University of Virginia Library

II

Before proceeding further, it is necessary to relate an analysis of the Frankenstein Last Draft to the scanty information provided by Mary's journal entries and one letter — and to the quite divergent reconstructions of the composition process based on those documentary sources — in order to determine (1) whether the process of "composition" (which should be variously understood in relation to the Last Draft as including transcription, new composition, re-drafting, and revision) corresponded to the order of the published story, and (2) approximately what portions of the story were written when. I begin with a review of the documentary evidence.

Unfortunately, Mary's journal for the period 14 May — 20 July 1816, in the latter half of which period Frankenstein was begun, is missing. The anonymous Preface to the 1818 edition (written, according to Mary's 1831 Introduction, by Percy from his wife's point of view) simply refers to the

now familiar ghost-story compact (proposed by Byron according to Mary's more expansive Introduction to the 1831 edition) as occurring during "the summer of 1816 in the environs of Geneva" (Rieger 7). From information provided by Thomas Moore, Byron's biographer (confirmed by related entries in John Polidori's diary), it is clear that the compact must have been initiated at Byron's residence, the Villa Diodati (Moore 2: 31). Since Byron did not move into the Villa Diodati until 10 June 1816, and since his contribution, an unfinished vampire story, is dated 17 June 1816, the compact must have been proposed between those two dates. 16 June would appear to be the most likely date. In her 1831 Introduction Mary records that for several days she was unable to think of a story until, the night following a discussion about "the nature of the principle of life" (Rieger 227), she experienced the waking dream that inspired her: "On the morrow I announced that I had thought of a story. I began that day with the words, It was on a dreary night of November, making only a transcript of the grim terrors of my waking dream" (Rieger 228).[12] Since Percy Shelley and Byron left for a week's tour of Lac Léman on 22 June, Mary must have begun her story on that day at the latest — more probably a day or two earlier — in order to make her announcement.[13] The words she began with open Chapter IV of Book One of the 1818 edition.

In the 1831 Introduction, Mary writes, "At first I thought but of a few pages — of a short tale; but Shelley urged me to develop the idea at greater length" (Rieger 228 — 229). It seems reasonable to suppose that Percy made this suggestion around 22 June before he left for the tour of Lac Léman, or (less likely) shortly after returning on 30 June. Subsequently, at least the first line and probably other portions of the first composition stage of Frankenstein (the "transcript") were incorporated into a preliminary draft or preliminary drafts and eventually into the surviving Last Draft. Although the Last Draft might seem to constitute a second composition stage, it actually constitutes a third (one which incorporates the first and second stages).

In the surviving journal, which begins on 21 July 1816 (when Percy and

Mary and her stepsister Claire Claremont set off for a week's tour of Chamonix, a location which figures importantly in the novel), the first reference to Frankenstein appears (during the tour) in the entry for 24 July: "I read nouvelle nouvelles [Nouveaux contes moraux et nouvelles historiques (1802), by Madame de Genlis] and write my story . . ." (I: 118). Subsequent references to her writing (most probably Frankenstein) in Switzerland appear in entries for 29 July; 1, 5, 7, 9, 12, 16 — 22 (on the 21st she adds, "Shelley & I talk about my story" [I: 130]), 24, and 25 August 1816. Further references to her writing when back in England occur in entries for 16 and 18 September; 7, 17 — 27 (the last entry specifying, "Write Ch. 2 ½" [of the Last Draft Volume I or Volume II?] [I: 142]), and 28 October; 2 — 4, 6, 9, 11, 13, 15 — 18, 20 ("Draw and write (137)" [Mary's parenthetical number; I: 146] — presumably "137" refers to page 137 of the Last Draft but is it page 137 of Volume I or of Volume II?), 21 — 30 November; 1 — 11, and 13 December 1816; and 3 — 8, and 10 January 1817. A synoptic entry following 23 February 1817 and written, at the very latest, on 9 April 1817, includes this information: "the following week we enter our house [March 18] — Write every day" (I: 166). Presumably this means she wrote every day after moving into Albion House in Marlow and before her father William Godwin's visit on 2 April. The more than two month period after 10 January and before 19 March 1817 where no mention is made of any writing strongly suggests that the Last Draft had reached at least a first stage of completion by 10 January 1817. Since the entry for 10 April 1817 begins "Correct F." (I: 166) — the first of several such — it may be concluded that, after various second and third thoughts, perhaps prompted by Percy and other readers of her manuscript, Mary had certainly finished the Last Draft of Frankenstein before that date; most probably it was completed by 1 April, the day before Godwin's visit.

