offspring of solitude and delirium
Walton is taking very seriously the notion of the living dead whom Victor
accounted a "guiding spirit" (3.7.6 and
note) as he embarked on the Arctic ice fields.
Yet what he appears to be telling his sister and her readers here is that
Victor's only solace is in madness, and that for so deeply alienated a
creature madness is preferable to sanity. If by this statement he is
recognizing that Victor is actually mad, it raises considerable questions
about what constitutes the truth contained by either narrative --
Victor's, certainly, but also his own which relies exclusively on Victor's
for its authority.
