read by Grace Garrett.

22Elizabeth Lavenza.

23Read by Elizabeth Clatt.

24Ernest Frankenstein.

25Read by Ernst Batinama.

26Justine Moritz.

27Read by Avai.

28The Officer.

29The Creature.

30Read by John Trevithick.

31Felix De Lacy.

32Read by Tiffany Haller Colonna.

33De Lacy.

34Read by Steve W.

35Thompson.

36Landlord.

37Read by April Gonzalez.

38William Frankenstein.

39Read by Miss Avarice.

40Irishman.

41Read by Elizabeth Clett.

42Old Woman.

43Read by Capricia Page.

44Mr.

45Kerwin.

46Read by Erich Sturra.

47Magistrate.

48Read by Max Schörlinge.

49Section 1.

50Letters 1 to 3.

51St.

52Petersburg, December 11th, in an undisclosed year in the 18th century.

53To Mrs.

54Saville, England.

55You will rejoice to hear that no disaster has accompanied the commencement of an enterprise which you have regarded with such evil forebodings.

56I arrived here yesterday, and my first task is to assure my dear sister of my welfare and increasing confidence in the success of my undertaking.

57I am already far north of London, and as I walk in the streets of Petersburg, I feel a cold northern breeze play upon my cheeks, which braces my nerves and fills me with delight.

58Do you understand this feeling?

59This breeze, which has traveled from the regions towards which I am advancing, gives me a foretaste of those icy climes.

60Inspirited by this wind of promise, my daydreams become more fervent and vivid.

61I try in vain to be persuaded that the pole is the seat of frost and desolation.

62It ever presents itself to my imagination as the region of beauty and delight.

63There, Margaret, the sun is forever visible, its broad disk just skirting the horizon and diffusing a perpetual splendor.

64There, for with your leave, my sister, I will put some trust in preceding navigators.

65There snow and frost are banished, and sailing over a calm sea, we may be wafted to a land surpassing in wonders and in beauty, every region hitherto discovered on the habitable globe.

66Its productions and features may be without example, as the phenomena of the heavenly bodies undoubtedly are in those undiscovered solitudes.

67What may not be expected in a country of eternal light?

68I may there discover the wondrous power which attracts the needle, and may regulate a thousand celestial observations that require only this voyage to render their seeming eccentricities consistent forever.

69I shall satiate my ardent curiosity with the sight of a part of the world never before visited, and may tread a land never before imprinted by the foot of man.

70There are my enticements, and they are sufficient to conquer all fear of danger or death, and to induce me to commence this laborious voyage with the joy a child feels when he embarks in a little boat with his holiday-mates on an expedition of discovery up his native river.

71But supposing all these conjectures to be false, you cannot contest the innestable benefit which I shall confer on all mankind to the last generation by discovering a passage near the pole to all those countries, to reach which at present so many months are requisite, or by ascertaining the secret of the magnet, which, if all possible, can only be effected by an undertaking such as mine.

72These reflections have dispelled the agitation with which I began my letter.

73And I feel my heart glow with an enthusiasm which elevates me to heaven, for nothing contributes so much to tranquilize the mind as a steady purpose, a point on which the soul may fix its intellectual eye.

74This expedition has been the favorite dream of my early years.

75I have read with ardor the accounts of the various voyages which have been made in the prospect of arriving at the North Pacific Ocean through the seas which surround the pole.

76You may remember that a history of all the voyages made for purposes of discovery composed the whole of our good Uncle Thomas's library.

77My education was neglected, and my familiarity with them increased that regret which I had felt as a child on learning that my father's dying injunction had forbidden my uncle to allow me to embark in a seafaring life.

78These visions faded when I perused, for the first time, those poets whose effusions entranced my soul and lifted it to heaven.

79I also became a poet, and for one year lived in a paradise of my own creation.

80I imagined that I also might obtain a niche in the temple where the names of Homer and Shakespeare are consecrated.

81You are well acquainted with my failure, and how heavily I bore the disappointment.

82But just at that time I inherited the fortune of my cousin, and my thoughts were turned into a channel of their earlier bent.

83Six years have passed since I resolved on my present undertaking.

84I can even now remember the hour from which I dedicated myself to this great enterprise.

85I commenced by inearing my body to hardship.

86I accompanied the whale fishers on several expeditions to the North Sea.

87I voluntarily endured cold, famine, thirst, and want of sleep.