Two of the entries that I have parenthetically speculated about above call for further comment. The 27 October 1816 entry regarding "Ch. 2 ½" is followed on 28, 29, and 30 October, and on 2 and 4 November by references to Mary's reading Sir Humphry Davy's "Chemistry" (I: 142 — 144) — whether his Elements of Chemical Philosophy (1812) or his Discourse, Introductory to A Course of Lectures on Chemistry (1802; see Laura E. Crouch's argument for the latter), or both. If, as seems likely, this reading was undertaken to help with her writing at the time, the "Ch. 2 ½" reference must be to Volume I of the Last Draft. Most immediately, "Ch. 2 ½" might be identified as either the insert material headed "Chapt. 2" (Part A1) that deals with the contest between ancient "science" (as represented by Cornelius Agrippa, Albertus Magnus, and Paracelsus) and the modern science of chemistry, or, as might seem more likely, all of an original Chapter 2 (i.e., "3," altered from "2" [p. 47]) plus half of the next chapter, a chapter, originally undesignated, which later became Last Draft Chapter 4. Like Part A1, Chapter 4 (the last half of Chapter II of Volume One in the 1818 edition) deals with the contest between alchemy and chemistry (as it arises from Frankenstein's contact with professors Krempe and Waldman) (pp. 55 — 59; Rieger 40.19 — 43.30). Chapter number "2" in the Last Draft is altered to "3" in what appears to be the same

revision ink — the revision ink in which other changes on the same pages are made — as the designation "Chap. 4" (p. 55).

In pursuit of further insight into "Ch. 2 ½" as transcribed in the 1987 edition of Mary's journals, I examined the journal itself (Bodleian Dep. d. 211 [2]) and the actual reference. What Mary actually wrote was "Write Ch. 2 [altered from 3]½" (noted under "Words Obscuring Recovered Matter," Journals II: 700). The alteration is visible to the naked eye and beyond all doubt when examined under a magnifying glass. In spite of the fact that the "2" of Chapter 2 was altered to a "3" (Vol. I, p. 47) and that in the journal the reverse amendment apparently took place, the fact that the same numbers are involved makes it a well-nigh certainty that the confused "Ch. 2 [altered from 3]½" refers to "Chapter 3 [altered from 2]" plus its originally non-chapter-designated continuation. What became "Chap. 4" in the Last Draft is the half chapter. "Ch. 3 [altered from 2]½" could, of course, reasonably be understood as referring only to the half chapter following Chapter 2, in which case it denotes only what became "Chap. 4."

The common content strongly suggests that the Part A1 insert material was written with "Chap. 4" in mind and possibly shortly after "Chap. 4." If a chapter and a half, or even just the half chapter, comprising early pages of the Continental paper, were/was written/transcribed in just one day, it is likely that the preceding one or two chapters was/were written/transcribed during the two or three days immediately preceding 27 October 1816.

If what appears to be a page number in the entry for 20 November 1816 does indeed apply to a page of the Last Draft, it could refer to Part A page 137 of Volume I (corresponding to Rieger 84.16 ["may this be"] — 84.28]) or Part D page 137 of Volume II (corresponding to Rieger 174.14 ["neck, and screamed"] — 175.3 ["characterize that"]). The first page 137 marks the end of Chapter 11, Volume I of the Last Draft (and the end of Volume One of the 1818 edition) — it deals with Frankenstein's fiancée, Elizabeth, reconciling herself to the servant Justine's unjust execution. The second page 137, which is part of the account of Frankenstein's imprisonment in Ireland for murder, occurs several pages into Chapter 14, Volume II of the Last Draft (Chapter IV, Volume Two of the 1818 edition). Combined with the evidence regarding the placement of "Ch. 3 [altered from 2]½," it would seem most likely that the climactic Volume I page 137 is being referred to (making that page and the "Ch. 3 [altered from 2]½" pages the only passages from Frankenstein that can be dated with precision). The sad death of Justine might well have reminded Mary of the sad suicide of her half-sister Fanny Imlay on the ninth day of the month before she made the journal entry including the number "137."[14]

