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English
Romantic novelist, biographer and editor, best known as the author of
FRANKENSTEIN, OR, THE MODERN PROMETHEUS (1818). Shelley was 21 when the book was
published.
The story deals with an ambitious young scientist. He creates life but
then
rejects his creation, a
monster.
"But success
shall
crown my endeavours. Wherefore not? Thus far I
have
gone, tracking a secure way over the pathless seas: the very stars
themselves
being witnesses and testimonies of my triumph. Why not still proceed
over the
untamed yet obedient element? What can stop the determined heart and
resolved
will of man?"
(from Frankenstein)
Mary Shelley was
born in
In her childhood
Mary
Shelley was left to educate herself amongst her father's intellectual
circle.
She published her first poem at the age of ten. At the age of 16 she
ran away
to
The story of
Frankenstein
begins in the summer of 1816 when Mary joined Percy Shelley and Claire
Clairmont at a Chateau near
"I had worked
hard
for nearly two years, for the sole purpose of infusing life into an
inanimate
body. For this I have deprived myself of rest and health. I had desired
it with
an ardour that far exceeded moderation; but now that I have finished,
the
beauty of the dream vanished, and breathless horror and disgust filled
my
heart."
(from Frankenstein)
The first edition
of the
book had an unsigned preface by Percy Shelley. Many took Percy to be
the novels
author, disbelieving that a 19-year-old woman could write such horror
story.
However, when the book was published in 1818, it became a huge
success.
In 1818 the
Shelley's left
None of Shelley's
subsequent works match the power of her first legendary novel. Her
later works
include LODORE (1835) and FAULKNER (1937), both romantic potboilers,
and the
unfinished MATHILDE (1819, published 1959), which draws upon her
relations with
Godwin and Shelley. VALPERGA (1823) is a romance set in the 14th-
century, and
THE LAST MAN (1826) depicts the end of human civilization, set in the
21st
century.
Shelley gave up
writing
fiction when realism started to gain popularity, exemplified in the
works of
Charles Dickens. She wrote numerous short stories for popular
periodicals,
particularly The Keepsaker, produced
several
volumes of Lives for Lardner's Cabinet Cyclopaedia, and
the first
authorative edition of Shelley's poems (1839,
4
vols.). Shelley's well-received travelogue RAMBLES IN GERMANY AND ITALY
appeared in 1844.
FRANKENSTEIN;
OR, THE
MODERN PROMETHEUS
(1818)
Frankenstein is a student of natural philosophy in
The scientist is
driven
insane, but recovers and chases the creature across the world. The
two
have a final confrontation in the Arctic wastes. Frankenstein dies and
the
creature disappears into the wilderness mourning the loss of the man
who gave
him life. - The novel contains no supernatural elements; the creation
of the
monster is described in the third edition in a rational scientific
basis. The
work epitomizes the scientist who experiments first and thinks about the
consequences later.
For further
reading: Mary Shelley: A Biograph
by R. Glynn Grylls (1938); Child of Light by
Muriel
Spark (1951); Mary Shelley by Eileen Bigland
(1959);
Ariel Like a Harpy by Christopher Small (1972); Mary Shelley by William
Walling
(1972); The Annotated Frankenstein by Leonard Wolf (1977); Moon in
Eclipse by
Jane Dunn (1978); Mary Shelley by Harold Bloom (1985); Approaches to
Teaching
Shelley's Frankenstein, ed. by Stephen C. Behrendt,
Anne Kostelanetz Mellor (1990); Mary Shelley:
Her
Life, Her Fiction, Her Monsters by Anne K. Mellor (1990); Frankenstein:
Mary
Shelley's Wedding Guest by Mary Lowe-Evans (1993); Mary Wollstonecraft
Shelley:
An Introduction by Betty, T. Bennett (1998); Frankenstein Creation and
Monstrosity, ed. by Stephen Bann(1995); In Search of Frankenstein by
Radu Florescu (1997); Mary
Shelley: Frankenstein's Creator: First Science Fiction Writer by Joan
Kane
Nichols (1998); Frankenstein: Case Studies in Contemporary Criticism,
ed by Johanna M. Smith (2000); Readings on
Frankenstein,
ed. by Don Nardo(J2000) - bibliography Mary
Shelley
by W.H. Lyles (1975) - See also: Robert Louis
Stevenson
Frankenstein films:
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HISTORY
OF SIX WEEK'S TOUR,
(1817)
FRANKENSTEIN; OR THE MODERN
PROMETHEUS,
(1818)
VALPERGA, (1823)
THE LAST MAN, (1826)
THE FORTUNES OF PERKIN
WARBECK, (1830)
LODORE, (1835)
FALKNER, (1837)
TALES AND SHORT
STORIES, (1891)
THE LETTERS OF MARY
WOLLSTONECRAFT
SHELLEY,
(1983)
JOURNALS OF MARY
SHELLEY, (1814)
SELECTED LETTERS OF MARY
WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY, (1995)
FRANKENSTEIN, (1931)
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