Danger: Women Writing

Okay, maybe it’s the mad scientist I revealed during my recent visit to Mysteries and Margaritas that explains my initial reaction when I think of the monster from FRANKENSTEIN. To me the monster is the doctor, Victor Frankenstein, who assembled the creature from the assorted bits of humans and other assorted animals since the novel makes reference to taking materials from the slaughterhouses.

As a scientist, Frankenstein had a moral obligation to think about the consequences of what he would create much like Oppenheimer and those who worked on the Manhattan Project to create the atom bomb or the fictional scientists from Wardwell Laboratories who decided to experiment on innocent humans in the SIN HUNTER Series.

When I read paranormals or write them, that challenge of monster versus humans is often most interesting when it turns out, like in FRANKENSTEIN, that it’s the humans who are more monstrous than the demons and creatures in the stories.

What do you think of when you think of Frankenstein?  The creature or the scientist?

Some interesting facts about FRANKENSTEIN:

1.  It was originally published anonymously in 1818 and then again in 1823.  It was substantially revised before being reissued by another publisher in 1831.  The 1831 version is the one most commonly read.

2.  The book was subtitled The Modern Prometheus as some scholars believe the book to be a warning against the adoption of science over civility and the expansion of machinery via the Industrial Revolution.

3.  The author, Mary Godwin (later Shelley) was the lover of Percy Shelley who was a friend to Lord Byron.  Rumor has it the writing of the book came about as the result of a challenge issued that each of them write their own supernatural story.

4.  Mary was 18 at the time she created the novel.

5.  The novel was rejected when submitted to both Shelley’s and Lord Byron’s publishers at the time.

6.  The original work was not well-received and when the identity of the author was revealed,  some attacked the work as being a product of her gender.

Hope you enjoyed today’s Dark Side Demon Monday!

Photo Credit:  Frankenstein entry at Wikipedia; Tate Private Collection.

I think one of my all time favorite classic television shows is THE TWILIGHT ZONE. One of the best episodes was NIGHTMARE AT 20,000 FEET which was all about a gremlin that was trying to sabotage a plane. Of course the only passenger on the plane that could see what was going on was a very young William Shatner.

The origins of gremlins is an interesting one. According to Monsterpedia, gremlins are fictional mischievous creatures that are “mechanically oriented and extremely devious.” Because of their interest in mechanical things, gremlins came to be associated most commonly with aircraft. In fact, since 1942 Royal Air Force journals make mention of gremlins that were sabotaging airplanes.

Interest in gremlins appears to have spread after author Roald Dahl wrote his children’s book THE GREMLINS that was optioned by Disney, but never made into a motion picture. Eventually the characters in the story were optioned to Warner Bros. who used them in several World War II cartoons.

During World War II, many pilots complained of weird creatures sabotaging their planes and mechanics noted missing tools that were being hidden by the weird little creatures. Because of their association with planes, gremlins have even been incorporated in the logos of various air corps and patrols.

In recent times, people are more familiar with gremlins from the 1984 motion picture of the same name: GREMLINS. In that movie, gremlins were fuzzy adorable little creatures who turned into menacing and deadly demons if you failed to follow three little rules: never expose the gremlin to bright lights, never put it in water, and never feed it after midnight.

You can read more about gremlins here:

Monsterpedia: http://www.monstropedia.org/index.php?title=Gremlin
Wikimedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gremlin
GREMLINS, the movie: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gremlins_(film)