It would seem logical to deduce, then, that between 27 October and 20 November 1816, and most probably for a couple of days before and rather more after these dates, Mary was working on Volume I of the Last Draft,

that back in England Mary was transcribing/revising/composing on the Continental paper (whether that paper was acquired in England or, as is much more likely, in Switzerland), and that she had not transcribed, etc., any part of Volume II of the Last Draft before those dates — specifically during the early period back in England (say 16 September — 24 October 1816) — into a British notebook acquired shortly after her arrival in Bath. With regard to the last, however, one should allow for the seemingly less likely hypothesis, that in late October and throughout November she turned to Volume I after having written a substantial portion of Last Draft Volume II.

As I have indicated, 5 December 1816 was one of the days that Mary records doing some writing. A letter of the same day from Mary in Bath to Percy in Marlow contains what, as will become increasingly clear in the context of my reconstruction, is undoubtedly the most illuminating specific documentary reference to the writing of Frankenstein. It begins:

One should note here the phrase "the 4 Chap." instead of simply "Chap. 4." The article may imply that Percy would have aware of the material that she was referring to, perhaps because she had drafted an earlier version of it and that version was not satisfactory. Mary's stressing the length of this new chapter is probably related to Percy's now faint and hard to read pencilled marginal comment on the preceding Chapter 2: "This chapter is too short" (Vol. II, p. 11). In quoting the Chapter 4 reference in a note to Mary's 5 December 1816 journal entry, the normally perspicacious editors Paula R. Feldman and Diana Scott-Kilvert make an extraordinary mistake. They provide this clarification: "In chapter iv Frankenstein succeeds in discovering the cause of generation and life" (I: 148 n5). Ray Hammond in The Modern Frankenstein makes the same mistake regarding the same chapter allusion: "The fourth chapter of Mary's novel is the crucial scene-setting for Victor Frankenstein's creation. It is in this chapter that he describes his long work of raiding graves, visiting charnel houses and abattoirs to collect the materials for the creature he is to make" (170). Hammond, and Feldman and Scott-Kilvert, are all referring to Chapter IV of the 1831 edition (which is one of the shorter chapters in the book). They should, of course, be referring to Chapter 4 in the Last Draft, whether in Volume I or II. Chapter 4 of Volume I (which I have identified as the half of "Ch. 2 [altered from 3]½") is very very short (it corresponds, as previously noted, to Rieger 40.18 — 43.30). Mary must be referring in her letter to Chapter 4 of Volume II of the Last Draft. As I have conjectured in section I above, in its prior form this Chapter 4 (the last rewritten half of which survives as Part Cr) would presumably have

corresponded to chapters V and VI (the second corresponding to the rewritten Cr) of Volume Two of the 1818 edition — the story of Felix and Safie, the heart of the monster's narrative (itself the book's central narrative, framed as it is by Frankenstein's narrative, and the outermost Walton context).

It is possible that the unsatisfactory version of "the 4 Chap." that Mary, it may be, implicitly asks Percy to recall in her 5 December letter was transcribed (or drafted) in the latter pages of what could be the lost sixty-one pages of the British notebook. My hypothesis here is that for the Last Draft Mary began with the notion of drafting Volume I in the Continental notebook, and Volume II in the British notebook, but because the opening 61 and a bit pages in the British notebook was rethought, she followed Volume I in the Continental notebook with a revised version of all, or some of, the opening chapters of Volume II. In that case, Volume II "Chapter 4" in the Continental notebook would have replaced a series of pages (constituting one or more chapters) that ended ten pages before the surviving portion of "Chapter 6" in the British notebook.

