Given Clerval's seeming representation as a Shelleyan ideal, his desire to attach
himself to the imperialist designs of Europe upon Asia would appear to have Mary Shelley's
endorsement. And it should be said that this early in the growth of the British empire—long
before the Afghan Wars (1839-42) and the Indian Mutiny (1857-59)—when the liberal-minded
Sir William Bentinck was Governor-General (1828-35), the British saw their influence
in the Indian subcontinent as morally benign. Still, the extent to which the imperial
"native" is debased within this system has its corollary in the rejection of the Creature
by Europeans wherever he encounters them. Likewise, earlier imperial projects are
roundly condemned elsewhere in the novel: for instance, by Victor and by the Creature
himself in his reaction to the reading of Volney's Ruins of Empires.