from which [we] view the scene—we
went on the ice,” she wrote. “It is tra-
versed by irregular crevices whose
sides of ice appear blue while the sur-
face is of a dirty white.”
Some of her inspirations were far
more intimate—beginning with her
relationship with Shelley. “There’s no
doubt in my mind that the ‘Modern
Prometheus’ Victor is partly a reflection
of Shelley, whose interest in science is
often overlooked,” Leslie S. Klinger, edi-
tor of The New Annotated Frankenstein,
tells LIFE. Like the novel’s doctor, he
was fascinated by alchemy and chemis-
try. In addition, Shelley’s first pen name
was Victor.
The emotional similarities between
Shelley and the doctor are even more
telling. “Victor Frankenstein embod-
ies certain elements of Percy Shelley’s
temperament and character that had
begun to trouble Mary Shelley,” writes
Anne K. Mellor in 1988’s Mary Shelley:
Her Life, Her Fiction, Her Monsters.
“She perceived in Percy an intellectual
hubris or belief in the supreme impor-
tance of mental abstractions that led
him to be insensitive to the feelings of
those who did not share his ideas and
enthusiasms.”
Mellor cites Percy Shelley’s rela-
tionship with Claire, his desire to have
his wife sleep with Hogg, and his lack
of concern regarding the death of
Mary’s first child, which reflects Victor
Frankenstein’s desertion of his creation.
“All this had alerted Mary to a worri-
some strain of selfishness in Percy’s
character, an egotism that too often
rendered him an insensitive husband
and an uncaring, irresponsible parent,”
she writes. Klinger adds: “I think Mary
wished he was more family-oriented
and less focused on his grand art.”
Mary likely also based the charac-
ter of Victor Frankenstein in part on
her father. “I think that she felt that he
was deficient in his parenting skills,”
says Klinger. “In particular, I’m sure
that she harbored some resentment for
being sent off to Scotland, even if it did
relieve the tension she was experienc-
ing with her stepmother.”CONTINUED FROM PAGE 24NEW YORK CITY’S MORGAN
Library & Museum owns this
first edition of Frankenstein
(above), which Mary annotated
for a subsequent revised
edition, though only some of
her changes were ultimately
made. She presented the book
to a woman named Mrs. Thomas
who had helped the author after
Percy drowned in the Ligurian
Sea. Opposite: An illustration by
Nino Carbe for a 1932 edition of
Frankenstein.28 LIFE FRANKENSTEIN
GR
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