Mary Shelley

By: Thea McDarrah

The Beginning

Mary Shelley was born Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin.

She was born August 30, 1797, in London, England
Marys mother was a famous feminist named Mary Wollstonecraft,
Her father was a philosopher and political writer named William Godwin.
Marys mother died shortly after she was born.

Mary Wollstonecraft

William Godwin

Childhood and Family Life

Mary Shelley grew up with her older step sister, Fanny Goodwin.
After his wife died, William Godwin was remarried to a widow named Mary Jane
Clairmont.
Clairmont sent Marys other step sister Jane (later Claire), to school but did not
feel the need to educate Mary.
Since Mary never went to school, she spent most of her time at home reading,
writing, and daydreaming.
Mary Shelley published her first poem in 1807 when she was 15 called "Mounseer
Nongtongpaw"

Later Teenage years

During the summer of 1812, Mary Shelley went to Scotland to stay with an
acquaintance of her father, William Baxter and his family, she returned home the
following year.
In 1814, she began a relationship with Percy Bysshe Shelley. Shelley was a student of
Marys father
Shelley was still married to his first wife when he and Mary fled England.
Marys half-sister Jane (who they called Claire) came with them.
Marys father did not talk to her for a while.

Percy Shelley

Travelling Around Europe

Mary and Percy had their first baby girl in 1815. Sadly, the child died a few days
after she was born.
The couple also struggled with financing and had a lot of trouble finding enough
money to sustain themselves and Claire.
The following summer, the Shelleys were in Switzerland with Claire, Lord Byron
and John Polidori.
It was here that Mary started her most famous novel: Frankenstein, or the Modern
Prometheus.
Sadly, both Fanny and Percy Shelley's first wife committed suicide later that year.
Mary and Percy were then married in 1816.

Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus

The first time it was published in 1818, Frankenstien was published anonymously.
Mary Shelley's name did appear in the second edition in 1823.
Mary started writing the novel in 1816 and finished in 1818..
Frankenstien's genre is gothic horror but also has a little bit of romance in it.
It is also considered one of the earliest examples of science fiction.

Frankenstein by Mary
Shelley

Later Life

Mary and Percy Shelley ended up having three more children. Only on survived;
their boy named Percy Florence who was born in 1819.
Mary then suffered another tragic event when her husband drowned in a sailing
accident on the Gulf of Spezia. This made Mary a widow at age 24.
Mary ended up writing a few more novels before she died including The Last Man
published in 1826.
Mary Shelley died of brain cancer on February 1, 1851 in London, England. She
was 53.
She was buried at St. Peter's Church in Bournemouth, next to her mother and
father and with the cremated remains of her husband.

After Death

Shelley had a few of her novels published after death including Mathilde which
finally came out in 1950.
Frankenstein is still Shelley's most famous piece of writing.
In 1994, Kenneth Branaugh and Robert De Niro appeared in a Frankenstein film.
Other spoofs and thrillers such as Young Frankenstein and I, Frankenstein have
been based off Shelley's original novel.

Young Frankenstein

What Can One Learn From Mary Shelley?

even at a young age, you can persue your dreams and create amazing things
Mary was very young when she wrote her greatest work but it nevertheless
became an instantly popular best-seller despite the fact she was a teenage girl.

Mary Shelley

Citation

Spark, Muriel, Mary Shelley, Great Britain: Constable and Company Limited 1988
www.donegaldiaspora.i, Mary Shelley, Donegal Daispora, electronically published
www.gothic.com, gothic.net, bone chilling liturature, electronically published
www.ualberta.ca, University of Alberta
www.tate.org.uk, Tate, electronically published
www.biography.com, A&E Networks Television