Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, 1818-2018

Book excerpt: Ever since Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein was first published in 1818, the story of the scientist and his Creature has been constantly told, discussed, adapted, filmed, and translated, making generations of readers approach the novel in an extraordinary variety of ways and languages. This new collection of nineteen essays brings together a range of international scholars to provide an introduction to, and a series of pathways through, this iconic novel. Chapters explore various topics, from the Bible, mythology, ruins, and human rights, to the sublime, the epistolary, and acoustics. They also place the novel in a wider cultural context, exploring its numerous afterlives, its reception, and adaptations in different media, such as drama, cinema, graphic novels, television series, and computer games. Aimed at both scholars and new readers of Frankenstein, in its different guises, this volume stimulates an informed appreciation of one of the most influential and haunting novels of all time.