60 Fun Facts About Frankenstein

What is the novel's subtitle?

Prometheus stole fire from the gods; the label 'modern Prometheus' had been applied by Kant to Benjamin Franklin for his electricity experiments.

In what year was Frankenstein first published?

The first edition came out anonymously on New Year's Day in London.

How old was the author when the novel was published?

She was 18 when she started it, in the summer of 1816.

In which English city was the author lodging when she wrote much of the book?

She attended lectures on medical electricity by Dr Charles Wilkinson, whose laboratory was around the corner from her lodgings.

Who suggested that the group at Villa Diodati each write a ghost story?

Byron's own fragment about a vampire was later worked up into a novella by his doctor, John Polidori.

The gloomy summer of 1816 that kept the group indoors was caused by the eruption of which volcano?

1816 became known as the Year Without a Summer across Europe and North America.

Villa Diodati, where the story was conceived, overlooks which body of water?

An astronomer later used the moon's position to date her 'waking dream' to the small hours of 16 June 1816.

Which book of German ghost stories, read aloud in French translation, entertained the group at the villa?

Byron's proposal that they 'each write a ghost story' followed those fireside readings.

Which other landmark horror tale grew out of the same 1816 gathering?

John Polidori built it from a fragment Byron abandoned, creating the romantic vampire genre.

Who wrote the preface to the anonymous 1818 first edition?

The book was dedicated to Mary's father, the radical philosopher.

How many copies were printed of the 1818 first edition?

It came out in three volumes, the standard 'triple-decker' format of the day.

The author's mother, who died days after her birth, was which pioneering feminist writer?

Her 1792 essay A Vindication of the Rights of Woman made her one of the founding feminist thinkers.

The author's father, to whom the book is dedicated, was which philosopher and novelist?

Reviewers sniffed that Frankenstein was a 'feeble imitation' of his novels.

At which university does the scientist study and build the Creature?

He leaves home for university after his mother dies of scarlet fever.

The Frankenstein family belongs to which city, where much of the novel takes place?

Victor himself was born in Naples, while his family were staying there.

Which epic poem does the Creature find and read, later comparing himself to its fallen angel?

He tells Victor: 'I ought to be thy Adam, but I am rather the fallen angel.'

Who is the first person the Creature murders?

He then plants evidence on the family's servant Justine, who is tried and executed.

Where does the Creature confront his maker to tell his story and ask for a mate?

It is a glacier on Mont Blanc, a location Mary Shelley had visited herself.

In the novel, where does the scientist build, then destroy, the female creature?

He imagines the pair breeding a race of monsters and tears the unfinished body apart.

Whom does the Creature kill on Victor's wedding night?

He had promised, 'I shall be with you on your wedding-night', after Victor destroyed his mate.

Who is the ship's captain whose letters frame the whole novel?

He is leading an expedition to the North Pole when he pulls the dying Victor from the ice.

What does the Creature say he will do after his maker dies at the end of the novel?

He mourns over Victor's body before disappearing onto the ice.

What does Victor Frankenstein call his creation in the novel?

Victor calls him wretch, fiend, devil and 'vile insect', but never names him.

Which of these details of the Creature's creation comes from the 1931 film, not the novel?

Shelley leaves the method deliberately vague; Victor spends two years building the body and animates it by an unspecified process.

The 1831 revised edition changed Elizabeth from the scientist's cousin into what?

The 1831 text also dropped the Paradise Lost epigraph and softened many scientific references.

Which famous novelist praised the book in Blackwood's as an 'extraordinary tale'?

The Quarterly Review, by contrast, called it 'a tissue of horrible and disgusting absurdity'.

The first stage adaptation, Presumption, was performed in London in which year?

Mary Shelley went to see it and wrote 'lo & behold! I found myself famous!'

Which sci-fi writer argued Frankenstein is the first true science-fiction story?

His case is that Victor 'makes a deliberate decision' and turns to laboratory experiments rather than magic.

Who directed the 1931 film Frankenstein?

He was brought onto the project after Robert Florey, and cast Karloff, who was said to resemble him.

Who played the Monster in the 1931 film?

He was billed in the opening credits only as '?'.

Which actor plays the scientist in the 1931 film?

In the film he is called Henry rather than Victor; the friend named Victor is played by John Boles.

Which studio produced the 1931 film?

Dracula's $700,000 profit earlier that year is what convinced the studio to make more horror films.

