The Monsters: Mary Shelley and the Curse of Frankenstein

by Dorothy Hoobler, Thomas Hoobler

One murky night in 1816, on the shores of Lake Geneva, Lord Byron, famed English poet, challenged his friends to a contest--to write a ghost story. The assembled group
included the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley; his lover (and future wife) Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin; Mary's stepsister Claire Claremont; and Byron's physician, John William Polidori. The famous result was Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, a work
that has retained its hold on the popular imagination for almost two centuries. Less well-known was the curious Polidori's contribution: the first vampire novel. And the
evening begat a curse, too: Within a few years of Frankenstein's publication, nearly all of those involved met untimely deaths. Drawing upon letters, rarely tapped archives, and their own magisterial rereading of Frankenstein itself, Dorothy and Thomas Hoobler have crafted a rip-roaring tale of obsession and creation.

Genres: Nonfiction, Biography, History, Books About Books, Horror, Literary Criticism, Victor Frankenstein

447 pages, Kindle Edition

First published May 22, 2006

About the author

Dorothy and Thomas Hoobler, a married couple who have written numerous books together, were drawn to this story of great writers inspiring each other collaboratively. Their most recent novel, In Darkness, Death, won a 2005 Edgar Award. They live in New York City.

Series:
* Samurai Detective
* Century Kids
* Her Story
* Images Across The Ages
* American Family Album

Reviews

[El · Rating 3 out of 5]

Back in June I read Romantic Outlaws: The Extraordinary Lives of Mary Wollstonecraft and Her Daughter Mary Shelley which inspired me to read all the books in my house about both of the Marys, Percy, Byron, and any of their little friends. Of course I didn't get much further since June, but decided to read this book, The Monsters, for Halloween-month since the title sounds pretty spooky.

If you know anything about this circle of folk, you're not likely going to learn anything new from this book. The first however many pages involve the backstory of everyone - Wollstonecraft, Godwin, Mary Shelley, Percy Shelley, Byron, and a teeny-tiny bit about that-other-guy, Polidori. (Polidori gets no love in these books. Why is that?)

The best parts involve Shelley/Shelley/Byron/Polidori in Geneva because I've been there and stood outside the Villa Diodati where they got together that one summer when Mary Shelley started to write Frankenstein. So I get all warm-squishy inside because it's beautiful there, and I want to tromp around the same streets they likely wandered. There's something magical about that.

I am fascinated by their relationships. It was all very incestuous and dramatic, and I am constantly surprised to remember that Mary herself was in her late teens during all of that. What were you doing when you were 17 or 18 years old? Yeah, that's what I thought.

Unfortunately the entire title and subtitle is so completely irrelevant. This is another book about the people and the times they spent together. There is no fucking curse. The curse of the subtitle was some attempt at making it all seem spooky and shit, that Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein and then almost everyone in their little party met some untimely death.

The average lifespan in the early 19th century wasn't all that high to begin with. If they survived birth, they had all sorts of shit to contend with, like diseases and stuff like scarlet fever. And then you're talking about Byron, "mad, bad, and dangerous to know", and we're surprised he died young? I'm not victim-blaming here, but I am saying those kids were into some crazy things, so it's not particularly surprising. In any case, Byron got sick and he died, which is not uncommon, especially in the 19th century.

It had nothing to do with Mary Shelley writing Frankenstein.

I mean, really.

That being said, I'm always interested in reading about those kids, even though I've read it all before. It never seems to get old for me. I find them all fascinating, and hope to find a biography about Polidori since no one seems to appreciate him.

The Hooblers did a great job of pulling from letters and journals by the participants in this circle, which is great, particularly considering a lot of the journals by Mary Shelley during that time were lost (or destroyed), so it was great to see what did survive.

But, really, there's no curse there. Just shitty luck during a very unfortunate time in history.

[Anna · Rating 4 out of 5]

The thing about the lives of Mary Shelley, Percy Shelley, and Lord Byron is that they are too absurd to be made up. Moreover, they were fully aware of each other’s ridiculousness, seemingly without any great awareness of their own. In 1819 Percy wrote of Byron’s then mistress, for instance:

A pretty, sentimental, innocent, superficial Italian, who has sacrifized [sic] an immense fortune to live for Lord Byron; and who, if I know anything of my friend, of her, or of human nature will hereafter have plenty of leisure and opportunity to repent of her rashness.

‘The Monsters’ is a concise biography of all three figures and the literary works that emerged from their close friendship. It also recounts the extraordinary domestic upheavals of the Shelleys and some (by no means all) of Byron’s shenanigans. There is a great deal of tragedy in the story, as the three lost relatives, friends, spouses, and children to accident, illness, and suicide. The book’s tone strikes a suitable balance between the genuine sadness of these events and some of incredible melodrama that also occurs. For example, Percy Shelley once saved Mary’s life after she had a miscarriage, then two days later began to see visions of his own ghost. That just seems to be how it was in their household. I’d previously known the broad outlines of their lives, so ‘The Monsters’ filled in some fascinating and piquant details.

