Mary Shelley’s life was like a roller coaster, filled with ups and downs and a bunch of twists that you wouldn’t believe. Her journey to writing Frankenstein is a crazy story of its own. Imagine losing your mom, Mary Wollstonecraft, a total legend for women’s rights, right after being born. That’s how Mary’s life started. Her dad, William Godwin, was a radical thinker who didn’t believe in God and was all about shaking things up in society. Growing up, Mary was always in her dad’s massive library, reading every book she could get her hands on. This wasn’t typical for women back then, but Mary wasn’t your ordinary girl.
Then, at just sixteen, she starts hanging out with Percy Bysshe Shelley, a rockstar poet of the Romantic era. Percy was already married, but that didn’t stop them from falling madly in love and running away together, which totally messed up her relationship with her dad. It was a wild ride from there, with their passion facing more tragedies than most people could handle. They lost their children, one after the other, which broke Mary’s heart. These heartbreaks hit deep and inspired parts of Frankenstein, especially the bits about loss and feeling alone.
During a stay in Geneva with Percy and some of their famous friends like Lord Byron, they got stuck inside because of this insane weather caused by a massive volcanic eruption. With nothing better to do, they started reading ghost stories, which led Byron to dare everyone to write their own. Mary struggled at first, but then she had this vivid nightmare about a scientist creating life and being horrified by what he made. This nightmare, mixed with her own life story of loss and feeling like an outsider, sparked the idea for Frankenstein.
Frankenstein is pretty much a reflection of Mary’s life up to that point. It talks about creating life and then dealing with the loss, just like she did. Percy and Victor Frankenstein, the scientist in her book, were both obsessed with discovering new things, no matter the cost. The book also dives deep into loneliness, showing how much the monster wants to connect with others, a mirror of Mary’s feelings of being left out because she didn’t fit into society’s norms.
The book wasn’t just an incredible story about a guy playing God; it had deep questions about the ethics of creation, the responsibilities of creators, and the dangers of wanting too much power. These were personal questions for Mary, reflecting her views on the world and her place in it. The monster, all lonely and rejected, symbolizes anyone who’s ever felt like they don’t belong, much like Mary herself.
On top of that, Frankenstein landed right when science was booming, with discoveries like galvanism, which probably gave Mary the idea for her creature. It was a mix of her romantic views and the scientific curiosity of the time, making the book a warning about getting too cocky with science and a spine-chilling story.
Frankenstein has been a big deal for almost two centuries now, contributing to this epoch in literature and helping to establish the science fiction genre. It is a book not only about science and fears attached to ethics but also about love, death, and trying to comprehend life. That dramatic, emotional potpourri, with vivid intellectual minutes—the life of Mary before Frankenstein she has laid out in the novel, which gave it depth and wealth- remains attractive for the readers.
In conclusion, it can be said that Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein” is more than a ghost story. It actually goes on to the very essence of human beings, raising critical issues, including ambition, responsibility, loneliness, and the search for belonging and meaning. Mary took her own experiences and mixed them with universal themes into a masterwork that makes us wonder about science and the way it has affected us, at the core of creation, and complex emotions in humanity. This is a reminder of the results of our deeds and human aspiration to find their place when we keep pushing the frontiers of what is possible and genuinely lies in this ever-changing world—thanks to Frankenstein.
Works Cited
Baker, J.I. “A Monster is Born.” Life Magazine, 12 October 2018, pp. 1-43.
Aldiss, Brian W. “Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft (1797-1851).” Science Fiction Writers: Critical Studies of the Major Authors from the Early Nineteenth Century to the Present Day, edited by Richard Bleiler, 2nd ed., Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1999, pp. 681-688. Gale eBooks. It was accessed on 13 February 2024.
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