She wrote her main book when she was 19. And, along with the novels of Walter Scott, entered the golden fund of English literature. Young Mary Shelley came up with a story of a monster that captivated the whole world, but most importantly, she struck everyone with a rare power of poetic talent and an extraordinary gift of foresight. No one believed that the author of the dark Gothic novel was a charming girl, everyone decided that the author was her lover. The famous Percy Bysshe Shelley angrily denied the rumors …
Ahead of time
She probably would have been surprised to learn that her novel outlived the author by 150 years. And that she has so many imitators and so many epigones! And so far, the story of the monster she wrote is one of the most read! Probably, the fact is that Mary Shelley touched upon the most important problems of human existence: the question "willingly or unwillingly" is hardly appropriate. For philosophers and writers of all times, this is the main scientific and moral dilemma: can a person act in the role of God? Does he have the right to design his own kind according to his own whim? Is it admitted to the main mystery of nature? These are the questions the young muse of the poet Shelley put before the widest circle of readers 200 years ago. And the inner feeling of permissiveness of Victor Frankenstein is still a subject of contemplation for artists and thinkers of modernist and postmodern aesthetics. But,we left the main subject of the conversation - from a young girl who grew up in the family of a philosopher fashionable in England, Dr. Godwin. Her mother was Mary Wollstonecraft, possibly the first feminist in Europe, who gave birth to a daughter on August 30, 1797, and died 11 days later of postpartum fever. Intellectual life was in full swing in Godwin's house, the deepest questions of being and the most radical ideas were discussed. Mary received an excellent education and very broad interests as a gift - it was impossible to find a better place for the mental maturation of a young person. So when we ask ourselves whether a young lady at the age of 19 could write such a difficult thing, we must remember that she was not an ordinary girl. And when she met the rich and famous helipad Percy Bysshe Shelley, she almost surpassed him in an intellectual sense.who grew up in the family of the fashionable philosopher in England, Dr. Godwin. Her mother was Mary Wollstonecraft, possibly the first feminist in Europe, who gave birth to a daughter on August 30, 1797, and died 11 days later of postpartum fever. Intellectual life was in full swing in Godwin's house, the deepest questions of being and the most radical ideas were discussed. Mary received an excellent education and very broad interests as a gift - it was impossible to find a better place for the mental maturation of a young person. So when we ask ourselves whether a young lady at the age of 19 could write such a difficult thing, we must remember that she was not an ordinary girl. And when she met the rich and famous helipad Percy Bysshe Shelley, she almost surpassed him in an intellectual sense.who grew up in the family of the fashionable in England philosopher, Dr. Godwin. Her mother was Mary Wollstonecraft, possibly the first feminist in Europe, who gave birth to a daughter on August 30, 1797, and died 11 days later of postpartum fever. Intellectual life was in full swing in Godwin's house, the deepest questions of being and the most radical ideas were discussed. Mary received an excellent education and very broad interests as a gift - it was impossible to find a better place for the mental maturation of a young person. So when we ask ourselves whether a young lady at the age of 19 could write such a difficult thing, we must remember that she was not an ordinary girl. And when she met the rich and famous helipad Percy Bysshe Shelley, she almost surpassed him in an intellectual sense. Her mother was Mary Wollstonecraft, possibly the first feminist in Europe, who gave birth to a daughter on August 30, 1797, and died 11 days later of postpartum fever. Intellectual life was in full swing in Godwin's house, the deepest questions of being and the most radical ideas were discussed. Mary received an excellent education and very broad interests as a gift - it was impossible to find a better place for the mental maturation of a young person. So when we ask ourselves whether a young lady at the age of 19 could write such a difficult thing, we must remember that she was not an ordinary girl. And when she met the rich and famous helipad Percy Bysshe Shelley, she almost surpassed him in an intellectual sense. Her mother was Mary Wollstonecraft, possibly the first feminist in Europe, who gave birth to a daughter on August 30, 1797, and died 11 days later of postpartum fever. Intellectual life was in full swing in Godwin's house, the deepest questions of being and the most radical ideas were discussed. Mary received an excellent education and very broad interests as a gift - it was impossible to find a better place for the mental maturation of a young person. So when we ask ourselves whether a young lady at the age of 19 could write such a difficult thing, we must remember that she was not an ordinary girl. And when she met the rich and famous helipad Percy Bysshe Shelley, she almost surpassed him in an intellectual sense. Intellectual life was in full swing in Godwin's house, the deepest questions of being and the most radical ideas were discussed. Mary received an excellent education and very broad interests as a gift - it was impossible to find a better place for the mental maturation of a young person. So when we ask ourselves whether a young lady at the age of 19 could write such a difficult thing, we must remember that she was not an ordinary girl. And when she met the rich and famous helipad Percy Bysshe Shelley, she almost surpassed him in an intellectual sense. Intellectual life was in full swing in Godwin's house, the deepest questions of being and the most radical ideas were discussed. Mary received an excellent education and very broad interests as a gift - it was impossible to find a better place for the mental maturation of a young person. So when we ask ourselves whether a young lady at the age of 19 could write such a difficult thing, we must remember that she was not an ordinary girl. And when she met the rich and famous helipad Percy Bysshe Shelley, she almost surpassed him in an intellectual sense.could a young lady at the age of 19 write such a complex thing - one must remember that she was not an ordinary girl. And when she met the rich and famous helipad Percy Bysshe Shelley, she almost surpassed him in an intellectual sense.could a young lady at the age of 19 write such a complex thing - one must remember that she was not an ordinary girl. And when she met the rich and famous helipad Percy Bysshe Shelley, she almost surpassed him in an intellectual sense.