I was left thinking that a film about the Villa Diodati gang and their ghost stories should really be from the perspective of their servants. Although the journals and letters of those involved were subsequently purged of potentially shocking content by concerned relatives, the Hooblers tell an excellent tale using what has survived. As the authors are Americans, now and again a comment sounds slightly comic to a British reader, however overall this is an entertaining and thoughtful look at the triumphs and tragedies of the early 19th century’s greatest goths.

[Lauren Stoolfire · Rating 5 out of 5]

To be honest, The Monsters: Mary Shelley and the Curse of Frankenstein is now one of my favorite biographies/ history books. Dorothy Hoobler does a brilliant job of laying out extraordinary and tragic lives of Mary Shelley, Lord Byron, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Dr. John Polidori, and Claire Clairmont. I wasn't particularly expecting much out of this, but it turned out to be exactly what I didn't know I needed.

[robin]

brilliant historical essay

very well written...while i think "The Monsters" would still be a difficult read for someone who is not fascinated by history, it is exceedingly far from dry. highly recommended for anyone who is interested in Gothic, Romanticism, original horror, literature, and/or Scottish & English history - and who is not afraid of history in general

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was a dark and stormy night on the shores of Lake Geneva, 1816. You’ve heard the story before; Lord Byron challenges his friends to see who can come up with the best ghost story. Among the people include Percy Bysshe Shelley, his lover Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin, Mary’s stepsister Claire Claremont and Byron’s physician, John William Polidori. Two novels were born that very night; Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley’s (née Godwin) Frankenstein and John William Polidori’s The Vampyre. The evening begat a curse, too. Within a few years of Frankenstein’s publication, nearly all of those involved met untimely deaths.

First of all I want to point out that authors of this book Dorothy and Thomas Hoobler don’t actually believe this was a curse. Well at least I hope they don’t, this is a little gimmick to help sell the book and I think they just wanted to explore the interesting fact that they did all die young. This book is purely a biography on Mary Shelley that focuses on the night in 1816 and the novel Frankenstein. I was hoping for something about struggling to write something as great as Frankenstein or how the novel has been destroyed by pop culture.

The book starts out with the life of William Godwin and Mary Wollstonecraft, the famous philosopher and feminist parents of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley. The two had very different personalities and they seemed like a very odd couple but I think they really complemented each other. Sure, they had their problems but nothing like their daughter.

This brings us to the bulk of the book, Mary Shelley and the young romantics. These were the original rock stars and their lives, no soap opera will ever come close to the drama and complexity as the real lives of the romantics. I picked up this book to learn about these poets after reading A Treacherous Likeness and I wanted to know more about them. This was a very accessible biography, which focuses primarily on Mary Shelley but it gives you a great insight into her life. I don’t pretend to fully understand the Romantics, they are way to complex but I feel I have a better knowledge into their lives.

My interest in the Romantics has gotten stronger thanks to The Monsters by Dorothy and Thomas Hoobler. I have a few other books I plan to finish off in on the topic and I doubt I’ll stop there. I love the quotes and the referencing in this biography; I’ve often found that I wonder about the source of information in biographies that don’t reference so it was so handy to have that reference.

While this book does primary focus on Mary, it was nice to learn a little more of Percy Bysshe Shelley, Lord Byron, Claire Claremont and John William Polidori. I didn’t previously know the story of the original publication of The Vampyre; I found it fascinating and heart breaking for John William Polidori. It is always great to find new stories about these amazing talented people.

One thing I liked about this biography, especially after reading A Treacherous Likeness, is the fact that it didn’t try to sway the reader’s opinions; it stuck to facts and left it to the readers to make up their own mind. This was a refreshing change from the opinionated A Treacherous Likeness and I really enjoyed the experience of learning more about these poets. I’m sure there are better biographies on Mary Shelley out there but The Monsters is worth checking out as well.

This review originally appeared on my blog; http://literary-exploration.com/2013/...

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you hear the name Mary Shelley, you are likely to recognize her as the author of the classic novel about a young scientist bent on creating life where there is none.  But when Shelley died, many contemporary news outlets denied her recognition for her work and instead lionized her for being the wife of the poet Percy Byshhe Shelley.


The origins of Mary Shelley's novel are in a gathering of her husband, her stepsister, an English doctor bent on becoming a writer, and the "mad, bad, and dangerous to know" poet Lord Byron. Gathered in Switzerland and confined indoors because of weather, Byron set a challenge the five writers to create a story that might terrify them all. The only story that emerged and eventually captured the world's imagination for over two centuries is Frankenstein.


