A Mary Shelley Encyclopedia

(Hardback)

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Description

Mary Shelley has only recently emerged from the shadows of her famous parents, Mary Wollstonecraft and William Godwin, and her husband, Percy Bysshe Shelley. Today, "Frankenstein" (1818, 1831) is one of the most popular classroom texts in high school and college, and her other works are attracting renewed attention. These works reveal much about the Romantic literary period and Shelley's ongoing development as a writer. In addition to her novels, she wrote short stories, poems and dramas. These texts illustrate the difficulties of a shifting literary marketplace, while her travel writings illuminate her rich personal experiences and keen intellect. This reference is a comprehensive guide to her life and career. Included in the volume are hundreds of alphabetically arranged entries. Readers of Shelley's texts can garner more information about her works, friends, relatives, residences, fictional characters, allusions and much more. Some of these entries briefly identify and contextualize their topics, while others offer more extensive discussions. Many of the entries cite sources of further information, and the volume closes with a bibliography. The work is fully cross-referenced and includes an appendix, which discusses the sources for Shelley's quotations as well as a detailed index.

Reviews

[a] very useful glimpse of Shelley, her works, the influences, and scholarship. This volume is recommended for academic and large public libraries.-Booklist/RBB
[a]n exhaustively comprehensive A-to-Z listing of all subjects that refer to Mary Shelley's life and work....will be of most use to scholars, especially since Shelley studies now concentrate on the author's less-known works.-Library Journal
[A] worthy addition to a reference collection on the period of romantic literature and thinking. Since its focus is on Mary Shelley, the most famous woman of romanticism, the entries on the broader issues of that period's history, politics and literature are excellent.-Reference Reviews
[M]ary Shelley merits recent renewed attention exemplified by the publication of this first reference guide to her life and literary work....Thorough citations and annotations to references in Shelley's individual works recommend this handbook to literary scholars. Two appendixes list quotations: those that Shelley attributes to their authors and those that are unidentified. An extensive bibliography and index enhance the book's utility. Recommended. Academic and large public libraries.-Choice
"a very useful glimpse of Shelley, her works, the influences, and scholarship. This volume is recommended for academic and large public libraries."-Booklist/RBB
"an exhaustively comprehensive A-to-Z listing of all subjects that refer to Mary Shelley's life and work....will be of most use to scholars, especially since Shelley studies now concentrate on the author's less-known works."-Library Journal
"A worthy addition to a reference collection on the period of romantic literature and thinking. Since its focus is on Mary Shelley, the most famous woman of romanticism, the entries on the broader issues of that period's history, politics and literature are excellent."-Reference Reviews
"Mary Shelley merits recent renewed attention exemplified by the publication of this first reference guide to her life and literary work....Thorough citations and annotations to references in Shelley's individual works recommend this handbook to literary scholars. Two appendixes list quotations: those that Shelley attributes to their authors and those that are unidentified. An extensive bibliography and index enhance the book's utility. Recommended. Academic and large public libraries."-Choice
"[a] very useful glimpse of Shelley, her works, the influences, and scholarship. This volume is recommended for academic and large public libraries."-Booklist/RBB
"[a]n exhaustively comprehensive A-to-Z listing of all subjects that refer to Mary Shelley's life and work....will be of most use to scholars, especially since Shelley studies now concentrate on the author's less-known works."-Library Journal
"[A] worthy addition to a reference collection on the period of romantic literature and thinking. Since its focus is on Mary Shelley, the most famous woman of romanticism, the entries on the broader issues of that period's history, politics and literature are excellent."-Reference Reviews
"[M]ary Shelley merits recent renewed attention exemplified by the publication of this first reference guide to her life and literary work....Thorough citations and annotations to references in Shelley's individual works recommend this handbook to literary scholars. Two appendixes list quotations: those that Shelley attributes to their authors and those that are unidentified. An extensive bibliography and index enhance the book's utility. Recommended. Academic and large public libraries."-Choice

Author Bio

LUCY MORRISON is Assistant Professor of English at Salisbury University. She has published articles in Studies in Philology, Studies in Short Fiction, and the Keats-Shelley Review, among others. STACI L. STONE is Director of Humanities at Murray State University.