"Frankenstein"--today the very name sends
chills down our spines.
Mary Shelley was only
18 when she began
to write the novel
What influenced Mary
to use
“Frankenstein” for
the name of her
protagonist?
Frankenstein, or the Modern
Prometheus (1818)
•
•
Mary Shelley’s novel was an immediate
literary success and has not been out of
print since 1818.
People are intrigued by the horror in the
novel, written by a teenager who was
inspired by a nightmare (which Shelley
called her “waking dream”);
•
•
•
More significantly, ever since its appearance,
the novel has challenged our basic conceptions
and assumptions about science and life (Brown,
1994).
In it, she created the forerunner to two literary
genres--science fiction and horror fiction.
On the other hand, it was both a representative
romantic adventure written during the Romantic
Period and a critique of Romanticism.
• [B]oth the media and the
average person in the street
have mistakenly assigned the
name of Frankenstein not to the
Frankenstein is our
maker of the monster but to his
culture's most
creature. . . . [T]his "mistake"
penetrating literary
actually derives from an
analysis of the
intuitively correct reading of the
psychology of modern
novel. Frankenstein is our
culture's most penetrating
"scientific" man.
literary analysis of the
psychology of modern
"scientific" man, of the dangers
inherent in scientific research,
From Anne K. Mellor, Mary Shelley:
and of the exploitation of nature
Her Life, Her Fiction, Her Monsters.
and of the female implicit in a
technological society.
Keith Burns, Archivist/Collector: "What we get in
the movies is the male version: the monster, the
blood, the screaming, the fights, the struggle, the
fire.... Whatever we get from the visual is the
male element."
Dr. Stephen J. Gould, Dept. of Comp. Zoology,
Harvard University: "If you just saw the film, you
would miss the primary moral seriousness of the
entire book which is the responsibility that we all
have to the things we make with our own hands."
Why read Frankenstein in a biology course lab?
• Shelley’s novel correlates with
the subject matter--genetics,
embryology, biochemistry, and
cell biology--particularly well
since the novel can be read not
only as a political and feminist
critique of nineteenth-century
European society in general, but
more specifically as a penetrating
literary critique of the psychology
of modern "scientific" man.
• Thus, the dangers inherent in
scientific research and current
ethical dilemmas can be
discussed, giving students the
opportunity to consider the
consequences of genetic
engineering, gene therapy,
reproductive technologies,
human embryo research, and
cloning.
For science students, the novel is
significant in that it incorporated the
current science of her time.
Mary Shelley based her work upon an extensive understanding
of the most recent scientific developments of her day—
specifically, that of
Humphry Davy,
Erasmus Darwin, and
Luigi Galvani.
Humphry Davy
• Humphry Davy of the Royal Institution of Science published A Discourse,
Introductory to a Course of Lectures on Chemistry in 1802; Mary Shelley
read this work on Monday, October 28, 1816, just before working on her
story of Frankenstein.
• Her husband Percy Shelley then obtained Davy's textbook, Elements of
Chemical Philosophy (London: 1812), for her to read further on the
subject.
• Davy, in his celebration of the powers of chemistry, asserted that "the
phenomena of combustion, . . . of the agencies of fire; . . . and the
conversion of dead matter into living matter by vegetable organs, all
belong to chemistry."
• Davy introduces the very distinction Mary Shelley wishes to draw between
– the scholar-scientist who seeks only to understand the operations of
nature and
– the master-scientist who actively interferes with nature.
Erasmus Darwin, grandfather of Charles
• In contrast to Davy, Erasmus Darwin provided Mary Shelley with a
powerful example of what she considered to be "good" science, a careful
observation and celebration of the operations of all-creating nature with
no attempt radically to change either the way nature works or the
institutions of society.
• Percy Shelley acknowledged the impact of Darwin's work on his wife's
novel when he began the Preface to the 1818 edition on of Frankenstein
with the assertion that "the event on which this fiction is founded has
been supposed, by Dr. Darwin, and some of the physiological writers of
Germany, as not of impossible occurrence" (1).