In this book, the Hooblers chronicle the path that led to the five meeting and in the process reveal the fascinating lives of all involved. They focus most on Mary Shelley herself. Her life had a tragic beginning, when her mother died within days of her birth, and she weathered a series of terrible events leading up to her husband's death when she was only twenty-four.


I have not read a nonfiction book this compelling in a very long time. Lord Byron emerges from the pages in all his glory as the first international celebrity. Percy Byshhe Shelley is revealed to be self-centered and heedless of his loved ones' hearts and lives. Mary Shelley emerges as stalwart in the face of loss after loss and deeply intelligent in a way women of her time rarely get credit for being.


The Hooblers have a great talent for recording the mundane (Mary spent hours making "fair copies" of Byron 's poems to be sent to editors and publishers) and the ridiculous (when disturbed by the household chaos created by rising tension between his wife and his lover, Shelley calmed himself down by reading the Stoics).  The authors make this story far more readable than one would expect such a book to be

[Gary · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Monsters: Mary Shelley and the Curse of Frankenstein by Dorothy and Thomas Hobbler
New York: Little, Brown and Company
$14.99 (paperback) – 374 pages

“I busied myself to think of a story … One which would
speak to the mysterious fears of our nature and awake
thrilling horror.”
- Mary Shelley, Introduction to Frankenstein

Back in the 50’s, when I was an English major, I frequently found myself moribund with boredom as I suffered through classroom lectures on the meaning of sonnets, epics and allegories. I slogged through the quagmires of literature, not because Chaucer, Shakespeare, Pope and Milton were boring, but because I was in thrall to teachers who seemed incapable of making literature walk, talk and sing. There were exceptions, of course, but the majority of my guides merely succeeded in convincing me that I was either immune or insensitive to “great literature.”

However, when we got to the Romantic poets, not even the best/worst efforts of my instructors could deaden that music. I heard it; we all heard it: the seductive music of Wordsworth, Coleridge, Byron, Shelley, Keats. Suddenly, here was a world that was populated by misfits, rebels and (with the exception of Wordsworth) drug addicts. They thumbed their nose at religion and social convention, behaved outrageously and often died young. Even if we didn’t approve of them, they got our attention.

Those of us who loved (or were fascinated by) the Romantics have probably heard some version of that magic night when five young people gathered inside the Villa Diodati, a luxurious summerhouse on Lake Geneva in Switzerland to tell ghost stories. It was June 17, 1818, and violent thunderstorms and lightning swept across the lake that night. Illuminated by lightning and flickering candles, the guests attempted to frighten each other with lurid tales of vampires, the resurrected dead and vengeful spirits.

All of those present were either gifted, famous and/or notorious: George Gordon Lord Byron, “the most famous man in the world,” whose literary works and sexual exploits had shocked (or fascinated) Europe; Percy Bysshe Shelley, who had abandoned his pregnant wife, Harriet, and eloped with Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin (soon to be Mrs. Shelley); Dr. John Polidori, Bryon’s personal physician and aspiring poet, who was about to lose his lucrative position, and Claire Clarmont, Mary’s step-sister and Byron’s current mistress (she is pregnant with his child). Finally, there is Mary W. Godwin, daughter of London’s renowned, radical and scandalous William and Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin, both of whom considered conventional marriage to be “a form of prostitution.”

Of all the lurid images and tales evoked that night, only two are destined to survive: Mary’s Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus and Dr. Polidori’s Vampyre – both destined to become world famous (Polidori’s novel will eventually become Bram Stoker’s Dracula.) The gothic tales created by Byron, Shelley and Claire Clarmont did not survive long enough to be published.

Dorothy and Thomas Hobbler have undertaken a provocative thesis: to demonstrate that Mary Shelley’s novel is a thinly veiled autobiography. The Hobbler’s contend that the “monster” created by Dr. Frankenstein is Mary Shelley’s alter ego! It is a persuasive argument. Both the author and Dr. Frankenstein’s creation are unloved and outcast. Further, both Mary’s father, William Godwin and her perverse husband, Percy Shelley have much in common with the cruel, remote Dr. Frankenstein who rejected his own creation and sought to destroy it.

In addition, the Hobbler’s perceive other parallels between the novel and the lives of all of the original guests at Villa Diadoti. Not only are all of the characters fated to either die prematurely or, like Claire Clarmont, live tragic, obscure lives; they often suffer the loss of their loved ones. In effect, all seem to be victims of a curse that was engendered on the night that Mary Shelley outlined the basic plot of Frankenstein – the tale of a monster that vows to destroy all that his creator holds dear – children, lovers and relatives.

The first to die are children. Mary and Percy’s children fall victims to sickness (cholera and or related epidemics). Then, Harriet Westbrook, Shelley’s abandoned wife and Fanny Godwin, William’s oldest daughter, commit suicide. Byron and Claire’s daughter, Allegra, dies in a convent. Dr. Polidori, having lost control of Vampyre and living as a social outcast, commits suicide; Shelley drowns in a boating mishap; Byron joins a Greek struggle for independence, becomes ill and dies tragically – a victim of incompetent doctors.

