An Introduction to Mary

Shelley's Frankenstein
By

Stephanie Forward

Cover illustration courtesy of Stephen Collins

This eBook was produced by OpenLearn - The home of free

learning from The Open University.

It is made available to you under a Creative

Commons (BY-NC-SA 4.0) licence.
 ‘I busied myself to think of a story…One which would speak
to the mysterious fears of our nature, and awaken thrilling
horror—one to make the reader dread to look round, to curdle
the blood, and quicken the beatings of the heart.’

(From M ary Shelley’s Introduction to the 1831 edition of

Frankenstein).

The life of Mary Shelley (1797-

1851)
M ary Wollstonecraft Godwin was born in London on 30 August
1797, to the radical feminist M ary Wollstonecraft and the
philosopher William Godwin. Her mother died as a result of
complications following the birth, and after Godwin’s second
marriage M ary was brought up with two stepsiblings, a half-sister
(Fanny Imlay), and a half-brother (named William, after their
father).

Their home in Holborn was located near the candlelit abattoirs

under Smithfield: indeed, the children could hear the screams of
animals being slaughtered. On a more positive note M ary benefited
from a broad education, enhanced by visits to the household from
literary luminaries including William Hazlitt, Charles Lamb and
Samuel Taylor Coleridge. At the age of ten she had an amusing
poem published: Mounseer Nongtongpaw; or, The Discoveries of
John Bull in a Trip to Paris.

Unfortunately her relationship with her stepmother was far from

cordial, and the onset of eczema when M ary was thirteen may
have been partly psychosomatic. As she had poor health generally,
she was sometimes sent away for long periods of recuperation.
During one of the journeys she hid her money in her stays for safe-
keeping; nevertheless it was stolen from her!

The poet Percy Shelley first met M ary in 1812. Later they
arranged clandestine meetings beside her mother’s grave. Shelley
and his friend Byron advocated that people should follow ideals
rather than imposed conventions and rules. Lady Caroline Lamb
famously declared that Byron was ‘M ad, bad and dangerous to
know’, and similar accusations were pointed at Shelley (who was
nicknamed ‘M ad Shelley’ at Eton). In 1814 he deserted his
pregnant wife, Harriet, to elope with M ary, who was also
expecting a baby. Their travels took them to France, Germany,
Italy and Switzerland, and were described in the co-authored text
History of a Six Weeks Tour (1817). They were accompanied by
M ary’s stepsister, Jane (later Claire) Clairmont, in a scandalous,
unconventional triangular relationship which lasted for eight years.

Baby Clara was born in February 1815, but lived for only twelve
days. M ary’s journal records concerns that her death might have
been prevented. In January of the following year she gave birth to a
son, William. The travellers were in Geneva when Byron proposed
that they should write ghost stories. Ultimately, M ary’s
contribution developed into her novel Frankenstein. It is
remarkable to think that she began this extraordinary work when
she was just eighteen years old.

The suicides of Fanny Imlay and Shelley’s wife also occurred in

that memorable year, 1816. Shelley married M ary, and their third
child, another Clara, arrived in 1817. M ary completed her book:
Frankenstein was published – anonymously - on 1 January 1818.
Little Clara passed away in the same year, then William died of
malaria in 1819. Percy had a jotting book, in which he conveyed
their heartbreak:

My dearest M. wherefore hast thou gone

And left me in this dreary world alone,
Thy form is here indeed – a lovely one –
But thou art fled, gone down the dreary road,
That leads to Sorrow’s most obscure abode…​
For thine own sake I cannot follow thee
Do thou return for mine.

Fortunately their fourth child, Percy Florence, survived.

Percy Shelley drowned in 1822, after visiting Byron and Leigh

Hunt. During his cremation onlookers tried to retrieve keepsakes
from the flames. M ary salvaged what was left of her husband’s
heart, wrapped it in silk, placed it between the pages of his poem
Adonais, and secreted it in her travelling-desk. It was discovered
there almost thirty years later.