88I often worked harder than the common sailors during the day, and devoted my nights to the study of mathematics, the theory of medicine, and those branches of physical science from which a naval adventurer might derive the great practical advantage.

89Twice I actually hired myself as an undermate in a Greenland whaler, and acquitted myself to admiration.

90I must own I felt a little proud when my captain offered me the second dignity in the vessel, and entreated me to remain with the greatest earnestness.

91So valuable did he consider my services.

92And now, dear Margaret, do I not deserve to accomplish some great purpose?

93My life might have been passed in ease and luxury, but I preferred glory to every enticement that wealth placed in my path.

94Oh, that some encouraging voice would answer in the affirmative.

95My courage and my resolution is firm, but my hopes fluctuate, and my spirits are often depressed.

96I am about to proceed on a long and difficult voyage, the emergencies of which will demand all my fortitude.

97I am required only to raise the spirits of others, but sometimes to sustain my own when theirs are failing.

98This is the most favorable period of traveling in Russia.

99They fly quickly over the snow in their sledges.

100The motion is pleasant, and in my opinion far more agreeable than that of an English stagecoach.

101The cold is not excessive, if you are wrapped in furs, a dress which I have already adopted, for there is a great difference between walking the deck and remaining seated motionless for hours, when no exercise prevents the blood from actually freezing in your veins.

102I have no ambition to lose my life on the post-road between St.

103Petersburg and Archangel.

104I shall depart for the latter town in the fortnight, or three weeks, and my intention is to hire a ship there, which can easily be done by paying the insurance for the owner, and to engage as many sailors as I think necessary among those who are accustomed to the whale fishing.

105I do not intend to sail until the month of June.

106And when shall I return?

107Ah, dear sister, how can I answer this question?

108If I succeed, many, many months, perhaps years will pass before you and I may meet.

109If I fail, you will see me again soon.

110Or never.

111Farewell, my dear, excellent Margaret.

112Heaven shower down blessings on you, and save me, that I may again and again testify my gratitude for all your love and kindness.

113Your affectionate brother, R.

114Walton.

115Letter Two.

116Archangel.

117The 28th of March.

118In an undisclosed year in the eighteenth century.

119To Mrs.

120Saville, England.

121How slowly the time passes here, encompassed as I am by frost and snow.

122Yet a second step is taken towards my enterprise.

123I have hired a vessel, and am occupied in collecting my sailors.

124Those whom I have already engaged appear to be men on whom I can depend, and are certainly possessed of dauntless courage.

125But I have one want which I may never be able to satisfy, and the absence of the object of which I now feel as a most severe evil.

126I have no friend, Margaret.

127Where I am glowing with enthusiasm for success, there will be none to participate my joy.

128If I am assailed by disappointment, no one will endeavor to sustain me in dejection.

129I shall commit my thoughts to paper, it is true.

130But that is a poor medium for the communication of feeling.

131I desire the company of a man who could sympathize with me, whose eyes would reply to mine.

132You may deem me a romantic, my dear sister, but I bitterly feel the want of a friend.

133I have no one near me, gentle yet courageous, possessed of a cultivated, as well as of a capacious mind, whose tastes are like my own, to approve or amend my plans.

134How would such a friend repair the faults of your poor brother?

135I am too ardent in execution and too impatient of difficulties.

136But it is still greater evil to me that I am self-educated.

137For the first fourteen years of my life I ran wild on a common, and read nothing but our Uncle Thomas' books of voyage.

138At that age I became acquainted with the celebrated poets of our own country.

139But it was only when it had ceased to be in my power to derive its most important benefits from such a conviction, that I perceived the necessity of becoming acquainted with more languages than that of my native country.

140Now I am twenty-eight, and in reality more illiterate, than many schoolboys of fifteen.

141It is true I have thought more, and that my daydreams are more extended and magnificent.

142But they want, as the painters call it, keeping.

143And I greatly need a friend who would have sense enough not to despise me as romantic, and affection enough for me to endeavour to regulate my mind.

144Well, these are my useless complaints.

145I shall certainly find no friend on the wide ocean, nor even here in Archangel, among merchants and seamen.

146Yet some feelings, unhailed to the dross of human nature, beat even in these rugged bosoms.

147My lieutenant, for instance, is a man of wonderful courage and enterprise.

148He is madly desirous of glory, or rather, to word my phrase more characteristically, of advancement in his profession.