The sole survivor, Mary Shelley, devotes the remainder of her life attempting to reconstruct (or resurrect) her brilliant husband’s life and work. She painstakingly gathers his poems, diaries and letters – all of which she edits and transcribes. There is considerable evidence that Mary destroyed or altered any materials which did not support her vision of Shelley as a brilliant, revolutionary genius. In effect, she “recreated” him.

The Monsters is a brilliant, exhaustively researched work. However, I was distressed to find that some of my most cherished images of the Romantics were groundless myths. (Edward Trelawney did not snatch Shelley’s heart from his burning body at the seaside cremation service, nor did Leigh Hunt have it shaped into an amulet that he wore around his neck.) For me, the most distressing evidence in this book is that which dealt with the personal flaws of Percy Bysshe Shelley. The Hobblers’ research reveals him to be an arrogant, thoughtless hedonist whose self-serving behavior led to the deaths of his children (acknowledged and unacknowledged), and the suffering of countless others.

In conclusion, the Hobblers provide significant insights into the period that produced the Romantics. It was a period that was preoccupied with the French Revolution and the thrilling ideas of individuality and personal freedom. In addition, Shelley, Byron and Mary Godwin were all fascinated by recent scientific advances – especially experiments with electricity and magnetism – experiments that held an aura of magic about them. These discoveries found their way into Frankenstein. In many ways, they saw themselves as a vanguard - disciples and torch-bearers of a new era of enlightenment in which women would be treated as equals and war would become obsolete. Perhaps they were flawed prophets since that era has not yet arrived.

[Jessica · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was interesting even though I haven't yet read Frankenstein. I was surprised to learn that Frankenstein was the result of a contest among a group of friends proposed by Lord Byron to write a ghost story. Following are some of the other notes I made in the margins.

Shortly before Mary Shelley's mother, Mary Wollstonecraft, died the doctors applied puppies to "draw off the milk" (p.36) from her breasts in hopes that the stimulation would cause the placenta to be expelled. I'm curious to know if this was a standard procedure at that time, or if it was experimental on the part of the doctors.

Mary Shelley drew from her own life substantially when writing Frankenstein. For example, Victor Frankenstein and his monster were motherless, like Mary (p.38), she used a similar premise as Milton's Paradise Lost in her own novel (p.59), the title character's name may have been inspired by a castle she had visited (p.155) and among many other examples is the link between creation and death as "Her own birth accompanied the death of her mother, and her own motherhood accompanied the death of her child (p.159).

I was amused to read that Shelley was a hypochondriac and after thinking he was contracting elephantiasis from an overweight woman he had shared a carriage with, at a country dance, "...using the excuse of medical inspections, Shelley placed 'his eyes close to [the women's] necks and bosoms' and 'felt their breasts and their bare arms' until the hostess told him to stop" (p.61).Can you imagine?!

I was surprised to learn that Byron was a narcissistic, bisexual, anorexic man with inclinations towards gambling and incest who incidentally swam the 4 mile strait between Europe and Asia in trousers in icy water, against the tide, in imitation of Leander who swam the same strait to get to Hero, and that his father prostituted himself to cover gambling debts. (p.103, 112 and 104.

The Luddite movement was named for a man who "had been thrown out of work by the mechanization of the cloth trade and who began smashing the machines in response" (p.114).

The one and only assassination of a British prime minister occurred in 1812 with the death of Spencer Perceval.

A deviation from Mary's novel, the monster doesn't speak in stage productions,

(p.166).

[Casey · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a facinating account, not just of Mary Shelley but the equally famous and talented people that were part of her life. From her mother, Mary Wollstonecraft (author of A Vindication on the Rights of Women, and often referred to as the first feminist) and her father, William Godwin, (author of Political Justice, athiest, anarchist, philosopher) to her poet husband, Percy Shelley, and his fellow poet, the dark, legendary, and multifaceted Lord George Byron, this book describes the web of their creative, unconventional, and often ill-fated lives. Building up to the legendary "lost summer" renound for its harsh, winterlike weather where Lord Byron first challenged his companions to a horror story contest. From this challenge Mary Shelley's Frankenstein was born. With mini biographies on the five "friends" this book of thruths proves to be stranger than fiction. I highly recommend this book. For a fictionalized, yet extremely accurate portrayal of these people I suggest the novel Passion: A Novel of the Romantic Poets.

