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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsHappy 200th Birthday, Frankenstein
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
(12,470 posts)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
(101,414 posts)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
(4,429 posts)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
(10,419 posts)Lots of interpretations, but Karloff was sublime.
pressbox69
(2,252 posts)Still it did take Frankenstein 200 years to become president.
lindysalsagal
(20,795 posts)Even in 2010 I doubt people would pay a nickle to see this...
rogerashton
(3,920 posts)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
(25,327 posts)As the editors note, Shelleys contemporaries would have associated the monsters 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). Frankensteins 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, Frankensteins 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
(146,351 posts)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
(2,074 posts)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
(66,530 posts)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.