• Mary Shelley, in her Preface to the 1831 edition, referred to an admittedly
apocryphal account of one of Dr. Darwin's experiments (the “piece of
vermicelli in a glass case [that] by some extraordinary means began to
move with voluntary motion”)
More Darwin
• Erasmus Darwin was most famous for his work on evolution and the
growth of plants,
• The basic tenets of Erasmus Darwin's theories in his major works, The
Botanic Garden (1789, 1791), Zoonomia; or the Laws of Organic Life
(1793), Phytologia (1800), and The Temple of Nature (1803).
• For English readers, Darwin was the first to synthesize and popularize the
concept of the evolution of species through natural selection over millions
of years (the definitive theory of this concept was later expounded by his
grandson, Charles Darwin).
• By 1803, Darwin had accepted, on the basis of shell and fossil remains in
the highest geological strata, that the earth must once have been covered
by water and hence that all life began in the sea.
• Erasmus Darwin anticipated the modern discovery of mutations, noting in
his discussion of monstrous births that monstrosities, or mutations, may
be inherited.
Electricity/Galvanism/Luigi Galvani
• Lastly, in her depiction of science’s attempt to create human life ("a spark”
infused “into the lifeless thing" [Shelley 38]) as a transgression against the
very essence of nature, Shelley explicitly associated electricity with
galvanism.
• Shelley and most of Europe were aware of the work of Luigi Galvani, who
in 1791 published Commentary on the Effects of Electricity on Muscular
Motion, in which he came to the conclusion that animal tissue contained
a heretofore neglected innate vital force, which was subsequently widely
known as "galvanism."
The most notorious demonstration of galvanic electricity took place on
January 17, 1803, when it was applied to the corpse of the murderer Thomas
Forster
• Several experiments on the
severed heads of oxen,
frogs legs, dogs' bodies, and
human corpses were
subsequently replicated
widely throughout Europe
in the early 1800s.
• Here is the scientific
prototype of Victor
Frankenstein, restoring life
to dead bodies.
Electricity's seeming ability to stir the dead to life
gave the word galvanize its own special
flavoring, as this 1836 political cartoon of a
"galvanized" corpse suggests.
Technology’s Monster
• Shelley clearly saw that
uninhibited scientific and
technological development,
without a sense of moral
responsibility for either
their processes or products,
could easily, as in
Frankenstein's case,
produce monsters.
• Implicit in Shelley's novel is
the same warning to our
day.
The United States National Library of Medicine
(NLM) has taken the novel’s application to
scientific research seriously enough to create an
exhibit on their web site.
• In the Frankenstein: Penetrating the Secrets of Nature
<
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/exhibition/frankenstein/index.html >
exhibit, the NLM recognizes that Mary Shelley's novel
expresses our natural human fear in response to new
scientific discoveries which may threaten our existence or
make us re-examine our assumptions about human life.
• They cite as examples the atomic bomb, interspecies organ
transplants, genetic engineering, and cloning.
• These breakthroughs have raised the following fundamental
questions about scientific research:
• What is "acceptable" science and medicine? Who decides?
Questions
• How can society balance the benefits of new medical
discoveries against ethical or spiritual questions they may
pose? How can society balance the human urge to know and
understand against problems arising from that knowledge?
• More specifically in regard to transplanting animal organs into
humans, what are the public health risks, such as the
transmittal of animal viruses to humans? Or in reference to
cloning, can we let scientists proceed without constraint?
• Dare we embrace such a breakthrough's benefits heedless of
its risks? In either situation, should we consider the moral
aspect of usurping the "natural" order?
Although many of these issues currently remain
unresolved, for the most part they are openly debated.
• However, many people today are concerned about some
biomedical research that is being kept private because failure
to make results of research open to public scrutiny often leads
to dangerous consequences.
• This is one of the lessons of Mary Shelley's novel.
• Victor Frankenstein conducted his great experiment in secret;
immediately upon bringing the creature to life, he abandoned
it; he allowed the creature then to escape into the
unsuspecting world at large, to fatal result: this led directly to
his brother William's murder by the creature; still unwilling to
acknowledge publicly his activity, he allowed the innocent
Justine to be hanged for the crime.
The National Library of Medicine exhibit illustrates the importance of public
debate to reach a social consensus on issues involving scientific research with
the following two cases.
• The Visible Human Project began
in 1993.