[Eddylee · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved reading this! It was well written and adventurous yet not romantic and distanced itself from Lord Byron and Percy choosing the side of Mary Shelly. I haven't been into non-fiction in a while but I found this book as inspiring as fiction. In fact, it would be difficult to write a story like this and still have it be believable.
I learned all sorts of new things and got several new books to read out of it. One of the side characters was Pollidori who wrote a vampire novel which the authors claim was about his oppressive relationship with Lord Byron which makes plenty of sense. also, it rekindled my love for Lord Byron who is another one of those enigmatic characters that are hypocritical and yet passionate that i'm drawn to.
This book is also great if you love books. especially if you like to read books about books. to sum up: this is a well written book about books and writing and creativity and the monsters that live with them.

[RaeAnn · Rating 5 out of 5]

I could barely put this book down! I thought it sounded interesting when I bought it on half.com ( I don't usually buy books so randomly ) but ended up enjoying it much more than expected. This book follows the lives of the four writers who were at Lord Byron's the night he put forth the challenge to write a spooky story, and Frankenstein was born. I found it very interesting to read how Mary Shelley's parents and their lives as writers, influenced her subsequent life decisions and the connections which can be made between how she crafted Frankenstein and her own life. Also very interesting learning about the lives of the other writers, and how all these things could be connected to Frankenstein. Interesting story and bits of history. If you like biography/history you will likely enjoy this book.

[Tifany · Rating 5 out of 5]

As I just wrote to Grossi, I picked up a galley of this book at work several years ago and promptly forgot all about it, until I unearthed it last week in a fit of pre-Thanksgiving housecleaning (it is very important to rearrange your bookshelves before any major holiday). I opened it at random to some spot in the middle and couldn't stop reading, so I read the last half first and had to go back to the beginning to finish. The Da Vinci Code of Shelley biographies.

[Soph · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is on SIGHT when I see literally ANY man in MWS life my GOD

[Stephen · Rating 5 out of 5]

When I was a kid, the first big novel I tried to read was Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein"...a story about a benevolent monster, cobbled together from various parts, just trying to fit in. The book was too big for me when I was ten but years later I tackled it again.

What was the appeal of a book written so long ago (1816) by the 19-year-old (she was actually younger when she started it.)

Perhaps the authors of "The Monsters" sum it up best: "Feeling unloved, misunderstood, unjustly rejected are universal human experiences. Who has not felt the desire to be loved for ourselves alone? Who has not also thought that if we could show our true selves to the world, if we could only make people understand us, the result would be acceptance and affection?...Children in particular seem to love the monster...Mary's creature –– clumsy, unable to express himself, constantly getting into trouble —— was made to feel unloved first of all by the person who created him. To children, he is a kindred spirit. To young Mary Godwin [later Shelley] a motherless child, a heart-broken girl whose persona was molded and stitched together by men of cold and selfish genius, such an unloved being was found not just on the pages of her book, but in the mirror."

Are we not all creatures cobbled together from the parts of two other people? Don't we all at times feel alone, misfits.

"The Monsters: Mary Shelley and the Curse of Frankenstein" is the story of the creation of the novel on a dark and stormy night and the trio of writers: Mary Shelley, Percy Shelley and Lord Byron plus their extended families that were there for the creation of one of the world's most memorable characters.

Yes, Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein" is a story about blind ambition and science pushed beyond its limits, but it's so much more.

[Katrina Stonoff · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Monsters is a fascinating and compelling look at the circumstances under which Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein. It destroyed my view of Romantic poetry though! According to the authors (and the book appears to be very well documented indeed), Romantic poets (at least Byron and Shelly) were complete scoundrels.

Monsters suffers from Too-Much-Research Syndrome, IMO, or maybe I'm just not a big fan of non-fiction that isn't narrative. I want a story arc, and I want the story to start fast (yes, I'm a typical 21st Century reader in that way). But the story about the novel Frankenstein doesn't start until P. 127 -- before it begins, we're treated to exhaustive descriptions of the life history of every significant character in the book.

The information is fascinating, and the book is well worth reading, even if you have to push yourself through it. But the authors would have done well to study how to write fiction, and to have written Monsters more as a story than a scholarly study.

At least, if they wanted to attract THIS reader. I checked out their website, and they have several more books about fascinating topics (like Jamestown and the theft of the Mona Lisa from Louvre). But under the assumption that they are written in a similar research-intensive way, I think I'll pass.

[Elyse · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wild things. What a gathering it was - after Lord Byron read aloud some German horror stories, he challenges the 4 others present on that stormy summer day at Lake Geneva to write a ghost story. Young Dr. Polidori, Byron's personal physician, writes the first popular vampire story that all future writers, including Bram Stoker, use as a model. But the 19-year old lover (later wife) of the poet, Percy Bysshe Shelley, really takes the bull by the horns and writes the classic, Frankenstein. Mary Shelley is the person the authors highlight in this book. Lord Byron, a bad-ass rock star of his age, overshadows his contemporaries by shear force of personality. No one was safe from Lord Byron's charms and women and men threw themselves at him. He and Mary Shelley were just friends but she enjoyed his company. Mary later regrets her early bohemian life-style when she is ostracized by polite society. Truly a fascinating cast of real-life characters.

