Classics and the Western Canon discussion

Let's begin at the beginning, with the title page of the first (1818) edition of "Frankenstein."

http://knarf.english.upenn.edu/1818v1...

Can someone comment on the subtitle? The quote from Milton? The author byline (or lack thereof)?

Note that the book is dedicated to William Godwin, the father of Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin Shelley, and that one of his own books is referenced.

http://knarf.english.upenn.edu/1818v1...

The 1818 edition has a two-page preface written, according to the author, by Percy Bysshe Shelley, the eventual husband of Mary Shelley.

http://knarf.english.upenn.edu/1818v1...

How different in tone is the introduction that Mary supplied to the 1831 edition! You might want to comment on what her introduction tells us about Mary Shelley's writing ability.

http://knarf.english.upenn.edu/1831v1...

This thread is for any comments you have on this introductory material to the book and anything you can tell us about Mary Shelley and those who were with her in Geneva during the summer of 1816, and any other introductory information you wish to post about this strange and wild story. Geography, history, biography, web pages--anything helpful and relevant--will be appreciated.

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Let me repeat that either edition (1818 or 1831) is fine for our discussion. Both editions are given for comparison on the University of Pennsylvania website to which I have linked.

This is the first of three threads I will be posting this first week. The others cover (1b) the first four letters of Robert Walton and (1c) Book (or Volume) I, which consists of chapters 1-7 in the 1818 edition or chapters 1-8 in the 1831 edition.
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The floor is now open for your introductory thoughts.

The summer of 1816! Rossini, Weber, and Schubert were hoppin' that year. The snuff was circulating freely (in people's snuff-purses) in them days.

Supposedly it was the 'year without a summer', though--thanks to a volcano in the Dutch East Indies. Dark shadows over Western Europe.

Not exactly the best time for a holiday by the lake, was it? But at least it got the creative juices flowing. Here's a chronology that might help us. You'll have to scroll down quite far.

http://knarf.english.upenn.edu/Indexe...

I heard about the Year Without A Summer, but never realized the enormous impact it had: http://history1800s.about.com/od/crim...

Maybe we have to understand the deletion of the epigraph in the 1831 edition as part of an attempt to soften sharp edges? Mary having second thoughts about the way the friends in Geneva understood Milton’s poem?

It would certainly be helpful to have more information on their possible interpretations of Paradise Lost. In one of my (preliminary) ways to read Frankenstein we are the Monster, struggling with the idea of a(n imperfect) Creator.

Laurele wrote: "Not exactly the best time for a holiday by the lake, was it? But at least it got the creative juices flowing."

And let's keep in mind that this was a world without the transportation facilities we have today to transport food in quantity from the areas that were less affected by the cold to areas where crops failed, with large numbers of poor and without the massive government social services that help ease the cost of disasters for farmers and help provide food for the poor when the cost rises significantly, that relied for heat on the burning of coal and wood, which would throw further pollutants into the air, exacerbating the blockage of sunlight, without long range weather forecasting to predict this crisis and help adapt to it, and otherwise that was really unprepared to deal with a not-at-all understood disaster.

Laurele wrote: "How different in tone is the introduction that Mary supplied to the 1831 edition! You might want to comment on what her introduction tells us about Mary Shelley's writing ability."

I'm not sure it really tells us much.

I don't mean to denigrate her work on Frankenstein, but is a comparison between her writing in 1816 and in 1831 really valuable?

After all, the first was started when she was 18 and previously unpublished; the second was written when she was 34 and a published author of several other novels, short stories, biographies, and other works, plus editing the work of her husband and transcribing the poetry of Byron and living for some time with the author Leigh Hunt, all of which one would assume would have had a meaningful effect on the development of her writing style and ability.

I would expect a significant difference in writing style between a high school senior and an author with several published novels and other works under her belt. One can look at the development of the author, of course, and should, but one would expect, or at least I would, the work of the mature writer to be substantially better than her first work (just as I find Emma substantially better than Love and Freindship).

Wendel wrote: "Maybe we have to understand the deletion of the epigraph in the 1831 edition as part of an attempt to soften sharp edges? Mary having second thoughts about the way the friends in Geneva understood ..."

I hadn't noticed that the epigraph was missing in the 1831 edition, wendel, but you are right. It could be simply that there was no room for it, with the other additions. As far as I can remember, Milton has the same power in both editions. For one thing, "Paradise Lost" was the prime example of the Sublime in literature, a concept that was so very important to the Romantics.

http://knarf.english.upenn.edu/Contex...

http://knarf.english.upenn.edu/Contex...

Laurele wrote: "I hadn't noticed that the epigraph was missing in the 1831 edition, wendel, but you are right. It could be simply that there was no room for it, with the other additions. "

That seems possible, but I think unlikely; it was only a few lines, and if Shelley had thought important would have found space for it, even if it required another page. I think the omission must have been an intentional decision, though I'm not sure why.

Lake Geneva, 1818.
Today still picturesque (sublime sometimes), though not unspoiled.



"The Romantic writers were delighted by the unspoiled vistas of Lake Geneva and its surrounding snow-capped mountains. This watercolor, “Mont Blanc after sunset from the Secheron,” was made by Thomas Henry Graham (1793–1881) during an 1818 tour of Switzerland and France. NYPL, Pforzheimer Collection"

Source: http://exhibitions.nypl.org/biblion/o...

Thanks for bringing the landscape in, Wendel. It was very important to the Romantic and Gothic writers. Milton brought the word into English in "Paradise Lost."

Wendel wrote: "Lake Geneva, 1818.
Today still picturesque (sublime sometimes), though not unspoiled."

Nice find. I can imagine VF climbing the mountains in the far background.