What is the name of the hunchbacked assistant in the 1931 film?

Ygor did not appear until Son of Frankenstein (1939), where he was played by Dracula's most famous star.

In the 1931 film, which of the two specimens does the assistant mistakenly bring back?

He drops the healthy one on the floor after being startled and grabs the other jar.

What does the Monster do to little Maria at the lake in the 1931 film?

State censors cut the scene in 1931; it was rediscovered in a British archive in the 1980s.

Where is the Monster trapped when the mob sets it ablaze at the end of the 1931 film?

The sequel opens at the smouldering ruin, where the Monster turns out to have survived in a flooded pit.

Which star of Dracula was originally expected to play the Monster in 1931?

He reportedly grumbled, 'I was a star in my country and I will not be a scarecrow over here!'

Who created the Monster's famous makeup in 1931?

For the Bride he added scars and singed hair to show the Monster healing from the mill fire.

Which line from the 1931 film ranks among AFI's greatest movie quotes?

It was ranked 49th; the 'be God' line was cut by censors as blasphemous.

Which real inventor's coil was reportedly used in the 1931 laboratory effects?

Kenneth Strickfaden's machines became so iconic that fans call such props 'Strickfadens'.

Who plays the Bride in Bride of Frankenstein (1935)?

She also plays Mary Shelley in the film's prologue.

The Bride's famous hairstyle was modelled on which historical figure?

Her hair was set in a Marcel wave over a wire frame to hold the shape.

The actress playing the Bride modelled her hissing on which animal?

She gave herself a sore throat filming it, because Whale shot the sequence from several angles.

What is the name of the scheming mentor who blackmails Henry into building the Bride?

He shows Henry a collection of tiny homunculi he keeps in jars.

How many words did the studio allow the Monster to speak in Bride of Frankenstein?

Karloff hated the decision; he thought the character's power lay in being inarticulate.

Which Hammer star played Baron Frankenstein in six films beginning in 1957?

Hammer's films centred on the doctor rather than the monster, which Christopher Lee played in the first one.

Mel Brooks's Young Frankenstein (1974) was shot in what unusual way for its era?

Brooks even reused Kenneth Strickfaden's original 1931 lab equipment as props.

Who played the Creature in Kenneth Branagh's 1994 film Mary Shelley's Frankenstein?

He studied stroke victims to develop the Creature's voice.

Who plays the Creature in Guillermo del Toro's 2025 Frankenstein?

Del Toro had originally cast his regular collaborator Doug Jones when the project was still at Universal.

Which 1960s sitcom made Frankenstein's monster the father of a suburban family?

Herman's makeup was based directly on Karloff's.

The author's husband Percy died in 1822 in what way?

After his cremation, his heart was kept; it was found among her belongings after her death, wrapped in a page of his poem Adonaïs.

Which apocalyptic novel did the author publish in 1826?

It imagines a plague wiping out humanity in the late 21st century.

Which family servant is framed and executed for the murder of William in the novel?

Victor suspects his creature is responsible but does nothing to stop the trial.

Which friend of Victor is murdered by the creature after the female companion is destroyed?

The creature warns Victor that he will meet him on his wedding night, then takes revenge on the friend who had travelled with him to Britain.

Which Oxford institution acquired Mary Shelley's manuscripts for the 1818 edition in 2004?

Its 2008 edition, edited by Charles E. Robinson, sets Mary's original text beside Percy Shelley's additions and interventions.

Which philosopher's description of Benjamin Franklin gave rise to the term 'Modern Prometheus'?

He called Franklin the 'Prometheus of modern times' for his electricity experiments; Byron loved Aeschylus's Prometheus Bound and Percy Shelley wrote Prometheus Unbound.

Which small London publishing house issued the first edition on 1 January 1818?

The 500 copies came in three volumes, the standard 'triple-decker' format for 19th-century first editions.

In which year did the second English edition first credit Mary Shelley as author?

G. and W. B. Whittaker published the two-volume edition after the success of Richard Brinsley Peake's stage play Presumption.

What does the German name Frankenstein literally mean?

Mary Shelley said the name came to her in a dream-vision, but scholars point to several German castles and towns of that name, including one near Darmstadt.

Which critic attacked the novel anonymously in the Quarterly Review while conceding its author's powers?

Reviews were mixed: La Belle Assemblée called it 'very bold fiction' and the Edinburgh Magazine hoped for more from the author.