the peasant
The powerless of this unlanded peasant before the forces of state
power probably reflects the devastation of Europe during the last
phase of the Napoleonic Wars. However self-serving or
self-pitying we may find Victor's comparison, its political edge
is unmistakable and is perhaps intended by Mary Shelley, like
other incidental political observations in the novel, to
insinuate a viewpoint that could not be explicitly stated in the
political climate of England in 1818.
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