One night, while searching in the woods for food, Frankenstein’s monster discovers a leather suitcase containing three books: The Sorrows of Young Werther, Plutarch’s Lives, and Paradise Lost. Goethe is a source of “astonishment” but also alienation; the monster can sympathize with the characters, but only to a point—their lives are so unlike his own. […]

Original source: https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2023/02/09/misreading-the-cues-sold-a-story-emily-hanford/