Books with title Frankenstein or the Modern Prometheus

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In the summer of 1816, Lord Byron and Percy Bysshe Shelley - the two great poets of their age - and a lovely 17-year-old named Mary Shelley were partying and reading ghost stories on the shores of Lake Geneva. They dared each other to come up with the scariest story. Young Mary was the only one to rise to the challenge, and she gave birth to the entire horror and science fiction genres by crafting a brilliant and chilling account of what it means to be human, what responsibilities we have to each other, and how far we can go in tampering with nature. Frankenstein, published anonymously in 1818, was an instant runaway best seller! Chris Hendrie, who has appeared in several horror classics, including Psycho II, Fright Night, and Tom Holland's Twisted Tales, voices this compelling story of revolt, revenge, and, most intriguingly, one of the most gruesome and terrifying narratives ever told. This is an alarming book - in several very enjoyable ways. This is an amazingly brilliant book that sprang from the young mind of the remarkable Mary Shelley!

Dr. Victor Frankenstein, an ambitious young scientist, is consumed by a fanatic desire to create a living being. He fashions an eight-foot-tall creature and succeeds in animating him, but, horrified by his visage, perceives his creation to be a monster and frightens him away. The monster, wandering in search of human companionship, is spurned and repulsed by all he approaches and learns to hate and to kill. He confronts his maker with a terrible choice: unless Frankenstein creates for him a mate, he will go on a rampage of destruction.Frankenstein, a masterpiece of 19th-century Gothic horror and considered to be the first science-fiction novel, is a subversive tale about the corrupt tendencies in humanity's most "civilized" ambitions.

During the rainy summer of 1816, the "Year Without a Summer", the world was locked in a long cold volcanic winter caused by the eruption of Mount Tambora in 1815. Mary Shelley, aged 18, and her lover (and later husband) Percy Bysshe Shelley, visited Lord Byron at the Villa Diodati by Lake Geneva in Switzerland. The weather was consistently too cold and dreary that summer to enjoy the outdoor holiday activities they had planned, so the group retired indoors until dawn. Among other subjects, the conversation turned to galvanism and the feasibility of returning a corpse or assembled body parts to life, and to the experiments of the 18th-century natural philosopher and poet Erasmus Darwin, who was said to have animated dead matter. Sitting around a log fire at Byron's villa, the company also amused themselves by reading German ghost stories, prompting Byron to suggest they each write their own supernatural tale. Shortly afterward, in a waking dream, Mary Shelley conceived the idea for Frankenstein.

You will rejoice to hear that no disaster has accompanied the commencement of an enterprisewhich you have regarded with such evil forebodings. I arrived here yesterday, and my first taskis to assure my dear sister of my welfare and increasing confidence in the success of myundertaking.I am already far north of London, and as I walk in the streets of Petersburgh, I feel a coldnorthern breeze play upon my cheeks, which braces my nerves and fills me with delight. Do youunderstand this feeling? This breeze, which has travelled from the regions towards which I amadvancing, gives me a foretaste of those icy climes. Inspirited by this wind of promise, mydaydreams become more fervent and vivid. I try in vain to be persuaded that the pole is the seatof frost and desolation; it ever presents itself to my imagination as the region of beauty anddelight. There, Margaret, the sun is for ever visible, its broad disk just skirting the horizon anddiffusing a perpetual splendour. There—for with your leave, my sister, I will put some trust inpreceding navigators—there snow and frost are banished; and, sailing over a calm sea, we maybe wafted to a land surpassing in wonders and in beauty every region hitherto discovered on thehabitable globe. Its productions and features may be without example, as the phenomena of theheavenly bodies undoubtedly are in those undiscovered solitudes. What may not be expected in acountry of eternal light? I may there discover the wondrous power which attracts the needle andmay regulate a thousand celestial observations that require only this voyage to render theirseeming eccentricities consistent for ever. I shall satiate my ardent curiosity with the sight of apart of the world never before visited, and may tread a land never before imprinted by the foot ofman. These are my enticements, and they are sufficient to conquer all fear of danger or death andto induce me to commence this laborious voyage with the joy a child feels when he embarks in alittle boat, with his holiday mates, on an expedition of discovery up his native river. Butsupposing all these conjectures to be false, you cannot contest the inestimable benefit which Ishall confer on all mankind, to the last generation, by discovering a passage near the pole tothose countries, to reach which at present so many months are requisite; or by ascertaining thesecret of the magnet, which, if at all possible, can only be effected by an undertaking such asmine.

Mary Shelley's classic novel, Frankenstein; or The Modern Prometheus, is a story about a young scientist Victor Frankenstein and his grotesque sapient creation through unorthodox science. Odin's Library Classics is dedicated to bringing the world the best of humankind's literature from throughout the ages. Carefully selected, each work is unabridged from classic works of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, or drama.