• Gaining full permission prior to
his execution, the program
dissected the body of a
condemned murderer and posted
slides of small tissue sections to
the Internet.
• There they are used for
educational purposes but are
available to the public for
viewing. In this instance, society
endorsed the project.
• However, in 1997 when the fact
that Scottish researchers had
cloned the sheep "Dolly" became
public, Americans began an
intense public debate of the
issues surrounding cloning.
• As a result, President Clinton
asked the National Bioethics
Advisory Commission to
investigate and make a future
recommendation for standards;
in the meantime, he issued a
moratorium on human cloning.
A nuclear weapons-infested globe readily poised to destroy itself does all too easily
seem like a threatening fulfillment of Mary Shelley's prophetic “Frankenstein Idea.”
•
An excerpt from Fathering
the Unthinkable:
Masculinity: Scientists and
the Nuclear Arms Race
(Pluto Press, London,
1983: 28, 35), by
ex-nuclear physicist and
science historian Brian
Easlea
The violation of life on this planet has reached
epidemic proportions, and much of the blame for
this state of affairs must be laid at the feet of
those who find an endless thrill of excitement in
scientifically “penetrating” the “secrets of nature,”
taking little or no responsible account of the
damaging implications “theory” might have for
“practice.” Too often it seems the lure of power,
profit and a so-called “security” of nations
obscures any elements of “real disinterestedness,
toleration and a clear understanding” that may
have been present at the beginning of a
theoretical scientist's practical researches. We
should perhaps hope that the “sexy” lure of
scientific penetration need not have the cold kiss
of death waiting behind it.
The question was "so very frequently
asked me--'How I, then a young girl,
came to think of, and to dilate upon,
so very hideous an idea?'“
What influenced Mary to use
“Frankenstein” for the name of her
protagonist?
Mary Shelley's father was the
radical philosopher William
Godwin
• His Political Justice (1793) offers a criticism
of existing society, a system of social ethics,
and a series of prophecies for the future.
• Godwin’s optimism was founded upon a
confidence in the power of the human
reason and the possibility of limitless
development in the right direction
• This belief is exemplified by his famous
assertion: “What the heart of man is able
to conceive, the hand of man is strong
enough to perform.”
• He believed that the pursuit of knowledge
needed no sanction because education will
lead the individual to adapt his own
interests to the common good.
• This moral "enlightened self-interest"
corresponds to the political "will of the
majority " (Baugh 1112-14)
Mary Shelley’s mother was Mary Wollstonecraft,
a leader in the early feminist movement
•
•
•
•
She was the author of A Vindication of the
Rights of Women (1792), in which she argues
for equality of education for both sexes and
state control of co-education.
Before her marriage to Godwin,
Wollstonecraft had several affairs; the most
notable one was with an already married
American, Gilbert Imlay and resulted in the
birth of a daughter Fanny.
In 1793, she renewed a friendship with the
well-known philosopher William Godwin.
Both had publicly opposed the institution of
marriage, but when she became pregnant
with Mary, they married a shortly before her
birth.
Unfortunately, she died of complications ten
days after giving birth to Mary in 1797.
• A Vindication of the
Rights of Women is
still read in women's
studies classes today
Despite these illustrious parents, Mary had a difficult
youth.
•
•
•
•
•
•
After the death of his first wife, Godwin married a Mrs. Clairmont in 1801, who
had two children, Charles and Jane (or "Claire, who was approximately the same
age as Mary).
In 1805 William and Mrs. Godwin open a publishing firm and bookshop for
children's books, but, a poor businessman, Godwin experienced serious financial
difficulties the rest of his life.
An adversarial relationship developed between Mary and her stepmother, and in
1811 the young girl spent several weeks at Bath for sea-water treatment for a bad
rash on her arm.
After returning home and her relationship with Mrs. Godwin not improving, in
June 1812 William Godwin arranged for Mary to stay in Scotland with
acquaintances--the Baxter family.
Except for spending November and December of 1812 with her family in London,
Mary continued to live with the Baxters in Scotland until March, 1814 (from the
age of 14-16).
Mary's stepsister, Fanny Imlay, who was under the pressure of financial problems
and depression, took her own life in October 1816.
