I was their plaything and their idol, and something better—their child, the innocent and helpless creature bestowed on them by Heaven, whom to bring up to good, and whose future lot it was in their hands to direct to happiness or misery, according as they fulfilled their duties towards me.
Chapter 1 · Narrator
Context
Victor reflects on his parents' intense awareness of their responsibility for his upbringing, recalling how they viewed his future happiness as entirely dependent on their choices.
Analysis
Victor's tricolon ('plaything,' 'idol,' 'child') moves from trivializing to deifying to humanizing, yet all three terms position him as an object acted upon. The phrase 'future lot it was in their hands to direct' uses the passive voice and deterministic language ('direct to happiness or misery') that ironically mirrors how Victor will later view his own creative power over the creature—as total authorship of another being's fate. The gap between the parents' 'deep consciousness' of duty and Victor's later abdication of responsibility for his creation becomes starkly visible.
Essay Tip
Support a thesis that Victor's failure to take responsibility for the creature stems from a warped understanding of parental duty—his own parents saw child-rearing as directing a fate, so Victor assumes creation ends once the being exists, not grasping that care is ongoing.