Happy 200th Birthday, Frankenstein

[muriel_volestrangler]

This year marks the 200th anniversary of the publication of Mary Shelley's classic novel Frankenstein - first printed on 1 January 1818.

Shelley came up with the idea at the age of 18 after being challenged by romantic poet Lord Byron, while in Switzerland, to construct a ghost story. The results were to have a monumental impact. This was the kernel from which the story of Frankenstein would emerge.

The novel - originally published without Shelley's name - received mixed reviews, but came into prominence after being picked up and re-versioned by theatre companies a few years later. However, it was cinema that really took the ball and ran with it.

The first adaptation for the silver screen was made in 1910. Since then, there have been about 150 further versions on different mediums. But why is the story still such a success and how close are modern adaptations to Shelley's original novel?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-42411484

The 1910 version from Edison's company - rather than sewing together parts and zapping them with electricity, he "cooks" the monster, which seems to be the film of a model being burnt, show backwards:

[nuxvomica]

1. It think of it's publication as the official beginning of science fiction

Coming as it did near the end of the Enlightenment, Shelley's novel asks the fundamental question of sci-fi: What is our place in a universe without gods? The obvious followup to which being: Is man now a god?
I also like Mel Brooks' take on the story. He said it was all about male "womb envy".

[muriel_volestrangler]

4. You can also add in questions about relationships with parents

Mary Shelley's mother, Mary Wollstonecraft, died just a few days after giving birth to Mary: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Shelley , and Mary herself had already given birth to a child that died within a few days, and another that survived, before she first thought of the tale.

[janterry]

6. Womb envy

is interesting, since Shelley's wife was pregnant when Mary ran off with him (and herself became pregnant). Mary's daughter died - but Harriet's son lived. (Womb envy indeed)

And, of course, Mary's mother died giving birth to her.

[spiderpig]

2. Awesome! Exactly the picker-upper news I needed this morning.

Lots of interpretations, but Karloff was sublime.

[pressbox69]

5. You can say that again about Karloff.

Still it did take Frankenstein 200 years to become president.

[lindysalsagal]

3. The flapping of the arm is really convincing...

Even in 2010 I doubt people would pay a nickle to see this...

[rogerashton]

7. Mary's parents were optimists and "progressive" in the context of their time.

Wollstonecraft was a revolutionary and Godwin the founder of philosophic anarchism. Godwin raised Mary and she spent her childhood in the company of some of the great minds of enlightenment optimism. This being so, I'm fascinated with the pessimism of her story.

[GeorgeGist]

8. There's also this ...

Wolfson and Levao show that the first edition of Frankenstein of 1818 was packaged as a philosophic novel. Published anonymously, and dedicated to William Godwin, it features more references to the Prometheus legend and Paradise Lost than to such Gothic tropes as perverse sexuality and spectral hauntings. The monster may be Frontispiece_to_Frankenstein_1831stitched together from human and animal parts, yet he is more memorable for being an autodidact who pleads for affection: “his humanity is the most surprising, most disturbing, and ultimately most moving aspect of his character”. When he is viciously rejected, the monster engages in a murderous rampage – but Shelley blames this on his egotistic creator and an uncaring society that refuses to empathize with a suffering fellow “creature”.

As the editors note, Shelley’s contemporaries would have associated the monster’s terror with the Terror of the French Revolution. Conservatives likened the Revolution to a monster created by Enlightenment rationalism, whereas radicals perceived it as a justified response to a monstrous ancien régime. The novel raised questions about social justice and reciprocal obligations in a modern, secular age, in the process also condemning slavery. In addition, Shelley criticized gender relations, just as her mother had done in A Vindication of the Rights of Women (1792). Frankenstein’s creation of life was not simply an act of scientific hubris, but an exposé of patriarchy. By arrogating the creation of life solely to himself, Frankenstein’s deed of giving birth results in the death of everyone he loved, culminating in his own mortal struggle with his creation in the sterile frigidity of the Arctic.

(Image: the frontispiece to the 1831 edition of Frankenstein, via Wikimedia Commons) http://dish.andrewsullivan.com/2013/05/19/the-unknown-frankenstein/

[MineralMan]

9. And, just a little over 100 years from the making

of that short film, we're watching it on flat-screen displays of all sizes, streaming from a server somewhere. One century to go from celluloid film and stuttering movies without sound to streaming video on every imaginable platform.

Truly, we have lived in interesting times, indeed.

[Nonhlanhla]

10. An amazing novel

None of the film adaptation are very true to the book. They mostly turn it into something campy, and none of the philosophical questions in the novel really get addressed. I love teaching this novel to my students, although it is dreadful to read.

And the 1818 version is in my opinion superior to the 1831 one.

[Aristus]

11. One of the most amusing aspects of the novel is when the monster tells

Frankenstein that he learned to read and write when he discovered a trunk full of rare and valuable books lying in a ditch.

That's almost more improbable than creating a human being from dead body parts.