Mary Shelley

EARLY LIFE 

Mary Shelley was born Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin in Somers Town, London at 11.20 pm on August 30, 1797.

Her father, the anarchist philosopher William Godwin, and her feminist mother Mary Wollstonecraft, were both political writers. Four years before Mary was born, Godwin had written Enquiry Concerning Political Justice and its Influence on Morals and Happiness, which was the first ever modern work to expound anarchism.

Wollstonecraft died in agony of puerperal fever ten days after Mary's birth. Godwin was left to bring up Mary, along with her older half-sister, Fanny Imlay, Wollstonecraft's child by the American speculator Gilbert Imlay.

In 1801 Godwin married his neighbor Mary Jane Clairmont. She brought two of her own children into the household, Charles and Claire.

Under her father’s tutelage, Mary received an excellent education, which was unusual for girls at the time.

Mary learned to write by tracing the letters on her mother's headstone.

Richard Rothwell's portrait of Mary Shelley, which was shown at the Royal Academy in 1840, 

As a little girl, Mary was disfigured by eczema and forced to endure having her arm so tightly bandaged that it stuck out at an angle.

Mary was such a disruptive influence at home with her stepmother that at the age of 13 she was sent away to stay with the Baxter family in Dundee, Scotland. The young teenager traveled by herself by sea for six days during which she lost all her money to a pickpocket despite having tucked the notes into her stays. Mary stayed there for five months, becoming close friends with the Baxters' daughter Isabel.

In 1834 Mary's aged anarchistic father, now a yeoman of the Guard, allowed a quantity of wooden tally sticks to be burned within the Westminster Palace precincts while he went off to watch a performance of Richard III. As a result he accidentally achieved the ultimate anarchistic dream, the burning down of the Houses of Parliament.

RELATIONSHIPS 

Mary first met Percy Bysshe Shelley, a political radical and free-thinker like her father, when Percy and his first wife Harriet visited Godwin's home and bookshop in London. Percy, unhappy in his marriage to Harriet, began to visit Godwin more frequently (and alone).

Mary's father and mother were two of Percy Shelley's parents' favourite authors.

The 16-year-old Mary declared her love for the married Percy Shelley at her mother's graveside in the cemetery of St Pancras Old Church on June 26, 1814, The pair eloped to France on July 28, 1814 with Mary's stepsister, Clare Clairmont, in tow.

 St Pancras Old Church in 1815

Upon their return several weeks later, the young couple were dismayed to find that William Godwin, whose views on free love apparently did not apply to his daughter, refused to see them.

Percy was more than satisfied with his new romantic partner in these first years. He exulted that Mary was "one who can feel poetry and understand philosophy" - although she, like Harriet before her, refused his attempts to share her with his friend Thomas Hogg. Mary thus learned that Percy's loyalty to Godwin's free love ideals would always conflict with his deep desire for "true love" as expressed in so much of his poetry.

In the summer of 1816, the Shelleys took a summer holiday in Switzerland with Lord Byron and Claire Clairmont. The famous and scandalous poet Lord Byron's affair with Claire had left her both pregnant and somewhat obsessed with him.

Claire Clairmont (portrait by Amelia Curran, 1819)

While stuck in their house by Lake Geneva one rainy afternoon, Lord Byron suggested a contest to see who could write the best ghost story. Mary Shelley sketched the tale that became Frankenstein.

Percy Shelley's wife, Harriet Westbrook, was discovered drowned in the Serpentine, a lake in Hyde Park, London on December 10, 1816. She was pregnant with the couple's third child.

Shortly after Harriet Shelley's death, Percy and a pregnant Mary were married on December 30, 1816 at St. Mildred's Church in London, now with Godwin's blessing.

The Shelleys attempts to gain custody of Percy's two children by Harriet failed, but their writing careers enjoyed more success when, in the spring of 1817, Mary completed her novel Frankenstein.

Mary had four pregnancies in her eight-year relationship with Shelley including one premature daughter who died two months after her birth. Their household grew to include not only Mary's own children by Percy but also occasional friends and Claire's daughter, Alba, by Byron.

