Mary Shelley

(Paperback)

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The most dazzling biography of a female writer to have come my way for a decade' Financial Times

To be savoured for its vivid and sympathetic recreation of the tragic life and brilliant times of the gifted Mary Shelley Times Literary Supplement

Brilliant and enthralling' Independent On Sunday

'Wonderfully vivid' Spectator

The definitive and richly woven biography of Mary Shelley, in celebration of the 200th anniversary of Frankenstein

The creator of the worlds most famous outsider became one herself . . .

There is no more dramatic scene in literary history than the stormy night by Lake Geneva when Byron, Claire Clairmont, Polidori and the Shelleys met to talk of horror and the unexplained. From that emerged Frankenstein, a monster who has haunted imaginations for two hundred years.

Miranda Seymour illustrates the rich and unexplored life of Mary Shelley. Everything from her childhood to her tempestuous relationship with Percy Shelley; Seymour brings to life the brilliant mind that created Frankenstein through unexplored and intriguing sources.

The Mary Shelley we meet here is a woman we can engage with and understand. Her world, so rich in its settings and its cast of characters, seems drawn from a novel. She, at its centre, is flawed, brave, generous, and impetuous, a woman whose dark and brilliant imagination gave us a myth which seems ever more potent in our own era.

Reviews

The most dazzling biography of a female writer to have come my way for a decade Here, for the first time, Shelley steps off the page as a living, thinking, suffering woman, fraught and caught in the web of her own intelligence. -- Jackie Wullschlager * Financial Times *
To be savoured for its vivid and sympathetic recreation of the tragic life and brilliant times of the gifted Mary Shelley. * Times Literary Supplement *
Brilliant and enthralling, this portrait illuminates Marys life in many unexpected ways. * Independent On Sunday *
A wonderfully vivid, human and learned portrait of the woman who created Frankenstein, married Shelley, and, amazingly, survived. * Spectator *
'Mary Shelley,Miranda Seymours affectionate and well-written biography, concisely sketches the background of scientific inquiry that influenced Shelleys early intellectual developmentSeymour keenly brings out how fraught Mary Shelleys own life was with tragedies of childbirth and infant mortalityIn 1818, the Shelleys moved to Italywhere Byron now was. They formed a tense and inbred circle, sharply evoked by Seymour: the women eyeing each other jealously, each serially or simultaneously in love with Shelley or Byron or bothMiranda Seymour is a novelist as well as an experienced biographerShe has vivid narrative gifts and a perceptive understanding of the main personalities.' -- New York Times Notable Books * The New York Times *
'Splendid biography.' * The New Yorker *
'Miranda Seymours lucid biography arrives as the general readers guide to Mary Shelleys ascent to academic cult status Seymour is persuasive.' * The Guardian *
'Gracefully sweeping through the dramatic life of the woman behind historys most legendary monster, Miranda Seymour unbuttons a world of brilliant literary figures in Mary Shelley and re-creates the imaginative time in which Frankenstein was born The Mary we meet here, brilliantly brought to life by Seymour from previously unexplored sources, is flawed, brave, generous, and impetuous.' * Goodreads *
'I envy any reader of this excellent biography who happens not to be very familiar with the lives of Shelley and the girl who eloped with him when she was sixteen.' -- Diana Athill * The Oldie *
'The most thorough account of Shelleys lifeeminently readable.' * Choice *
'A harrowing life, wonderfully retold.' -- Washington Post Best Books of the Year * The Washington Post Book World *
'Seymour is adept at capturing the cultural climate and social context of the early nineteenth century in the major English and Italian settings of Shelleys life story. She has done hard and valuable work in finely combining the correspondence of the many players in this story, and reconstructing the likeliest version of events---no mean feat with a circle, such as Shelleys, that was rife with contention, backbiting and self-promotion.' * The Baltimore Sun *
'One of the finest and most significant biographies of recent years.' * Library Journal *
'Seymours book is a timeless representation of a woman who endured skewed public perceptions about herself and her loved ones.' * Commercial Appeal *
'Marys tragic life story makes for a biography as intriguing as her masterpiece.' * The Oregonian *
'Seymours scrupulous, almost anxiously tender portrait peels away the myths like layers of tissue paper shrouding a lost relic. This is a fine biography that gives us the dense background to Mary Shelleys work while losing none of the searing glamour and pain of her sad, extraordinary life.' * The Sunday Times *

Author Bio

Miranda Seymour, author of the award-winning In My Father's House has written many acclaimed novels and biographies, including lives of Mary Shelley, Robert Graves, Ottoline Morrell and Helle Nice, the Bugatti Queen.