Mary’s future husband was Percy Bysshe Shelley,
destined to be one of the great poets of the
Romantic Period
• As a young student, Shelley was expelled from Oxford in 1811 for writing
the essay The Necessity of Atheism
• In January of 1812, Shelley wrote a self-introductory letter to Godwin,
assuming the role of disciple to the philosopher.
• In October 1812—while Mary was still in Scotland--Percy Shelley and his
wife, Harriet, met and dined with the Godwins at Skinner Street.
• When Mary returned briefly to London in November, she first encountered
the young poet, accompanied by his wife, Harriet, who was visiting her
father, William Godwin.
Unlike her unfortunate stepsister Fanny Imlay, Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin was far
more flamboyant and escaped the family through rebellion.
•
•
•
On May 5, 1814, Percy Shelley returned
without Harriet to dine at Skinner Street
and saw Mary for the second time. They
begin spending nearly every day together.
By the end of June Mary declared her love
for Percy Shelley at her mother's grave in
St Pancras churchyard.
While estranged yet still married to the
pregnant Harriet, on July 28, 1814, Shelley
abandoned her to elope with sixteenyear-old Mary to Europe, accompanied by
Mary's stepsister Jane (later called Claire)
them. Godwin denounces his daughter.
•
•
•
•
Percy, Mary, and Jane spend two months
in a Europe devastated by the Napoleonic
Wars, traveling through France from Calais
to Switzerland. Financial troubles force
the trio to return to England in
September.
Part of the motivation for returning was
Percy’s expectation of an inheritance
following the death of his grandfather.
However, Percy’s father, incensed with his
son, prevents him from receiving the
estate, dooming Percy and Mary to
continuing financial troubles.
Mary gave birth prematurely to a baby girl
called Clara on February 22, 1815, but the
infant died a few days later on March 6.
Mary and Percy’s second child, William,
was born January 24, 1816.
Switzerland again, Lord Byron and the Ghost Writers'
Contest, Back to London
•
•
•
•
After their return to England, Mary’s
stepsister Claire—determined to have
a poet of her own--successfully
pursued the notorious Lord Byron
and becomes his mistress.
Because of his notoriety—and maybe
because he was tiring of Claire—Lord
Byron found it convenient to leave
London in the early spring of 1816 for
Switzerland, where he leased the
Villa Diodati at Coligny.
In May of 1816, Mary, baby William,
Percy, and Claire traveled to
Switzerland to join Lord Byron on
Lake Geneva and move into a nearby
cottage.
The inclimate summer of 1816 left
the visitors ensconced in the Villa
reading and telling one another
Gothic German ghost tales.
•
•
•
•
On June 15, the group engaged in
discussions about philosophy and the
principle of life, and Byron suggested
that they individually write a
supernatural tale.
On June 16, Mary has her “waking
dream," which becomes the germ of
Frankenstein, and she begins to write
her story.
Other than Mary's classic, the only
other extant story from this occasion
is John Polidori's reworking of Byron's
tale entitled The Vampire: A Tale.
(Mary and Percy returned to England in Sept.;
Fanny Godwin committed suicide on Oct. 9 and
was buried anonymously, Godwin having
refused to identify or claim the body; Harriet
Shelley's body, advanced in pregnancy, was
found in the Serpentine river on Dec. 10, where
she had drowned herself; Mary Godwin married
Percy Shelley on December 30.)
Why did Mary Shelley have such a
dream at this point in her life?
•
•
•
•
•
•
Over fifteen years later, she claimed she could still see vividly the room to which she woke
and feel "the thrill of fear" that ran through her. Why was she so frightened?
Mary Shelley had given birth to a baby girl eighteen months earlier, a baby whose death two
weeks later produced a recurrent dream: "Dream that my little baby came to life again; that it
had only been cold, and that we rubbed it before the fire' and it lived. Awake and find no
baby."
The 1816 reverie unleashed her deepest subconscious anxieties, the natural but no less
powerful anxieties of a very young, frequently pregnant woman, so she once again was
dreaming of reanimating a corpse by warming it with a "spark of life."
And only six months before, Mary Shelley had given birth a second time, to William (who,
ironically, would die of malaria within 3 years—6/7/1819).
