The terms become starker and starker, now directly figured as beyond Victor's control,
the operations of a destiny in which he is a mere pawn. Moreover, this force, however
much it may be involved in creation, is on a personal level destructive. As Victor
nears success in his endeavor to create life, it is as if the process directly saps
his own vitality.
Perhaps, however, there is an alternate, less dire, way of reading this condition,
as reflecting Mary Shelley's own experience with motherhood. On some preconscious
mental level, Victor is shown to be replicating the experience of the expectant mother
whose physical being is strongly affected by the second being gestating in her womb.