The desolate widow returned to London. Her financial situation

was precarious, particularly as she had a youngster to support;
luckily, M ary was a versatile author and managed to earn a living
from writing. Her other novels were: Valperga (1823), The Last
Man (1826), The Fortunes of Perkin Warbeck (1830), Lodore
(1835) and Falkner (1837). From 1824-40 she also penned short
stories, biographies, articles and reviews for journals, and travel
narratives. A novella, Mathilda, was published posthumously in
1959.

M ary’s son Percy proved to be a very decent man. After the

author’s death on 1 February 1851 her affectionate daughter-in-law
created a special shrine for M ary, Shelley and their circle at
Boscombe Lodge, near Bournemouth.

The genesis of Frankenstein

In 1816 Lord Byron and his physician, John Polidari, were staying
at the Villa Diodati near Geneva. One stormy night in June, they
were spending time with Shelley, M ary and Claire. Incessant
torrential rain had trapped them indoors, and Byron challenged the
group to produce their own ghost stories. They were inspired by
German tales (translated into French), from a collection of volumes
called Fantasmagoriana. In the preface to the 1831 edition of
Frankenstein, M ary claimed that she experienced a nightmare in
which she pictured a ‘pale student of the unhallowed arts’ and ‘the
hideous phantasm of a man stretched out’. In the dream she saw
the figure ‘stir with an uneasy, half-vital motion’. ‘At first I
thought but of a few pages of a short tale; but Shelley urged me to
develop the idea at greater length.’

She knew that the Italian Luigi Galvani had experimented with
stimulating the muscles of dead frogs in the 1780s, and was aware
that scientists were exploring the possibility of using electrical
power to regenerate human corpses. Her childhood home had been
visited by the chemists Humphry Davy and William Nicholson,
who were interested in galvanic electricity. At the age of fourteen
M ary had witnessed some of Davy’s experiments at the Royal
Institute, and she described herself as ‘a devout but nearly silent
listener’ to Byron and Shelley’s animated discussions about
science.

The story
Frankenstein opens in an epistolary style, with letters from
Captain Robert Walton to his sister, M argaret. The narrative then
switches to Victor Frankenstein. In Gothic novels this technique,
termed ‘nesting’, is often used: stories are cradled within stories, as
characters relate their tales.

En route to the North Pole, Walton rescues Victor from the ice.
The latter recalls his happy youth in Geneva with his family and
his friend, Henry Clerval. At the University of Ingolstadt Victor
embarks upon scientific experiments to discover the secret of life,
hoping to produce a living creature from body parts. His meddling
has tragic consequences. Having achieved his aim, he is horror-
stricken at the outcome. Subsequently the creature goes missing.
When Victor receives news of his brother’s death he guesses who
is responsible; however, Justine M oritz is accused and executed for
the crime. Victor’s guilt is now compounded.

The creature laments that he is lonely. His words are poignant: it

becomes apparent that he is not innately evil. To his acute distress,
the people he has encountered have reacted with terror and
loathing; yet he is desperate to belong to a family. Thus the
creature is depicted as an innocent victim who becomes malign
after being rejected by his maker and by society. He declares: ‘I am
malicious because I am miserable’, and pleads with Victor to
fashion a mate for him.

Later Victor destroys the female companion, causing the creature

to seek revenge. Henry’s violent demise is followed by the murder
of Victor’s bride, Elizabeth, and his father’s death from grief.
Victor, in turn, pursues the creature to exact vengeance, which
leads to a dramatic confrontation. After Victor dies, the creature
weeps over him. Isolated and remorseful, he departs to face his
own fate.

Frankenstein; Or, The Modern

Prometheus
M ary Shelley’s novel is a complex work that defies classification.
She successfully blended realist, Gothic and Romantic elements to
produce an enduring literary masterpiece. Her strategy of
employing multiple narrators (Walton, Victor, the creature) means
that there is not a single consistent viewpoint or message; rather,
the text lends itself to a range of interpretations.