She doubtless expected to be pregnant again in the near future; and indeed, she conceived
her third child, Clara Everina, only six months later in December. (This child died a year later
[9/24/1818] of a fever.)
We might also note that the nightmare motif made a significant impact on her. In 1792 her
mother Mary Wollstonecraft offered to enter a ménage a trois with the Romantic painter and
intellectual Henri Fuseli and his wife, but was refused.
“The Nighmare” by Henri Fuseli
“The Nightmare” is one of Fuseli’s most memorable and striking paintings.
Anne Mellor observes that Mary knew the painting very well, and several
critics have suggested that the description in Frankenstein of the death of
Elizabeth Lavenza on her wedding night is based on it (121).
Ben Franklin’s
Experiments with Electricity
• Given the importance of electricity as an animating force in the novel,
most readers, particularly her immediate audience of the early 1800s,
would connect the name Frankenstein with Ben Franklin. All Europe was
familiar with Ben Franklin's recent experiments with electricity and Mary
included a direct reference to him in the first edition of the novel.
•
•
•
•
•
In 1747 Benjamin Franklin began the electrical experiments
He developed a battery composed of eleven large glass plates covered with sheets of lead.
While several investigators--Wall, Newton, Hauksbee, Gray, and others—had noted the resemblance
between electric sparks and lightning, Franklin proved their identity.
In June, 1752, as a thunderstorm began, he sent up, on strong twine, a kite made of silk (as better fitted
than paper to bear wind and moisture without tearing); a sharply pointed wire projected some twelve
inches from the top of the kite; and at the observer's end of the twine a key was fastened with a silk
ribbon. The result demonstrated “the sameness of the electrical matter with that of lightning completely.”
In the first edition of Frankenstein, Victor is introduced to the recent discoveries of Benjamin Franklin by
his father (24-25).
But she didn't just make up a German name that
sounded like the Anglican Franklin.
Frankenstein is the name of an old aristocratic German
family
The name literally means “the
stone of the Franks.”
The Franks were a Germanic
people who settled in
Western Europe during the
decline of the Roman
Empire
This particular Frankish family
settled near a stone quarry
(in the vicinity of what is
now Darmstadt, Germany),
so they became known as
the Frankensteins.
Mary passed their ruined
castle on her way home
from Europe in 1814.
The history of the Frankensteins
included several Romantic heroes
While the novel may be a
critique and a parody of
Romanticism on one
hand, it also very much
embodies Romantic
values--particularly that
of the Romantic hero.
• Arbogast Baron von Frankenstein
was a victorious fighter from that
area and erected a castle in the
thirteenth century.
• One of the knights in the
sixteenth century, Sir George
Frankenstein, according to
legend, sacrificed his life slaying a
dragon. Before he died, however,
he was able to save beautiful
Annemarie, "The Rose of the
Valley."
Clearly, the novel is concerned with the search for
secret knowledge and the creation of life, and the
historical Frankensteins also had a connection with
these issues.
•
Fortuitously, the philosopher's stone--a
term associated with alchemy and
Paracelsus--is also suggested by
Frankenstein-- "FranksStone."
•
The philosopher's stone is the magical
substance in alchemy which brings about
the transmutation of metals, a cure for all
ills and immortality.
•
Eventually the Philosopher's Stone was
thought to signify the force behind the
evolution of life and the universal binding
power which unites minds and souls in a
human oneness.
Another legendary figure was Johann
Konrad Dippel (1673-1734) who was
born in the castle. He studied
Paracelsus and lived his life searching
for knowledge as a wandering scholar
and alchemist. He would sometimes
sign his works "Frankensteina," and
claimed to have the secret of the
philosopher's stone, as well as the
ability to create life.
Significantly, Mary has her protagonist
study the works of Paracelsus as a
youth.
Also, the Frankenstein Castle ruins no doubt served as a
magnet to travelers of romantic temperaments and
interest in legends. The site and its history had an
inspirational effect on Johann Goethe and his Faust.
Goethe spent part of his youth near the Frankenstein Ruins, and over a 30
year period worked on Faust, an epic poem about the quest for selfknowledge.
In Goethe's epic, the hero sells his soul to the devil in seeking the secret of
life; he creates an artificial man in his laboratory.
