Science & Prometheus

• Frankenstein was written at a time of extreme debate over science.
• Mary’s father's home often had visitors of the leading intellectuals of the time and so she was very aware of the issues.
• The distinctions between science, the arts, politics, philosophy and theology were more blurred during the time Frankenstein was written.
• Poets such as Coleridge found it important to address scientific issues in their work.
• Percy Bysshe Shelley and Lord Byron were both interested in science.
• During the summer of 1816, Mary Shelley would have overheard and participated in many conversations surrounding science, the principle of life.
• Mary Shelley undertook her own scientific readings during the summer of 1816.
• The figure of Prometheus was the subject of a poem published by Byron in 1816 and Percy Shelley was to publish his major work Prometheus Unbound in 1820.
• Prometheus was said to have taught humans many useful skills and was often a prototype of a modern scientist.
• Prometheus is a transgressive figure who defies the authority of Zeus by stealing fire from them and bringing it to the humans for their survival.
• The two aspects of Prometheus’ story, creation and transgression, complicate the image of the scientist that Victor represents.
• Samuel Taylor Coleridge was a poet, critic and philosopher and as a close friend of William Wordsworth was associated with the earliest phases of poetic romanticism.
• Byron George Gordon was one of the leading romantic poets of the time.
• Byron's scandalous life brought him as much notoriety as his poetry brought him fame.