The Last Draft — Volume I
A: The 121 pages (61 leaves) Mary numbered 41 to 161 (accidentally
skipping 52, numbering two pages 58, and concluding with a blank page
161) (Rieger 30.13 ["servants had any request to make"] — 97.16 ["he
thus began his tale."]). Assuming that all but the last leaf of the first two
quires are lost, these surviving 61 leaves originally constituted the last leaf of
quire II through to leaf eight (now apparently the sixth leaf since leaves two
and three are missing) of the originally ten-leaved quire VIII (only quires V
and VII contained twelve leaves) of a bound notebook of Continental paper.
As usual Mary writes on both sides of each leaf. The light blue leaves (18.6
X 27 cm) of parts A and B, and probably Cr, all derive from the same
notebook; its leaves were separated at some point after their being written
on. The leaves originated as a quarto sheet; consequently the two
watermarks — "D | ADIVONNE" and a bell — are split across the
reconstructed folds. On each page a left
hand margin of varying widths has been created by a pencilled line. A number
of Percy's inserts and suggestions appear in these margins (as they do in the
ruled and unruled margins of parts B — D). Taking account of the
deducible pages 1 — 40, this part is sectioned by Mary into 15 chapters
(with two chapter 7's).[3]
Bruce C. Barker-Benfield's reconstruction of the notebook quires
indicates that leaves two and three of quire VIII (four pages before leaf 153
[3 altered from 7]/154) are missing because they were cancelled at
the time of writing (Barker-Benfield 4 — 5). Following nine cancelled lines
at the top of page 153 [3 altered from 7], a revision of the four and a
bit cancelled pages (corresponding to Rieger 93.21 ["it rose"] — 97.16)
continues through to the top of page 160 (approximately seven manuscript
pages which deal with Frankenstein's meeting with the monster prior to the
monster's central narrative).
A1: Insert material that appears on six unnumbered (by Mary) off-white
pages larger than the Part A pages. Inserted at points on pages 43 and 44 of
Part A above, it corresponds to Rieger 32.15 ("Natural philosophy is the
genius") — 35.2 ("their place in my mind.") and to Rieger 35.17 ("I eagerly
inquired") — 36.19 ("this various literature."). (Some of the first insert and
all of the second were deleted in the revised 1831 edition.) A Bodleian
librarian, the late Margaret Crum, in foliating in pencil all but one of the
Volume I manuscript leaves (the accidental exception is Mary's pages 91
— 92), numbered these insert leaves 1, 2, 3, and 3v and then foliated
Mary's Part A leaves (minus blank page 161) as 4 — 62, thereby giving the
accidental impression that the insert material was written before the
beginning of Part A. Part A1 must in fact have been written at some point
while Part A was being written, or at some later stage of the drafting/revision
process.[4] Part A1 consists of a folded sheet, a
bifolium (with a rectangular portion torn from the bottom
of the second leaf some time before Mary wrote on it), followed by a single
leaf of the same folio paper. All but the torn second leaf measure 20.2 x 31.6
cm. The centered watermark "T W & B | BOTFIELD" is visible on the
leaves foliated 1 and 3. A centered crowned oval Britannia watermark
incorporating the date "1815" is visible on the torn attached leaf 2. All the
watermarks are upside down relative to Mary's script. Most probably these
leaves of British paper were detached from the same folio notebook before
being written on. There are no margins; Mary writes flush to the left and
right hand edges of the page, on both sides of the leaves. This insert material
is headed "Chapt. 2". It seems likely, therefore (see note 3 above), that a
Chapter 1 portion of the missing forty pre-Part A pages corresponded to, or
stood in place of, the frame narrator Walton's four prefatory letters and that
Chapter 2 here corresponds to Chapter I (Volume One) of the 1818
edition.