Mary was very familiar with Goethe and his works. As a young girl, she often
listened in on the conversation of William Godwin's intellectual circle.
Likely she heard Crabb Robinson report that he had discussed Godwin
with Goethe while he was in Germany. We know that in 1815 she read
Goethe's tremendously culturally influential The Sorrows of Werther, and
then before she conceived of Frankenstein in the summer of 1816, she
read de Stael's review of Goethe's Faust with its over-reaching
philosopher.
The need of carefully considering
consequences before acting is ironically
implied in Shelley’s subtitle for the novel:
The Modern Prometheus.
• Several critics have commented on the obvious allusion in that the titan
Prometheus is credited with two significant acts: creating humans from
clay and stealing fire from the gods and giving to man as a protectivesustaining gift.
• Shelley combines these attributes in Frankenstein: he creates (recombines
from used body parts) a being, animating it with fire (electricity).
• However, a fuller consideration of the Prometheus myth, as explained by
Hamilton (1942), deepens the significance of the allusion, especially in
regard to the issues of actions/consequences/responsibility.
Prometheus (“forethought”)
• In Greek, the name Prometheus literally means “forethought,”
for the titan was very wise.
• After his brother failed in the task of creation, Prometheus
perceptively discovered a way to fashion humans from clay
and then to provide for their most basic needs by giving them
the stolen fire.
• Furthermore, aware of the risks, he willingly sacrificed himself
for the good of others. Zeus, angry at the theft, had
Prometheus chained to the side of a mountain and a vulture
tore at his liver continuously.
Epimetheus (“afterthought”)
• In contrast, the titan’s brother was named Epimetheus, which means
“afterthought.”
• Epimetheus frequently acted on thoughtless impulse, only to regret his
actions later.
• Given by Zeus the responsibility for creation, he squandered all the good
gifts on animals and had inadequate qualities left for the making of
humans.
• Too late, as always, he was sorry and asked his brother's help.
• Later, despite a warning from Prometheus, Epimetheus accepted from the
gods the most beautiful woman ever created--Pandora, "the gift of all.”
• Unfortunately, the gods also gave Pandora a box containing all the evils in
the world, which she opened, releasing them.
• Thus disregarding reasonable caution, Epimetheus eagerly acted to
possess what he desired, indirectly causing all the miseries in the world
(Hamilton, pp. 85-93).
What genre of literature best
describes the Frankenstein tale?
• Gothic?
• Science Fiction?
Gothic Tales
• macabre, fantastic, and supernatural
• usually set amid haunted castles, graveyards,
ruins and wild picturesque landscapes
• they reached the height of their considerable
fashion in the 1790's and the early years of
the 19th century (Oxford Companion to
English Literature 405-06)
Science Fiction
• A prose narrative which
• either assumes an imaginary technological or
scientific advance
• or depends on an imaginary and spectacular
change in the human environment
• (Oxford Companion to English Literature 876)
Gothic elements in Mary Shelley's novel.
• She was familiar with the classics of Gothicism: Mrs. Radcliffe's The
Mysteries of Udolpho (1794), M.G. Lewis's The Monk (1796) and William
Beckford's Vathek (1786).
• In common with these Gothic tales, Frankenstein made use of the
correspondence between theme, character and setting.
• One of the chief elements in the novel is the use of atmosphere to create
mood. The icy mists of the Arctic and the bleak windswept Alpine glacial
fields are linked to the spiritual and social isolation of the Creature and its
Creator.
• Not unlike Victor Frankenstein, Gothic heroes are trapped in gloom unable
to appreciate the light of day. They are the descendants of Cain, Satan,
and Prometheus--heroic in their rebellion yet pathetic in their destiny.
• In order to depict the shadow-side of their heroes, Gothicists used ghostly
visitations, especially a device known as a doppleganger, a mirror image of
the self. Creator and Creature in Frankenstein are in reality one self,
reflecting different sides of human personality.
Narrator--1st person, but shifts
• Vol. I, Letters I-IV (1-18): Walton, Letters to Sister Margaret, making a
•
•
•
•
•
•
manuscript of conversation with Victor Frankenstein ("This manuscript will
doubtless afford you the greatest pleasure.... "[ 18])
Vol. I, Chps. I-VII (19-68): Frankenstein, via manuscript
Vol. II, Chps. I-II (69-79): At the end of chapter II, Frankenstein: "But I consented
to listen; and, seating myself by the fire which my odious companion hated lighted,
he thus began his tale" (79).
