Frankenstein

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Overview

Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, published anonymously in 1818, is Mary Shelley's novel about Victor Frankenstein, a scientist who creates a living being and then abandons it. It is often called the first science-fiction novel, though that label is debated. It matters because it asks who is responsible for what we make, what we owe to those who are made, and what happens when ambition outruns care.

Context

Shelley began the story in the summer of 1816 near Lake Geneva, when she, Percy Shelley, Lord Byron and John Polidori shared a ghost-story challenge during a cold, gloomy season often linked to the 1815 Tambora eruption. She drew on contemporary talk about electricity, galvanism and the nature of life. A revised edition appeared in 1831.