PAYMENT FOR SINS
She became his mistress, not thinking about the grief she caused to his wife and children. Passion deprives people of reason, especially the young and poetically gifted. And when in December 1817 in London's Hyde Park they found the body of the drowned Harriet Shelley, Mary realized what she had done and declared that she wanted to accept her orphaned children into her home. But the court denied Shelley and his young wife, who had compromised herself in the eyes of the world, the right to raise orphans. They were given for adoption to strangers. Shocked by this injustice, Shelley leaves for Italy forever. Here, as if as a punishment for sins, three newborn babies with Mary died one after another from various diseases. The young mother's grief was so great that Shelley feared for her sanity. But the Lord had mercy on her - he sent her a fourth child - a strong son, whom she adored until the end of her life. When Mary became the legal wife of a loved one, her existence was not very easy - in the eyes of the world, she and her husband remained almost criminals. The connection with the Shelly couple was considered a stain on their reputation. In addition, Mary had a half-younger sister, Claire, who constantly gave "decent society" reasons to condemn the "Shelley family", and to call her frivolous would be very delicate. This exalted person was going to go to the stage, then publicly arranged scandals for lovers, then started a lawless affair with Byron - and this is at 16! And when Claire had a girl from the "rebellious lord", the Shelly couple took her in, and Mary raised her niece with her son, never receiving a penny from Byron to support his child. But they saythat Mary overheard the idea of her famous novel in a conversation between her husband and Byron: they vigorously discussed the study of Dr. Darwin (great-grandfather of the great scientist), who conducted dubious experiments to create artificial life. At night, the poor thing had a terrible dream - an ugly corpse, stripped by a dissector, was chasing after her and … the idea of the first book was formed. Soon her novel "Frankenstein, or Modern Prometheus" was released. The success was unexpected, the fate of the protagonist - not at all a monster who was revived by a man, but a scientist who, out of vanity, created a monster that became a symbol of evil - excited the whole of Europe. This terrible homunculus, pursuing its creator, gradually destroys his family - a transparent metaphor: life, not inspired by a moral principle, brings only destruction to the world. Cruelty and malice take up residence therewhere they forgot to breathe in the divine light of the soul.
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LIFE AFTER LOVE
“I used to stain paper in childhood,” Mary admitted, “and my favorite pastime was“writing different stories”… From the very beginning my husband really wanted me to be a worthy daughter of my parents and to write my name on the pages of literary glory. He constantly urged me to seek literary fame … Literary studies for me were reduced to reading and to precious communication for me with his incomparably more developed mind. " She is very generous to her husband. And Shelley wrote in a different way: "How deeply I felt my own insignificance, how readily I admitted that I was inferior to her in originality, in genuine nobility and greatness of mind." They were together for eight years, and then Shelley died tragically - during a terrible storm he found himself on the high seas on a small schooner, and his corpse was washed ashore only a few days later. For the grief-stricken 25-year-old widow, there is only one joy left - Percy's little son Florence. And he was threatened to be taken away by Mary's harsh father-in-law - the poet's father, who, trying to break his daughter-in-law, appointed his grandson a meager maintenance, forbade the inconsolable widow to write anything about her husband, publish his manuscripts and generally use his name. Desperate Mary turned to Byron for help, and the handsome lord assured her that he would become her bank and support her children … Everything was said in the most lofty terms … but he, as always, deceived. And he didn't help a dime. Little Percy, by the way, did not show any signs of paternal genius (or maternal gift!), He grew up passive and lazy. He tried himself in politics, he gave up this occupation and decided to surrender himself to the life of a peaceful landowner - fortunately, a stern grandfather died and left him an inheritance. Having married,Percy Jr. finally gave shelter and peace to his mother, who was now enjoying a rural idyll next to her son and daughter-in-law. She was able to complete her husband's biography, prepared his collected works for publication and peacefully passed away in the fifty-fourth year.
AFTERWORD TO FATE …
Mary Shelley's novel, which contemporaries read with interest, became simply cult in the 20th century. He surprised his fans with the power of insight, turned into an urgent warning, a message to the future, which with tragic accuracy embodied Mary's nightmare: power without a soul is perhaps the brightest symbol of the century. Her novel about Frankenstein is still being filmed and taken away for quotes, finished and interpreted in a new way … Such a number of myths were never born, probably for any other literary occasion! What's the secret? She really got it right! The loss of moral guidelines, the use of science as a servant of a technological civilization leads to almost irreversible consequences - this is what the young English novelist foresaw. This novel was published in 1818. And the anniversary of the book brings to mind another work of Mary Shelley - "The Last Man", which was published after the death of the author. It describes the death of the human race in the 21st century from a mysterious plague. God grant that this terrible prophecy of the first lady of English literature does not come true!
Irina Voskresenskaya