[Anna · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm 1/3 of the way through, and it's been scandal after scandal so far. Mary and Percy were some crazy kids.

****
Engaging, well-written, and very, very sad. It's like E! True Hollywood story for the 19th century, and has the same addictive qualities. Will Mary and Percy reconcile? Will Claire's baby survive? Will Byron's body image issues be his downfall? Find out after the break. Reading it and then revisiting Frankenstein was a good idea.

[Bianca · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love the history of famous writers... the book wasn't bad but it dragged toward the end..

[J.M. Brister · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book because I found out a lot about Mary Shelly (maybe a little too much), but after awhile it stopped being interesting and instead was more tedious.

[Adam Doyle · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow that’s a well written account of the Shelley and Byron saga.

[ML Hart · Rating 3 out of 5]

True story, pieced together from diaries and letters – the ones that weren’t torn up or burned by ex-lovers or protectors of the ‘brand.’ Lots (and lots) of historical facts which seemed to occupy much of the book, too much even for me (who loves that kind of thing) until I realized how skillfully the authors were recreating the settings, the expectations, clothing, travel, family, medical treatment, and customs (here, often more observed in the breach than the observance).

Introductory pages for each of the major players in the story are enticing, as this one:

“One of the group would have been instantly recognizable to most people in Europe or America. His imposing profile aroused the envy of young men, who obsessively imitated his clothes and hairstyle, and the secret admiration of young women, who had heard it whispered (in the words of Lady Caroline Lamb, his onetime lover) that Lord Byron was “mad, bad, and dangerous to know.” And in fact Byron had fled here to escape the scandal caused by the allegation that he had committed incest with his half-sister Augusta—a rumor that had caused Byron’s young wife to leave him. Though only twenty-eight, Byron was already the most famous English poet of the time—an era when writing verse was the equivalent of playing in a rock band today."

Exciting up through the publication of Frankenstein, the second half of the book slows down, way down, with details of the aftermath of lives, loves, and one life-disaster after another. But it’s still worth pushing through to the end (having recently started to read a half dozen books, abandoned before I’d gotten 20 pages in due to poor writing, I can appreciate the result here).

If you’ve read this far, I’ll just say, don’t let my honest-if-pessimistic assessment turn you away. I majored in English Lit, and I didn’t know half these circumstances around some significant writers of the 19th century. Byron may be too flowery/romantic for my taste, but I like Shelley’s work. Kudos again, to the authors for tying all the pieces together – particularly the significance and lasting impact of the creations of iconic characters: Frankenstein and Dracula.

“A dark star hung over all the brilliant young people who listened to Byron read horror stories that night. Though their futures seemed limitless, early deaths or stunted lives awaited each of them. It almost might be said that the writing of 'Frankenstein' placed a curse on the lives of those who were present at its birth. Only Mary and her stepsister survived for long, bearing the heavy memory of those with whom they had shared a unique moment that produced two masterpieces of the imagination.”

Nothing the authors could do to make the creators of those characters more likeable. Ugh. But I learned quite a bit, and I enjoy that.

SPOILER ALERT
. . .
. . .
. . .

“At the heart of the book is the mystery of creativity and its consequences, something that concerned—even, at times, tormented—all five of the people at Villa Diodati. In their outsized passions, their remarkable talents, their distorted personal lives, their never-satisfied yearning for love—they were all monsters.”

[Jenny · Rating 4 out of 5]

Literary biographies tend to be hit-or-miss, and The Monsters is definitely the former. I knew the cliff's notes version of Mary Shelley's life, a little about her radical parents, and perhaps a little more about how her story was entwined with that of Percy Shelley and Lord Byron. I knew it wasn't the sort of story you'd call happy, but I had only the barest understanding of just how destructive their lives were.

While I want to be careful not to rush headlong into biographical fallacy, it does seem reasonable to assume, as the Hooblers assert, that Mary put much of herself into her Monster, and just as much of her father and her husband into Victor Frankenstein (arguably the true monster of the novel).

There is so much more that could be said, but I'll conclude with Galway Kinnell's poem "Shelley"--it expresses the heartbreak of their lives much more succinctly than I could.


