in Frankenstein. The fact of such mortality is surely what exacerbates the crew's
sense of its peril and justifies its appeal to the captain to cut short his expedition.
Although Walton expresses no guilt for the fate of these mariners under his command,
one might wonder at its lack. Certainly, it is an odd paradox that the novel can concentrate
with such intensity on the murderous consequences of the antagonism of Victor Frankenstein
and his Creature but pass by without comment the revelation that Walton's enterprise
in pursuit of knowledge has resulted in apparently greater death than has their destructive
dynamic.