149He is an Englishman, and in the midst of national and professional prejudices, unsoftened by cultivation, retained some of the noblest endowments of humanity.

150I first became acquainted with him on board a whale vessel.

151Finding that he was unemployed in this city, I easily engaged him to assist in my enterprise.

152The master is a person of excellent disposition, and is remarkable in the ship, for his gentleness and the mildness of his discipline.

153This circumstance, added to his well-known integrity and dauntless courage, made me very desirous to engage him.

154A youth passed in solitude, my best years spent under your gentle and feminine fosterage, has so refined the groundwork of my character, that I cannot overcome an intense distaste of the usual brutality exercised on board ship.

155I have never believed it to be necessary, and when I heard of a mariner equally noted for his kindness of heart, and the respect and obedience paid to him by his crew, I felt myself peculiarly fortunate in being able to secure his services.

156I heard of him first in rather a romantic manner, from a lady who owes to him the happiness of her life.

157This, briefly, is his story.

158Some years ago, he loved a young Russian lady of moderate fortune, and having amassed a considerable sum of prize money, the father of the girl consented to the match.

159He saw his mistress once before the destined ceremony, but she was bathed in tears, and throwing herself at his feet, entreated him to spare her, confessing at the same time that she loved another, but that he was poor, and that her father would never consent to the union.

160My generous friend reassured the suppliant, and on being informed of the name of her lover, instantly abandoned his pursuit.

161He had already bought a farm with his money, on which he had designed to pass the remainder of his life.

162But he bestowed the whole on his rival, together with the remains of his prize money, to purchase stock, and then himself solicited the young woman's father, to consent to her marriage with her lover.

163But the old man decidedly refused, thinking himself bound in honor to my friend, who, when he found the father inexorable, quitted his country, nor returned, until he heard that his former mistress was married according to her inclinations.

164What a noble fellow!

165You will exclaim.

166He is so.

167But then, he is wholly uneducated.

168He is as silent as a Turk, and a kind of ignorant carelessness attends him, which, while it renders his conduct the more astounding, detracts from the interest and sympathy which otherwise he would command.

169Yet, do not suppose, because I complain a little, or because I conceive a consolation for my tolls which I may never know, that I am wavering in my resolutions.

170Those are as fixed as fate, and my voyage is only now delayed until the weather shall permit my embarkation.

171The winter has been dreadfully severe, but the spring promises well, and it is considered as a remarkably early season, so that perhaps I may sail sooner than I expected.

172I shall do nothing rashly.

173You know me sufficiently to confide in my prudence and considerations whenever the safety of others is committed to my care.

174I cannot describe to you my sensations and the near prospect of my undertaking.

175It is impossible to communicate to you a conception of the trembling sensation, half pleasurable and half fearful, with which I am preparing to depart.

176I am going to unexplored regions, to the land of mist and snow, but I shall kill no albatross.

177Therefore, do not be alarmed for my safety, or if I should come back to you as worn and woeful as the ancient mariner.

178You will smile at my illusion, but I will disclose a secret.

179I have often attributed my attachment to, my passionate enthusiasm for, the dangerous mysteries of the ocean, to that production of the most imaginative of modern poets.

180There is something at work in my soul which I do not understand.

181I am practically industrious, painstaking, a workman to execute with perseverance and labour.

182But besides this, there is a love for the marvellous, a belief in the marvellous, intertwined in all my projects, which hurries me out of the common pathways of men, even to the wild seas and unvisited regions I am about to explore.

183But to return to dearer considerations, shall I meet you again, after having traversed immense seas, and returned by the most southern cape of Africa or America?

184I dare not expect such success, yet I cannot bear to look on the reverse of the picture.

185Continue for the present to write to me by every opportunity.

186I may receive your letters on some occasions, when I need them most to support my spirits.

187I love you very tenderly.

188Remember me with affection, should you never hear from me again.

189Your Affectionate Brother, Robert Walton Letter Three July 7th In an Undisclosed Year In the Eighteenth Century To Mrs.

190Saville, England My dear sister, I write a few lines in haste, to say that I am safe and well advanced on my voyage.

191This letter will reach England by a merchantman, now on its homeward voyage from Archangel.

192I am, however, in good spirits.

193My men are bold and apparently firm of purpose.

194Nor do the floating sheets of ice that continually pass us, indicating the dangers of the region towards which we are advancing, appear to dismay them.

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