When I was twenty the one true
free spirit I had heard of was Shelley,
Shelley, who wrote tracts advocating
atheism, free love, the emancipation
of women, the abolition of wealth and class,
and poems on the bliss of romantic love,
Shelley, who, I learned later, perhaps
almost too late, remarried Harriet,
then pregnant with their second child,
and a few months later ran off with Mary,
already pregnant herself, bringing
with them Mary's stepsister Claire,
who very likely also became his lover,

and in this malaise á trois, which Shelley
had imagined would be "a paradise of exiles,"
they lived, along with the spectre of Harriet,
who drowned herself in the Serpentine,
and of Mary's half sister Fanny,
who killed herself, maybe for unrequited
love of Shelley, and with the spirits
of adored but often neglected
children conceived incidentally
in the pursuit of Eros—Harriet's
Ianthe and Charles, denied to Shelley
and consigned to foster parents; Mary's
Clara, dead at one; her Willmouse,
Shelley's favorite, dead at three; Elena,
the baby in Naples, almost surely
Shelley's own, whom he "adopted"
and then left behind, dead at one and a half;
Allegra, Claire's daughter by Byron,
whom Byron sent off to the convent
at Bagnacavallo at four, dead at five—

and in those days, before I knew
any of this, I thought I followed Shelley,
who thought he was following radiant desire.

[John Morello · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you read this, and conclude the monsters the Hooblers are writing about are limited to Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, or John Polidori's Vampire, you should read it again. You can add poets Percy Shelley and Lord Byron to the list, as well as Mary Shelley's father and, ultimately Mary Shelley herself, although it takes the authors a couple of hundred pages before even they admit it.
The plot involves how Mary Shelley came to write "Frankenstein," but along the way readers are given an insight to the dynamics of social relations among England's 18th and 19th century upper classes. It's not flattering. In the hands of the Hooblers, who use plenty of reputable sources, Percy Shelley and George Gordon (Lord) Byron come off as entitled, overindulged, oversexed, self-absorbed, eccentric, and all and all not terribly practical. They also appear to be really bad at managing money; constantly short of cash, but never short of creditors. Mary Shelley, a host of other women and a legion of men who encircle the two men are either bit players or hangers on as Shelley and Byron drift and flit through time.

The real strength of the work is how Mary Shelley takes up the challenge Byron issues to his house guests in the summer of 1816 to write a ghost story. The Hooblers do a masterful job of showing how she constructs the story of Victor Frankenstein and his monster. Then they deconstruct each character, explaining how Mary took her own life experiences, complemented by her impressive powers of observation, to breathe life into them. Just as Victor Frankenstein built his monster by assembling parts and pieces taken from the dead, Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein" seems uncomfortably close to those who were alive.
That's bad news for fans of Shelley and Byron.

[Jonathan Forisha · Rating 4 out of 5]

I decided to read this because the true story is so wild. Frankenstein is considered the first sci-fi novel, and it happened to have been written by a teenage girl during a very strange cold summer. Another of her companions that summer wrote what turned out to be the first vampire story, and also there were two very famous poets (Percy Shelley and Lord Byron), and now you've got a fascinating story coming together.

The "curse" part of this book's intriguing title is what makes it occasionally a difficult read. Beyond the very fun literary challenge that our main characters took on that summer (which led to Frankenstein being constructed), everything they touched seemed to fall apart. There are personal tragedies, the death of children, and all-around stupidity like forcing your family to move in the middle of a heatwave for no particular reason.

The other part of this intriguing title, which also comes through in the book, is that Hoobler kind of hates these people. You might, too, by the time you get to the end and wonder why they couldn't just talk about how they feel. They're enormously self-centered and petty, doing typical rich people things like summering in beautiful faraway locales while perpetually wondering how they can get more.

Hoobler has certainly done the research, and includes in here many pertinent poems and excerpts of letters. Overall, it feels like a sober look at the lives led after a very famous and mythologized summer's events.

[Kelli · Rating 5 out of 5]

I think this is a fascinating book. I already knew the gist of Mary Shelley's life, but this book filled in a lot of details I had never known, as well as going fairly deeply into the lives of Percy Shelley, Lord Byron, and the other people that orbited their little group. There are also chapters dedicated to Mary's parents. I knew very little about Mary Wollstonecraft other than that she wrote A Vindication on the Rights of Woman, and nothing at all about William Godwin. So I appreciated those early chapters, though at first I was a little disappointed that we weren't getting straight to Mary Shelley.

There are parts of this book that are a little dry, but overall I think the authors did an excellent job of chronicling the romantic, tragic, and often ridiculous lives of these free thinkers of the early nineteenth century. Their antics are almost more entertaining than the fictions they wrote (though the book makes the convincing argument that a lot of their fiction was inspired by their lives and experiences, which is true of many writers). And that's taking into account that many of their most scandalous thoughts (as told through journal entries and letters) have been destroyed or sanitized by family members who wanted to present them as more respectable than perhaps they were. So we can only read between the lines to understand what was really going on, and even then the picture can be shocking given the mores of the day.