It is realistic in detailing Victor’s family life, education, career

aspirations, intention to marry, and so on; but the sub-title, The
Modern Prometheus, alerts us to M ary’s aim of producing a new
‘version’ of an ancient Greek myth. In the legend, Prometheus was
a Titan who brought enlightenment and knowledge to mankind.
The gods punished him when he stole fire from M ount Olympus.
He was chained to a rock; every day an eagle tore out and devoured
his liver; each night the organ would grow back. There are clear
analogies between the stories of Victor and Prometheus: hubris
leads to tragedy, and both suffer torments as a consequence of their
actions. Frankenstein also echoes the Genesis account of Adam
and Eve and John M ilton’s Paradise Lost.
Publication and the various
editions
Five hundred copies of the first edition were printed, and the text
was divided into three volumes. The critical reception was mostly
unfavourable. John Croker was damning in the Quarterly Review
(January 1818):

Our taste and our judgement alike revolt at this kind of

writing, and the greater the ability with which it may be
executed the worse it is - it inculcates no lesson of conduct,
manners, or morality; it cannot mend, and will not even amuse
its readers, unless their taste have been deplorably vitiated…

Frankenstein was reprinted in 1823, in two volumes, this time

crediting M ary openly.

The first theatre production was Richard Brinsley Peake’s

Presumption: or the Fate of Frankenstein (1823). When M ary
came back to London after her husband’s death she found that her
tale was being staged, with a frightening monster which sprang
from a concealed laboratory at the top of a staircase. In her book
the scientist who re-animates the corpse has the surname
Frankenstein; but by 1830 this appellation was being used for the
creature. The name ‘Frankenstein’ gradually became associated
with things that were monstrous and threatening. In the Universal
Studios movie of 1931 James Whale directed the famous version
starring Boris Karloff. Shelley’s text has been adapted for stage and
screen many times.

When M ary was writing the Introduction to the 1831 edition she
was keen to contradict suspicions that Percy Shelley had been
responsible for the novel. She stated:

I certainly did not owe the suggestion of one incident, nor

scarcely of one train of feeling, to my husband, and yet but
for his incitement, it would never have taken the form in
which it was presented. From this declaration I must except
the preface. As far as I can recollect, it was entirely written
by him.’

However, in his pioneering work, The Original Frankenstein,

Professor Charles E. Robinson has demonstrated that Percy
Shelley collaborated with M ary. The first draft is in the Bodleian
Library, Oxford. Percy acted as a kind of editor by making
additions, deletions and other amendments. Robinson has
presented both M ary’s original version and the revisions. Percy’s
recommendations affected many aspects of the text, addressing the
plot, structure, themes, descriptions and characterizations.

The novel’s sympathetic portrayal of the creature inevitably draws

attention to the defects in Victor Frankenstein’s personality. This
is interesting, in view of the belief that the character is partly based
on Percy Shelley, and that the poet actively contributed to the
manuscript drafts. It is possible to interpret Frankenstein as a
critique of the Romantic ideal of the solitary genius.

M ary decided to offer explanations of the changes she made for the
1831 version:

They are principally those of style. I have changed no portion

of the story, nor introduced any new ideas or circumstances. I
have mended the language where it was so bald as to interfere
with the interest of the narrative; and these changes occur
almost exclusively in the beginning of the first volume.
Throughout they are entirely confined to such parts as are
mere adjuncts to the story, leaving the core and substance of it
untouched.’

In fact the novel underwent some notable changes for the 1831
edition, which was published as a single volume in the Bentley’s
Standard Novels series. For example, it places greater emphasis on
the inexorability of fate, and Victor is described in a more
benevolent way. Even slight alterations can be illuminating. In the
1818 text it is stated that Victor and Elizabeth are first cousins.
M any readers would have considered it improper for them to
marry. When M ary revised the text for republication in 1831, the
reference to their blood relationship was removed; instead
Elizabeth is said to be adopted by the Frankensteins.
Percy Shelley’s thoughts about the novel were published
posthumously in the review On Frankenstein (in the Athenaeum,
10 November 1832):

Treat a person ill and he will become wicked. Requite

affection with scorn; - let one being be selected for whatever
cause as the refuse of his kind - divide him, a social being,
from society, and you impose upon him the irresistible
obligations - malevolence and selfishness. It is thus that, too
often in society, those who are best qualified to be its
benefactors and its ornaments are branded by some accident
with scorn, and changed, by neglect and solitude of heart, into
a scourge and a curse.
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