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In Frankenstein What Are Clerval's Plans For His Career?

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The clearest indication we are given of Henry Clerval's hopes for his future comes in Volume 3, Chapter 2. Clerval and Victor are travelling around Europe; Clerval especially enjoys this, as he not only likes seeing new people and places. but thinks a knowledge of different cultures will be useful to him in his chosen career.

He is planning to go to India; he already knows some of the major Indian languages, and hopes to have an opportunity there of "materially assisting the progress of European colonisation and trade." This is also why he is glad to visit Britain, from where such "colonisation and trade" was likely to be carried out at that time.

It appears that Clerval is basically planning a career in business, which in the colonial era of course meant being involved in colonial activities. Shelley never tells us anything more specific about the kind of work Clerval wants to do. (Perhaps because he is killed soon after this episode.)

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