Vol. II, Chps. III-VIII (79-118) : The Creature
Vol. II, Chp IX; Vol. III, Chps. I-VII (118-78): Frankenstein, via manuscript
Vol. III to end (178-91): "Walton, in continuation"--Letters to Margaret
Irony of narrative structure: the beginning, end, and climactic moment occur in an
ice field
Mary’s Reading List: Between January 1815 and the summer of 1816, the
eighteen months before she conceived Frankenstein, Mary Godwin read some
ninety works.
•
•
•
•
One important course was her study with
Shelley of the major English poets: Spenser,
Shakespeare, Milton, Coleridge, Wordsworth,
Byron, and Southey, as well as Scripture for its
poetry.
Her other reading included The Canterbury Tales
and Godwin's Life of Chaucer, William Beckford,
Samuel Richardson, Joanna Baillie, Matthew
"Monk" Lewis, Walter Scott, Ann Radcliffe;
she also read Goethe and Schiller in translation,
Shelley having interested her in German
literature.
In history and related fields she read Gibbon's
Decline and Fall and his Life and Letters, Edward
Clarendon's History of the Civil Wars, Edmund
Burke's Vindication of Civil Society, William
Robertson's History of America; memoirs of
modem philosophers, historically important
figures, and travelers, such as Admiral George
Anson's narrative of his voyage around the
world and Carl Phillipp Moritz's Tour of England.
•
•
•
•
She read Voltaire, d'Holbach, and the major
works of Rousseau and de Stael in the original,
and,
with Shelley tutoring, Ovid, Sallust, Virgil,
Quintus Curtius, and Petronius ("detestable,"
she noted). She would become an accomplished
scholar in Latin and Romance-language
literature." She studied Italian and Greek
through the Iliad and the satirist Lucian, aided
by Shelley, translations, and lexicons.
In addition, the lovers followed current
political-literary debates in the major arbiters of
taste and opinion, the Tory Quarterly and Whig
Edinburgh Reviews.
Remember, this reading was done by
a17-18 year-old girl who had no formal
education.
Videos
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Frankenstein (The Restored Version). Starring Boris Karloff, Colin clive, Mae Clarke, John Boles, Edward
Van Sloan, and Dwight Frye. Based on a story by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley. Adapted by John L.
Balderston from a play by Peggy Webling. Screenplay by Gsrrett Fort and Francis Edwards Faragoh.
Directed by James Whalen. Produced by Carl Laemmle, Jr. Orginal Theatrical release: Universal Studios,
1931. Restored Video release: August 22, 1991. Run Time: 71 minutes.
Mary Shelley's Frankenstein (Widescreen Version). Kenneth Brannagh, Robert DeNiro, Tom Hulce, Helena
Bonham Carter, Aidan Quinn, Ian Holm, John Cleese. Columbia Tristar, 1994. RT: 123 minutes.
Young Frankenstein. Gene Wilder, Peter Boyle, Marty Feldman, Cloris Leachman, Terri Garr, and Madeline
Kahn. Directed by Mel Brooks. Twentieth Century Fox, 1974. RT: 106 minutes.
The True Story of Frankenstein. Hosted by Roger Moore. Narrated by Eli Wallach. Interviews with Robert
DeNiro, Kenneth Brannagh, Francis ford Coppola. 1994. RT: 100 minutes.
Haunted Summer. Philip Anglim, Laura Dern, Alice Krige, Eric Stoltz, and Alex Winter. Cannon, 1988. RT:
106 minutes.
Gothic. Starring Gabriel Byrne, Julian sands, Natasha Richardson, Miriam Cyr, and Timothy Spall.
Screenplay by Stephen Volk. Directed by Ken Russell. Virgin vision and Vestron Pictures, 1986. Run Time:
87 minutes.
The Bad Lord Byron. International Films series. Timeless Video, 1949. RT: 95 minutes.
Percy Bysshe Shelley. The Famous Authors Series. Kultur, n.d. RT: 30 minutes.