in proper detail
This remark may be seen as less innocent than it appears at first. Victor
is about to recount a trial in which it is essential that he exonerate
himself. On a more interior level of the discourse we as readers are
privy to a second narrative, which is meant by Victor to exonerate the
course of his life to Walton and, through Walton, to posterity. This
comment, then, links up with other instances, both early and late in the
novel, in which Victor's concern with rhetorical propriety shadows a
desire to write history so as to reflect well on him (see Letter 4 and 1.3.8, Walton 1, and Walton 2).
