We know that on a dark stormy night in 1816 Lord Byron read some ghost stories to his guests and then asked them to write their own version. Mary Shelley was one of those guests and that is when and where the gothic masterpiece Frankenstein was born. In her introduction to the Third Edition of the book Shelly says:
When I placed my head upon the my pillow, I did not sleep, nor could I be said to think…I saw–with shut eyes, but acute mental vision–I saw the pale student of unhallowed arts kneeling beside the thing he had put together. I saw the hideous phantasm of a man stretched out, and then, on the working of some powerful engine, show signs of life, and stir with an uneasy, half-vital motion. Frightful must it be; for supremely frightful would be the effect of any human endeavor to mock the stupendous Creator of the world.
This brings us to Giovanni Aldini (who BibliOdyssey thoroughly covers in a recent post) whose work would have a profound influence on Shelley and play an important role in the creation of our Modern Prometheus.
Aldini, a physicist, carried out some amazing experiments at the Royal College of Surgeons in 1803 with electricity. Using conducting rods attached to a large battery he would essentially shock corpses until they moved. To people in the audience the jolt gave the appearance of returning the corpse to life.
In a 2004 the Guardian ran an article on these experiments titled Sparks of Life from which this quote comes from: “the jaw began to quiver, the adjoining muscles were horribly contorted, and the left eye actually opened”. The climax of the performance came as Aldini probed Forster’s rectum, causing his clenched fist to punch the air, as if in fury, his legs to kick and his back to arch violently.”
Are you scared yet?
Illustration at top appeared in Harper’s Weekly in 1836
Thanks to BibliOdyssey for the lead