You will rejoice to hear that no disaster has accompanied the commencement of an enterprisewhich you have regarded with such evil forebodings. I arrived here yesterday, and my first taskis to assure my dear sister of my welfare and increasing confidence in the success of myundertaking.I am already far north of London, and as I walk in the streets of Petersburgh, I feel a coldnorthern breeze play upon my cheeks, which braces my nerves and fills me with delight. Do youunderstand this feeling? This breeze, which has travelled from the regions towards which I amadvancing, gives me a foretaste of those icy climes. Inspirited by this wind of promise, mydaydreams become more fervent and vivid. I try in vain to be persuaded that the pole is the seatof frost and desolation; it ever presents itself to my imagination as the region of beauty anddelight. There, Margaret, the sun is for ever visible, its broad disk just skirting the horizon anddiffusing a perpetual splendour. There—for with your leave, my sister, I will put some trust inpreceding navigators—there snow and frost are banished; and, sailing over a calm sea, we maybe wafted to a land surpassing in wonders and in beauty every region hitherto discovered on thehabitable globe. Its productions and features may be without example, as the phenomena of theheavenly bodies undoubtedly are in those undiscovered solitudes. What may not be expected in acountry of eternal light? I may there discover the wondrous power which attracts the needle andmay regulate a thousand celestial observations that require only this voyage to render theirseeming eccentricities consistent for ever. I shall satiate my ardent curiosity with the sight of apart of the world never before visited, and may tread a land never before imprinted by the foot ofman. These are my enticements, and they are sufficient to conquer all fear of danger or death andto induce me to commence this laborious voyage with the joy a child feels when he embarks in alittle boat, with his holiday mates, on an expedition of discovery up his native river. Butsupposing all these conjectures to be false, you cannot contest the inestimable benefit which Ishall confer on all mankind, to the last generation, by discovering a passage near the pole tothose countries, to reach which at present so many months are requisite; or by ascertaining thesecret of the magnet, which, if at all possible, can only be effected by an undertaking such asmine.

Such were the professor's words—rather let me say such the words of the fate—enounced to destroy me. As he went on I felt as if my soul were grappling with a palpable enemy; one by one the various keys were touched which formed the mechanism of my being; chord after chord was sounded, and soon my mind was filled with one thought, one conception, one purpose. So much has been done, exclaimed the soul of Frankenstein—more, far more, will I achieve; treading in the steps already marked, I will pioneer a new way, explore unknown powers, and unfold to the world the deepest mysteries of creation. I closed not my eyes that night. My internal being was in a state of insurrection and turmoil; I felt that order would thence arise, but I had no power to produce it. By degrees, after the morning's dawn, sleep came. I awoke, and my yesternight's thoughts were as a dream. There only remained a resolution to return to my ancient studies and to devote myself to a science for which I believed myself to possess a natural talent. On the same day I paid M. Waldman a visit. His manners in private were even more mild and attractive than in public, for there was a certain dignity in his mien during his lecture which in his own house was replaced by the greatest affability and kindness. I gave him pretty nearly the same account of my former pursuits as I had given to his fellow professor. He heard with attention the little narration concerning my studies and smiled at the names of Cornelius Agrippa and Paracelsus, but without the contempt that M. Krempe had exhibited. He said that "These were men to whose indefatigable zeal modern philosophers were indebted for most of the foundations of their knowledge. They had left to us, as an easier task, to give new names and arrange in connected classifications the facts which they in a great degree had been the instruments of bringing to light. The labours of men of genius, however erroneously directed, scarcely ever fail in ultimately turning to the solid advantage of mankind." I listened to his statement, which was delivered without any presumption or affectation, and then added that his lecture had removed my prejudices against modern chemists; I expressed myself in measured terms, with the modesty and deference due from a youth to his instructor, without letting escape (inexperience in life would have made me ashamed) any of the enthusiasm which stimulated my intended labours. I requested his advice concerning the books I ought to procure. "I am happy," said M. Waldman, "to have gained a disciple; and if your application equals your ability, I have no doubt of your success. Chemistry is that branch of natural philosophy in which the greatest improvements have been and may be made; it is on that account that I have made it my peculiar study; but at the same time, I have not neglected the other branches of science. A man would make but a very sorry chemist if he attended to that department of human knowledge alone. If your wish is to become really a man of science and not merely a petty experimentalist, I should advise you to apply to every branch of natural philosophy, including mathematics."

Frankenstein, written by British author Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, was first published in London in 1818. Victor Frankenstein learns how to create life and creates a being in the likeness of man, but larger and more powerful than the average man. Frankenstein rejects the creature, and lives to regret his desire to create life, after it kills his brother William. Frankenstein is a warning against the "over-reaching" of modern man and the Industrial Revolution - as alluded to in the novel's subtitle, The Modern Prometheus. Frankenstein has significantly influenced modern literature and popular culture, and spawned the "mad-scientist" genre of horror stories and films.

FRANKENSTEIN; or, The Modern Prometheus is a novel written by English author Mary Shelley that tells the story of Victor Frankenstein, a young scientist who creates a grotesque but sapient creature in an unorthodox scientific experiment. Shelley started writing the story when she was 18, and the first edition of the novel was published anonymously in London in 1818, when she was 20. Her name first appeared on the second edition, published in France in 1823.