This month in 1816, Mary Shelley attended a house party thrown by her good friend Lord Byron. That summer had been particularly dreary for England – torrential downpours, gray skies, and abnormally cold temperatures had Europeans dubbing this ‘the year without a summer.’
To combat the depressive weather, Lord Byron proposed a game. Who could write the scariest ghost tale? Of the participants, I daresay Mary Shelley won. She created the epic tale of man versus science, man versus creation, and man versus himself. That night she dreamed (had a nightmare?) of Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus.
I know this novel has been reviewed in the blog before, but I decided to suggest it again. This month marks the 206th anniversary of its beginnings. When I say Frankenstein, most people think of the green, shuffling creature as portrayed by Boris Karloff. Or maybe you see Gene Wilder and Marty Feldman standing in the laboratory over Peter Boyles.
Or maybe you are a child of the eighties and immediately think of Franken-berry. I loved that cereal!
I am not going to rehash the synopsis of the book. We all know Shelley’s monster is more cadaverous than normally portrayed in modern cinema and that Frankenstein is the doctor. The story follows both characters in their journeys and the emotional upheaval they experience. I just want to say that there is a reason we still know this book over 200 years after its publication. The story is gritty, uncomfortable, and thought provoking.
This novel was written during the Romantic Period, so the language and descriptions are grandiose, emotional, and vivid. Do not let this discourage you from this book! It may start out like a high school literature assignment, but the story of selfish ambition, man’s pursuit of knowledge, and man’s responsibility for his actions will captivate you.
Note: I urge you to revisit all of your ‘required’ reading lists from high school – Animal Farm, The Plague, To Kill a Mockingbird, The Catcher in the Rye – even The Canterbury Tales. Reading these books now as an adult will bring new insights and understandings you just did not see as a teen. For example, as a young reader, I thought Huckleberry Finn riding a raft down the Mississippi was the epitome of adventure! Now, as an adult, I think that brat – I mean, charming rapscallion – needs a serious time-out!
Do you have a book, maybe one you struggled with then, you might want to tackle again?
From Amazon – Few creatures of horror have seized readers’ imaginations and held them for so long as the anguished monster of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. The story of Victor Frankenstein’s terrible creation and the havoc it caused has enthralled generations of readers and inspired countless writers of horror and suspense. Considering the gothic novel’s enduring success, it is remarkable that it began merely as a whim of Lord Byron’s.
“We will each write a story,” Byron announced to his next-door neighbors, Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin and her lover, the romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley.
The illustrious poets failed to complete their ghost stories, but Mary Shelley rose supremely to the challenge. With Frankenstein, she succeeded admirably in the task she set for herself: to create a story that, in her own words, “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.”
Daughter, sister, friend, huge nerd, procrastinator… All are words Cammi Woodall uses to describe herself. A new one she is using is “writer.” You can find her at Facebook or on Pinterest.
