FRANKENSTEINby

Mary Shelley

Or, the Modern Prometheus

Allusion to Greek & Roman myth of Prometheus, said to have created man from clay and later stealing fire from Mt. Olympus to save mankind

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

Born in 1797 to Wm. Godwin (a radical philosopher) & Mary Wollstonecraft (a feminist)

At 16 Mary went to live with the poet Percy Shelley, 21, who was married at the time to Harriet Shelley

Percy encouraged Mary’s intellectual & artistic growth

Published in 1818, Frankenstein was written in Switzerland in 1816, the result of a writing competition among the Shelleys and Lord Byron

Frankenstein is a gothic novel (part of the Romantic movement) characterized by innovation, freedom of thought & expression, and the belief of living in an age of “new beginnings and high possibilities”

Frankenstein is also considered by many to be the first science fiction

novel Encourages the reader’s suspension

of disbelief Plot structures based on

hypothesized scientific advancement & imagined technology

Epistolary novel Written in the form of letters or

correspondence Lends credibility to an incredible

story Told from various perspectives