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Frankenstein: Or `The Modern Prometheus': The 1818 Text
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Frankenstein: Or `The Modern Prometheus': The 1818 Text Paperback - 2020

by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley; Nick Groom (Editor)


About this book

Frankenstein; or, the Modern Prometheus is a Gothic novel written by Mary Shelley in 1818. The story revolves around Victor Frankenstein, a scientist who creates a monstrous creature and immediately regrets his actions, abandoning the creature to its own devices. The creature, seeking acceptance and revenge, terrorizes Victor and those he loves. Themes of ambition, ethics, humanity, and loneliness are explored through Shelley's vivid descriptions of the natural world and her characters' psychological torment. Frankenstein remains a classic of Gothic literature and a seminal work of science fiction.

Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin wrote the first draft of her groundbreaking novel in 1816, while on a trip to Lake Geneva with her soon-to-be husband, poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, and poet Lord Byron. They were stuck indoors during famously known as the Year Without a Summer.




First Edition Identification

A small London publishing house, Lackington, Hughes, Harding, Mavor & Jones, first printed Frankenstein: or, the Modern Prometheus in a limited series of just 500 copies on January 1, 1818. By then, Mary was just 20 years old. The first edition was published anonymously in 1818, with a preface by Percy B. Shelley and a dedication to Mary’s father, philosopher William Godwin. Mary Shelley didn’t publicly claim her novel until years later, and her name appears in the second edition, published in 1823. First edition original pasteboards were in blueish gray.

First editions are very scarce and exceptionally rare on the market. In 2021 one of the first 500 copies of the novel was sold at auction for $1.17 million. It was the first Frankenstein first edition copy to be auctioned since 1985.


Details

  • Title Frankenstein: Or `The Modern Prometheus': The 1818 Text
  • Author Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley; Nick Groom (Editor)
  • Binding Paperback
  • Pages 304
  • Volumes 1
  • Language ENG
  • Publisher Oxford University Press, USA
  • Date 2020-01-01
  • Features Bibliography
  • ISBN 9780198840824 / 0198840829
  • Weight 0.45 lbs (0.20 kg)
  • Dimensions 7.6 x 5 x 0.6 in (19.30 x 12.70 x 1.52 cm)
  • Themes
    • Chronological Period: 19th Century
    • Sex & Gender: Feminine
  • Library of Congress subjects Horror fiction, Fiction
  • Dewey Decimal Code 823.7

About the author

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

Nick Groom is Professor in English at the University of Exeter. He has published widely for both academic and popular readerships, and among his many books are The Forger's Shadow (Picador 2002), The Union Jack (Atlantic 2006, rev. edn 2017), The Gothic: A Very Short Introduction (OUP 2012), The Seasons: A Celebration of the English Year (Atlantic 2014), and editions of a variety of eighteenth-century texts, from crime writing to Shakespeare. He has edited Horace Walpole's The Castle of Otranto (2014), Matthew Lewis's The Monk (2016), and Ann Radcliffe's The Italian (2017) for Oxford World's Classics.

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Frankenstein: or `The Modern Prometheus': The 1818 Text (Oxford World's Classics)
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Frankenstein: or `The Modern Prometheus': The 1818 Text (Oxford World's Classics)

by Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft

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Frankenstein: or `The Modern Prometheus': The 1818 Text (Oxford World's Classics)
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Frankenstein: or `The Modern Prometheus': The 1818 Text (Oxford World's Classics)

by Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft

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Frankenstein : Or `the Modern Prometheus': the 1818 Text
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Frankenstein : Or `the Modern Prometheus': the 1818 Text

by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

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Frankenstein: Or `The Modern Prometheus': The 1818 Text
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Frankenstein: Or `The Modern Prometheus': The 1818 Text

by Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft

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Frankenstein: Or `The Modern Prometheus': The 1818 Text
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Frankenstein: Or `The Modern Prometheus': The 1818 Text

by Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft

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Frankenstein: Or `The Modern Prometheus': The 1818 Text
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Frankenstein: Or `The Modern Prometheus': The 1818 Text

by Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft

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Frankenstein : Or `the Modern Prometheus': the 1818 Text
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Frankenstein : Or `the Modern Prometheus': the 1818 Text

by Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft

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ISBN 10 / ISBN 13
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Frankenstein : Or `the Modern Prometheus': the 1818 Text

by Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft

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Frankenstein: or `The Modern Prometheus': The 1818 Text (Oxford World's Classics)
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Frankenstein: or `The Modern Prometheus': The 1818 Text (Oxford World's Classics)

by Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft

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Frankenstein: or `The Modern Prometheus': The 1818 Text (Oxford World's Classics)
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Frankenstein: or `The Modern Prometheus': The 1818 Text (Oxford World's Classics)

by Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft; Groom, Nick

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