Shelley moved his menage from place to place first in England and then in Italy. Mary had to bear the death of two infant children whilst roaming the continent with Shelley. She suffered the death of her infant daughter Clara Everina of dysentery in Venice on September 24, 1818; and nine months later,
their three-year-old son William "Willmouse" Shelley died of malaria in Rome on June 7, 1819.

William "Willmouse" Shelley, painted just before his death from malaria in 1819 

The birth of Mary Shelley's only surviving child, Percy Florence Shelley on November 12, 1819, consoled her somewhat for her losses.

By now Mary had resigned herself to her husband's self-centered restlessness and his romantic enthusiasms for other women. Eventually the group settled near La Spezia in Italy, but it was an ill-fated choice. It was here that Claire learned of her daughter's death at the Italian convent to which Byron had sent her and also Mary almost died there of a miscarriage.

On July 8, 1822, Percy Shelley drowned in the Gulf of Spezia while sailing with a friend. A devastated Mary Shelley had his body cremated. She mourned the passing of her husband for the rest of her life and carried his heart with her for nearly 30 years.

Percy Shelley by Amelia Curran 

CAREER

Mary Shelley's Gothic novel Frankenstein came out of an evening on the shore of Lake Geneva spent with her husband Percy Shelley, Lord Byron and other companions. They started discussing ghosts and the supernatural fuelled perhaps by laudanum.

After thinking for weeks about what her possible storyline could be, Mary Shelley came up with Frankenstein, a scientist who created life and was horrified by the result. Percy Shelley was impressed and he got his wife to write the novel out in full. Frankenstein was published anonymously on January 1,1818 in an edition of just 500 copies in three volumes, the standard "triple-decker" format for 19th-century first editions.

Draft of Frankenstein

After Frankenstein, Mary Shelley she wrote another six novels. Of these, The Last Man, a pioneering science fiction story of the human apocalypse in the distant future, is considered her best work. Shelley is considered to have invented the Post-Apocalyptic Plague genre with the 1826 novel.

After the passing of her husband Percy Shelley, Mary was dependent on hack journalism to maintain herself.

APPEARANCE AND CHARACTER 

There was something about Mary; she was petite and strikingly pretty with translucent, glowing skin, almost fluorescent in the dark. Mary had a long nose, grey eyes and a milky pallor with blonde/auburn hair.

Reginald Easton's miniature of Mary Shelley 

Mary had a fine intellect and vigorous character. She was clever, impulsive and elegant, but bad tempered.

HOMES

Mary Shelley was born and raised at The Polygon in Somers Town, London, between Camden Town and St Pancras.

The Polygon (at left) in Somers Town, London

The Shelleys moved with Claire Clairmont and her daughter Alba to Albion House at Marlow, Buckinghamshire in March 1817. A large, damp building on the river Thames. it was there that Mary Shelley wrote her Frankenstein novel.

The Shelleys traveled to Italy in March 1818, order to convince Lord Byron, who taken up residence in Venice, to give his estranged lover Claire Clairmont access their child. They remained in Italy for several years, staying at 300 Via Del Corso, Rome in the Spring of 1819. They eventually settling in Lerici, a town close to La Spezia in Italy.

BELIEFS 

Both Mary and her husband Percy Shelley were ethical vegetarians and strong advocates for animals. One can see references to vegetarianism in Mary's writing. For example, in Frankenstein, the 'monster' was a vegetarian.

The young Mary Shelley's philosophy of life was based on her stern reason. After her husband's death, Mary grew increasingly more conservative.

HEALTH  AND DEATH 

Mary Shelley had depressive tendencies, which she inherited from her mother.

Mary Shelley died at her London home after a long illness on February 1, 1851, possibly caused by a brain tumor.

She was buried in the graveyard of St. Peter's Church in Bournemouth. In order to fulfill Mary Shelley's wishes, Percy Florence and his wife Jane had the coffins of Mary Shelley's parents exhumed from St. Pancras and buried with her in Bournemouth. (See their grave below)

By LordHarris at en.wikipedia,

Source Shmoop