After her mother's death, Elizabeth's father—intending to remarry—writes to Victor's father and asks if he and his wife would like to adopt the child and spare her being raised by a stepmother (as Mary Shelley had unhappily been).

In the revised third edition (1831), Victor's parents, during a stay on Lake Como, find Elizabeth being raised by a foster family after her German mother's death and the disappearance of her Italian father.

In the abridged version of Great Illustrated Classics intended for younger audiences, there is a fourth revision, where the Frankensteins and Lavenzas had been longtime friends.

Elizabeth continually writes letters to Victor, encouraging him and acting as a positive force against his guilt at creating the monster.

This grim foreboding turns out to be true; on the day of Elizabeth's marriage to Victor, the monster breaks into the bridal suite and strangles her.

She worries when Henry secludes himself in his laboratory and refuses to see anyone, and begs his mentor, Professor Waldman, to talk some sense into him.

When the monster decides to destroy Frankenstein Castle with himself, his bride and the evil Septimus Pretorious inside, he allows Henry and Elizabeth to leave.

Elizabeth (Helena Bonham Carter) plays the same role in the 1994 film Mary Shelley's Frankenstein as she does in the novel, save one significant alteration.

After the monster (Robert De Niro) kills her by tearing her heart out, a distraught Victor (Kenneth Branagh) reanimates her as an undead being, attaching her head and hands to a different female corpse.

Although Frederick tries to be affectionate, Elizabeth recoils from physical touching out of fear that it might smear lipstick, wrinkle her dress, or mess up her hair.

When Frederick plays the violin to summon his creation back to the castle, Elizabeth is devastated when the monster leaves her side.

At the ending, Adam finds his creators house, where he attacks Victor, but Elizabeth calms him down and tells him the truth about his origins.