Summary Detailed notes summarising the key contexts of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein
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Course
Unit 2 - Prose
Institution
PEARSON (PEARSON)
Detailed Notes including all of the relevant contexts of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Ideal exam revision for Unit-2 (Prose) of Edexcel Pearson A-level in English Literature.
Mary Shelley’s life:
Shelley was born in the late 18th century (1797) in Great Britain, to the famous feminist
writer, Mary Wollstonecraft and the political philosopher William Godwin. Mary’s mother,
however, died shortly after her birth, so she grew up without ever knowing her mother.
Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin (as she was originally called) met Percy Bysshe Shelley, a
young poet, when she was just 17. In 1814 the two eloped and ran away together and
travelled all around Switzerland, Germany and France; Percy left behind his last wife
Harriet, who drowned herself in 1816 whilst pregnant with Percy’s child.
In the summer of 1816, a tour of continental Europe was proposed. At a stop in
Switzerland, the couple and Mary's stepsister, Claire, rented a house near another British
writer, Lord Byron. The summer proved wet and unseasonable; Byron suggested the
group take to writing ghost stories to pass the time. It was during this summer that the
form for Frankenstein was to take shape. The story was first only a few pages, but with
the encouragement of Percy, the tale took on a greater length. Mary's story, the best of
the group, was so frightening to Byron that he ran "shrieking in horror" from the room. In
that same year, Mary’s sister Franny committed suicide.
Frankenstein was first published in 1818.
By which point, the couple had three children, all of whom sadly died in infancy. Her forth
son was the only one to reach adulthood. On July 8, 1822, Mary's life was forever altered
when her husband was drowned at sea in a boating accident off the coast of Livorno,
Italy. Her life was seemingly surrounded by tragedy.
She spent the rest of her life writing original works and tending to the works of her late
husband. She became the keeper of Percy Bysshe Shelley's fame and was editor of his
remaining pieces of writing. Though, at the time he was far more famous than she,
Shelley would later go on to be much more famous for the writing of the original gothic
novel of its kind: ‘Frankenstein, a modern Prometheus’.
-Mary Wollstonecraft
Wollstonecraft was an advocate for women’s rights, a rare thing to behold at the time.
She is best known for A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792), in which she argues
that women are not naturally inferior to men, but appear to be only because they lack
education. She suggests that both men and women should be treated as rational beings
and imagines a social order founded on reason; she stated ‘I do not want women to have
power over men, but over themselves’. Her feminist views were not quite as radical of
those in the late 19th and 20th century, but nevertheless Shelley’s knowledge of her
mother’s writing, would have greatly influenced her own views on feminism as a woman
at a time when social equalities between men and women were still greatly divided, and
women were viewed as innately passive and domestic.
, Frankenstein context notes
It is particularly interesting that Shelley chooses to construct the majority of female
characters throughout ‘Frankenstein’ as passive women, who behold the common
stereotypes of domesticity, fragility and kindness. Elizabeth Lavenza, Catherine Beaufort
and Justine Mortiz, are all female characters who fit into these stereotypical views, and all
of them ultimately die in different circumstances; however it is Justine Moritz, a young
woman who of a lower class, who reaches the least justified of endings- simply due to
how she is perceived within society. The only female in the novel who could be perceived
as unusually strong and courageous is Safie, ‘The Arabian’, who defies her father to
travel to the man she loves, bringing her possession of wealth; she does not have an
atrocious death, which to some extent could portray Shelley’s feelings about the
importance of strong women within society.
It is suggested that the relationship between Frankenstein and the creature is a result of
Mary’s simultaneous attractions and repulsion towards motherhood.
-William Godwin
Godwin was a member of a circle of radical thinkers in England that counted Thomas
Paine and William Blake among its ranks. Mary’s upbringing in this rarefied atmosphere
exposed her at an early age to cutting-edge ideas, and it forged useful connections for
her to such notables as Lord Byron. Her father's most famous book was Political Justice
(1793), which is a critical look at society and the ethical treatment of the masses.
Godwin's other popular book Caleb Williams (1794) examines class distinctions and the
misuse of power by the ruling aristocracy
The Romantic Movement:
Romanticism was an artistic, literary, musical and intellectual movement, which
originated in Europe in the late 18th century, and is estimated to have peaked in the
period between 1800 and 1850.
It was well-known poets and famous men of literature, such as William Wordsworth,
Samuel Taylor Coleridge and of course the likes of Lord Byron, Mary’s friend, and her
husband Percy Shelley who marked the beginning of the romantic period in Britain. In
particular, pieces of literary work such as William Wordsworth’s ‘The prelude’, typically
highlight the extravagance and beauty of nature, as was common of romantic poetry.
There were no particular forms or themes that were requited to be used by a romantic
poet or writer, in fact the writers themselves were not considered as ‘Romantics’ until
much later in time. However, general conventions are identifiable in the works of those
writing within this heightened period of romanticism:
Nature and the Natural world
Human feelings and emotions
Compassion for humankind
Rebellion against society
The importance of freedom
The romantics also emphasised the vital importance of personal thought and feeling;
conveying truths personal to the poet, along with putting emphasis on the power of the
workings of the unconscious mind.
Shelley spent much of her time whilst writing ‘Frankenstein’ with her husband Percy
Shelley and their friend lord Byron, and spent much of her childhood in the company of
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