Frankenstein Published

January 1, 1818

Mary Shelley's anonymous novel about a student who stitches a man from corpses and flees in horror appeared in three small volumes. Reviewers called it disgusting. It sold. Two centuries later, its central image - the creator running from his creation - would feel more prophetic than Gothic. Shelley was nineteen when she wrote it, during a rain-soaked summer at Lake Geneva in the company of Byron and her husband.