Given the Choice
By birth, I am from Geneva. My family, the Wilsons, was very distinguished by way of our ancestors. My father was respected throughout the city due to his integrity and attention to public business. My mother and father married after the death of her father, which rendered her an orphan, and the two traveled Europe together. I, the eldest child, was born in Naples and accompanied them as an infant. I was their only child and, for a long time, the only object of their affection. I was their plaything, sent to bring good upon them. My mother so desired to have a daughter but was not successful. One day, however, while visiting my father in Milan, my mother and I discovered a peasant and his wife with five hungry children. Among these was one girl, who, unlike the rest of these children, was thin and fair with dark hair and eyes. The peasant woman communicated to us that she was not the mother of this girl, but rather that she was the child of a Milanese nobleman. Her mother had been German and died during the birth. She had been placed within their care to raise. When my father returned, he found me playing with this fair child in our villa. With his permission after the story was explained, my mother arranged a change in guardianship. This resulted in Vannessa becoming a dweller of my parents' house, and my more than friend. Everyone adored her and regarded her with the highest pride and delight. My mother told me she was getting me a present of something truly pretty and in my childish selfishness, I decided that Vanessa was for me and me only, to have and to cherish until death.
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The two of us grew up together, with not even a year between our ages. She was calmer than I considering my intense application and thirst for knowledge. Vanessa was focused on poetry and the scenery around our Swiss home while I was more delighted in the causes of these things than the outcome. I was curious and have been curious for as long as I can remember. Eventually, we settled in Geneva after my parents had tired themselves with traveling. Here my younger brother, Jeff, was born. In Geneva, I found myself in solitude often save a few of my schoolmates, one of these being Peter Parker, the son of a merchant of Geneva. Peter was a boy who enjoyed hardship and danger for the sake of it. He liked to read romance books and composed songs describing the heroic deeds of men of past. I was very fond of him.
No one could claim that I had an unhappy childhood. I was treated well and had many advantages that others did not. However, I possessed a temper and was wholeheartedly consumed by my interests and a desire to learn. I became fascinated by the secrets of heaven and earth, the substance of nature and life. Meanwhile, Peter was fixated with the moral relations of things. The traits of heroes and the deeds of men were his interests, and he dreamed of one day being known among the men whom he studied.
Vannessa continued to illuminate our home with her kind nature. Her sympathy was ours, and her smile made all of us feel her happiness just being around her. Between her radiance and Parker’s passion for adventure, I had good forces all around me.
I enjoy looking back on my early past before my misfortune overtook me and ruined everything I once had. Recounting these events lets me take a look at the path that led me to the choices that brought my despair. My passion led me to my own destruction and I can now see how my past influence allowed this to happen. I discovered the works of a certain natural philosopher and read with the greatest interest despite the discouragement of my father.
When I returned home, my priority was to find all of this author’s works. I read and studied these works and could feel my desire for knowledge being satiated. I began to teach myself in the subjects I wanted to be versed in rather than those the school was teaching me. I decided that I was meant to do something with this knowledge I was procuring and came to the conclusion that I would cure disease and make man invulnerable to all but violent death. These were not the only visions I had, however. I dreamed of ghosts and demons being raised and my own failure that could only be blamed on inexperience. Still, I continued on the learning track that I had devoted myself to until an accident occurred that changed my perspective yet again.
When I was about 15, we had retired to our home near Belrive and I witnessed such a storm. There was an old oak tree near our house, and when the storm had finished, I looked at this tree and realized it had vanished. All that remained was a charred stump and this event sparked my interest in electricity and its uses.
And so, my path was set and my destruction was brought into motion.
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When I turned 17, my parents decided I should attend a university in Ingolstadt. There were schools in Geneva that I could attend, but my father decided that I should finish my education in a country where I could learn new customs. On the date when I was supposed to leave, I got the first taste of the misfortune that I was to face throughout the rest of my life. Vannessa had contracted Scarlet fever. She was severely sick and in grave danger, and we had to plead with my mother to not attend to her so she would not also contract the disease. Eventually, Vanessa recovered from her sickness but my mother had already become sick. She died without strife and looked calm even in her death. I’m sure you can understand the grief I felt with this development. The realization that my mother, who had always been there for me, would no longer be present was difficult for me to process. Of course, despite my mother’s death, there we still duties we had to fulfill.
My departure for Ingolstadt was rescheduled for a few weeks after and I would no longer be in this house of mourning. I still desired to be near Vannessa, who hid her grief in an attempt to offer the rest of us comfort. The night before I left, Parker came to bid me farewell. He had attempted to convince his father to allow him to accompany me to the college but had not been successful. The next day I left with my melancholy evident. I was not glad to be leaving my companions behind and be alone. At university, I would have to create my circle and fend for myself. Despite these fears, my hopes and excitement arose as I continued my journey. When I reached Ingolstadt I delivered my introduction letters and paid a visit to some of my professors, one of whom was impressed by the depth of my studies and recommended further reading for me. I returned home that day with a renewed sense of fervor. The next day, I visited one of my other teachers, who was less impressed with my reading and insisted that my studying had been worthless. That night, when I went to bed, I found I could not sleep. I was filled with turmoil and could do nothing about it. When I awoke, my thoughts from the day before had left and I once again returned to my studies. I devoted myself to science and continued to visit the professor who supported my endeavors. I was given books that I had requested and continued my research.
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From this day, I devoted myself to my learning entirely and neglected communication with my family in the meantime. I became fascinated with the human anatomy. The human frame and the prospects of life in everything living. How did life work? It was a heavy question, yet one I sought to answer still. I realized that to examine the cause of life, one would have to examine the cause of death. Studying the decay of the human body would help me better understand its complexities. I began to spend my nights in graveyards and crypts, observing the decaying.
Now remember that I am not recounting insanity. I am not insane. I was learning and using the knowledge I procured to eventually be able to animate lifeless matter. With this knowledge, I started to create a being. At first, I was unsure if the being I was to create would be like me or one better, but my imagination ran too high and the being began to have its own form. At this time, I could not see at all how this creation could result in turmoil, but alas it did. During my time building, spring faded into summer and summer into fall. At this point, I still had the belief that my knowledge would allow me to vanquish disease and I continued with my strenuous work.
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Finally, on a dreary night in late November, I had finished my creation. I collected my instruments to give the spark of life to this being. The dull eyes of the creature opened and its limbs started to convulse as it breathed heavily. How can I possibly explain how I feel at this moment? At first, I felt nothing but absolute joy and pride in this being I had made. It was well-proportioned and strangely beautiful, although a little shorter than I intended it to be. I had done such a great job selecting its features that worked together in harmony with its appearance. Its skin barely covered its muscles beneath the skin, and its pearly teeth were both beautiful, but they paled in comparison to the watery eyes that were set in its face. Its eyes moved to match mine, and the creature seemed to growl at me. I was suddenly struck with terror when looking at this beast. I fled the room and soon found myself losing consciousness from the exhaustion caused by the creation of this being. My sleep was plagued with nightmares, and when I awoke, the being was nowhere to be found.
I could not help the relief I felt.