[Jdsowder · Rating 5 out of 5]

Shocked there are no reviews of this book! If you want a well balanced entertaining account of the romantic poets Byron and Shelley and their affairs mistresses and illegitimate offspring this is the best written and funniest around.
The central focus is on Mary Shelley as she is the only really sympathetic actor in the cesspool of egotism and near insanity. Shelly comes off as a complete nut and I'm not sure this isn't the most balanced record of the poet. Byron has been infamous since his own lifetime but this telling makes him funnier and more real despite his lack of common humanity. His mistress and Mary's half-sister Claire gets in depth treatment as never before and her portrait is as hilarious and believable as the others. Strong personalities, bitter resentments abound and the authors do not seem to be exaggerating. I can't imagine a better book to set the record straight on these people and the genesis of Frankenstein as a bonus. Get a used copy read it and love it!

[🥀 Rose 🥀 · Rating 5 out of 5]

My all time favorite book is Frankenstein, so reading about its creator and how it came about was a treat. I knew about the challenge between these kids but had no more knowledge beyond that.

What a fascinating read!!!! The research done here based on writings and letters was brilliant! They well document the lives of Mary Shelley along with her parents, one of the first women’s rights advocates, Mary Wollstonecraft and her eccentric father William Godwin. The. Percy Shelley, her husband, Lord Byron and poor Polidori show wrote the first vampire novel and based it off Lord Byron.

These were incredibly young people living the original bohemian, artsy lifestyle. Driven by passion, poetry, philosophy and art. There are so many references to how Frankenstein came about and how utterly personal that story is for Mary. Her short life was filled with so much tragedy. How each one of these people’s lives ended so untimely and tragic. I loved every minute of this

[Otempora · Rating 3 out of 5]

An enjoyable and fascinating read. I wasn't expecting too much from this, though I couldn't tell you why - maybe just because the authors aren't historians by trade? But the pace is lively and the portraits of their various subjects are thoughtful and rich. The Monsters strikes a good balance between breadth and depth. It considers its subjects from multiple angles - their own journals and letters, descriptions by contemporaries, their fiction, and the wider cultural context of their times - and does so with fine historical and psychological insight. I appreciated that the Hooblers let their subjects speak for themselves whenever possible, quoting liberally from their writing but still keeping the narrative zipping along. I thought I knew a fair bit about Mary Shelley, but I learned a lot about her and her contemporaries by reading this. Great pick for October.

[David Zubl · Rating 4 out of 5]

This inventive book is a literary biography of a number of early 19th-century writers and thinkers; as such, it likely appeals to various small, though overlapping, audiences. Its creative approach involves highlighting one intersection of these lives that results in two novels which have had a powerful, enduring impact on popular culture.

In 1816 Switzerland, a small group including Lord Byron, Percy Bysshe Shelley, his future wife Mary, and two others spent a memorable, stormy evening together. After reading some German folktales together, Byron challenged the others to write their own ghost stories, resulting in the eventual publication of Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, and The Vampyre by John Polidor, one of the other guests. (Polidori’s book was a major inspiration for the later more famous novel by Bram Stoker).

The authors start by recounting the lives of Mary’s parents, Mary Wollstonecraft and William Godwin. Godwin was apparently quite famous and influential during his early life, though largely forgotten now; Wollstonecraft is of course still well-known as a prominent early feminist, the author A Vindication of the Rights of Woman.

From there, the stories get quite complicated: The Godwins’ daughter Mary falls in love with the poet Percy Shelley, who leaves his first wife for her and later marries her; they both meet and befriend Byron, whom Mary’s half-sister Claire falls desperately in love with - a child results, but not marriage or returned love from Byron. (Claire is the fifth member of the ghost story challenge.)

Intrigue abounds, as Byron and Shelley both had other lovers and children, and ample time is spent on each of their lives, as well as those of Polidori and Claire. This book is a highly interesting literary biography, especially as it chronicles the lives of not just one but a number of influential writers who were connected by marriage, birth, or circumstance.

Additionally, numerous examples are given of the influence that these people, their travels, and their experiences had on Mary Shelley’s novel, Frankenstein. In particular, Mary’s relationship with her father, William Godwin, and her husband Percy provided fertile ground for her characterization of Victor Frankenstein and the monster he created.

While the audience(s) for this book may be small, those who are interested in the lives of these writers and/or the origin story of two highly influential horror novels will find this a fascinating read.

[Amy Christine Lesher · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting look at the summer of 1816 when a group of young writers and thinkers met and were challenged to write a ghost story. We know quite a bit about one of those books, Frankenstein, but I was surprised to learn that the modern vampire also came out of this summer.

Reading about Polidori, Lord Byron's personal doctor, created the modern vampire, based on Lord Byron. Before the vampire was a peasant who would prey on a village until killed. Polidori, possibly using a story Byron began, created the aristocratic, sexually charged male vampire. This was one of those little bits of information I'd never known before. That and Polidori was the uncle to the Rossetti family.

If you want a quick biography of Mary and Percy Shelley this is a fantastic book.