LoveReading4Kids Says
Obsessed by creating life itself, Victor Frankenstein plunders graveyards for the material to fashion a new being, which he shocks into life by electricity. But his botched creature, rejected by Frankenstein and denied human companionship, sets out to destroy his maker and all that he holds dear. Mary Shelley's chilling gothic tale was conceived when she was only eighteen, living with her lover Percy Shelley near Byron's villa on Lake Geneva.
It would become the world's most famous work of horror fiction, and remains a devastating exploration of the limits of human creativity.
Why not check out Kenneth Oppel's This Dark Endeavour, which he has written as a prequel to Mary Shelley's gothic classic, Frankenstein. 16-year-old Victor Frankenstein begins a dark journey where dangerous alchemy and a bitter love triangle threaten his quest at every turn and will change his life forever. The story follows Victor Frankenstein - together with his beloved cousin Elizabeth and reliable friend, Henry - on a desperate quest to create the forbidden Elixir of Life. It's an alluring story for young adult readers.
LoveReading4Kids
Find This Book In
| Suitable For: |
|
| Recommendations: |
|
Frankenstein Synopsis
Obsessed by creating life itself, Victor Frankenstein plunders graveyards for the material to fashion a new being, which he shocks into life by electricity. But his botched creature, rejected by Frankenstein and denied human companionship, sets out to destroy his maker and all that he holds dear. Mary Shelley's chilling gothic tale was conceived when she was only eighteen, living with her lover Percy Shelley near Byron's villa on Lake Geneva.
It would become the world's most famous work of horror fiction, and remains a devastating exploration of the limits of human creativity.
About This Edition
| ISBN: |
9780141439471 |
| Publication date: |
30th January 2003 |
| Author: |
Mary Shelley |
| Publisher: |
Penguin Classics |
| Format: |
Paperback |
| Pagination: |
273 pages |
| Suitable For: |
|
| Recommendations: |
|
About Mary Shelley
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley was born in London. Her mother, Mary Wollstonecraft, died of puerperal fever 10 days after giving birth to her daughter. Mary's labor lasted 18 hours and then it took four hours to remove the rest of the placenta. She was one of the first feminists, the author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792), and the novel The Wrongs of Woman, in which she wrote: "We cannot, without depraving our minds, endeavour to please a lover or husband, but in proportion as he pleases us." In the intellectual circles of London, her acquaintances included the painter Henry Fuseli, Erasmus Darwin, Charles's grandfather, and William Blake, who illustrated an edition of her book, Original Stories from Real Life.
Mary Shelley's father was the writer and political journalist William Godwin, who became famous with his work An Enquiry Concerning Political Justice (1793). Godwin had revolutionary attitudes to most social institutions, including marriage. In feminism he found an "amazonian" element. Among his other books is Things as They Are, or The Adventures of Caleb Williams (1794).
In her childhood Mary Shelley was left to educate herself amongst her father's intellectual circle, the critic Hazlitt, the essayist Lamb, the poet Coleridge and Percy Bysshe Shelley, who came into Godwin's circle in 1812. Godwin took a second in 1801, but Mary never learned to like her. In 1812 Godwin sent her to live in Dundee. Mary published her first poem at the age of ten. At the age of 16 she ran away to France and Switzerland with Shelley; they had met at the end of 1812. Percy and Mary married in 1816 - Shelley's wife Harriet had committed suicide by drowning. Their first child, a daughter, died in Venice, Italy, a few years later. In HISTORY OF SIX WEEKS TOUR (1817) the Shelleys jointly recorded their life. Thereafter they returned to England and Mary gave birth to a son, William.
More About Mary Shelley
