[WW] Re: Frankenstein's Papers

["Michael R. Blair" <michael@carrickfergus.schoolzone.co.uk>]

Mary Shelly was English, her mother was the famous feminist Mary
Wollstonecraft.

There really is a castle Frankenstein which might be a better site, if a
little unsubtle.

Frankenstein was written following an evening telling ghost stories as the
party stayed in a house on the edge of a Swiss lake. The party included lord
Byron and his doctor Polidori. Byron created a vampire story but Polidori
wrote another, probably based on Byron's and the protagonist, Lord Ruthven,
is based on Byron himself. Polidori later committed suicide.
Byron was involved with the 'Hellfire Club' a society of dandies intent on
fun (drink and debauchery) though the Dublin Hellfire Club was even crazier.

In the original novel Frankenstein does not create a synthetic man from bits
of bodies, that comes from the black and white horror films, but rather
follows a much older method involving his own bodily fluids... This
incidentally was how alchemists created a homunculus.

Useful novels include:
Tim Powers. The Stress of Her Regard
Tom Holland. The Vampyre, Supping With Panthers... (all his works are
interconnected, except possibly 'The Bonehunter' but I have not read it yet)


Michael