Although there is no evidence of work on Frankenstein between 11 January and 18 March 1817, every journal entry from 10 April through to 17 April 1817 begins with the notation "Correct F" (I: 166 — 168). Entries for 18 — 25, and 29 April, and 3 and 9 May, record the act of transcribing the Fair Copy, culminating on 13 May 1817 with the words "Finish transcribing" (I: 169) — the entry for 29 April adding "and correct F" (I: 168). The last journal entry relevant to the composition of Frankenstein is for Wednesday, 14 May 1817: "S. reads hist of Fr Rev. [Précis historique de la Révolution française (1792) by Jean-Paul Rabaut Sainte-Étienne and Charles-Jean Dominique de Lacratelle] and corrects F. write Preface — Finis" (I: 169).[16]

There have been two very different attempts to reconstruct the process of Frankenstein's composition based on the facts assembled above: M. K. Joseph's "The Composition of Frankenstein," Appendix A to his 1969 edition of the 1831 text, and Emily W. Sunstein's much more expansive account in her biography of Mary Shelley, a 1989 winner of the Modern Language Association Prize for Independent Scholars.

Joseph narrows the starting date for Frankenstein to between 10 (or possibly 13) June and 22 June 1816, and goes on to point out that, sometime thereafter, Mary's original short story conception

The journal indicates further writing in late March not February but what is particularly significant about this account is Joseph's assertion that Frankenstein was "virtually complete" by late December 1816.

According to Sunstein, Frankenstein was only half done by that time. Her much more detailed reconstruction is characterized by a reliance on dogmatic assertion rather than argument; guesses are thereby passed off as facts. For Sunstein the novel was begun on the "morning after the poets sailed off" around the lake (122), i.e., on 23 June 1816. As I have indicated, the five sources — Polidori's diary, the 1818 Preface, Mary's 1824 letter to John Cam Hobhouse, Thomas Moore's 1830 life of Byron, and Mary's 1831 Introduction — do not allow for such precision. After the Chamonix tour, the Shelley party returned "to Chapuis [the Maison Chapuis, where they were staying] on July 27 . . . next day Mary observed the second anniversary of her elopement and continued her story" (Sunstein 123 — 124). Actually, Mary does not record any writing in her journal until the day after that, 29 July. After 21 August — the day "Shelley & I talk about my story" (Journals I: 130) — "Thanks to his 'incitement' she decided to make it into a full-length novel" (Sunstein 124). For Sunstein, this short-story version was written in Switzerland and the novel version after the return to England in September. As I have argued, I think it much more likely that the expansion decision occurred around 22 June (or shortly after 30 June). There is no logical connection between Mary's journal entry for 21 August and the conclusion that Sunstein draws from it. Having settled in Bath since to September 1816, "On October 18 Mary launched full into Victor's [i.e., Victor Frankenstein's] early life, and in ten days noted completing 'Chap. 2 ½' with his mother's death and his departure for Ingolstadt University" (Sunstein 127). Since the half refers to "Chap. 4" of Rough Draft Volume I, Mary had actually completed a bit more, namely her account of Frankenstein's conversion to modern science at the instigation of professors Kempe and Waldman. (And hence Mary's recourse to the work of Sir Humphry Davy around this time.) According to Sunstein, Mary "finished Volume I on November 20 . . ." (127). Sunstein does not explain that her evidence here is the "[137]" journal entry, and the Volume I she is referring to here is not, as one would expect, Volume I of the Last Draft but the rather different Volume One of the 1818 edition.

Mary, claims Sunstein, then switched to the "longer sheets" (127) that constitute my Part D of the Last Draft, in spite of the fact that chapters 13 and 14 of Volume I and chapters 1 — 4 of Volume II of the Last Draft intervene between page 137 of Volume I and Part D. Presumably she is assuming the existence of at least thirty-one longer leaves — 61 pages — now lost. "On December 5 Shelley left to look for a house at Marlow" and "Mary was finishing Chapter IV [of the Last Draft] of Volume II [of the 1818 edition]" (128). Here Sunstein has more or less correctly understood the reference to the "very long" Chapter 4 of Frankenstein in Mary's letter to Percy; she realizes (unlike Feldman and Scott-Kilvert, and Hammond) that Mary was writing about Chapter 4 in Volume II of the surviving draft, not Volume I.

Sunstein explains in a note that "This very long chapter was revised. The present Chapter VI of Volume II [of the 1818 edition] was originally V" (431 n37). Sunstein is in the right vicinity but, as I have explained, the revised draft "Chapter 5" (seemingly Percy's "another Chapter") or 1818 Chapter VI involved, was most probably previously part of a very long Chapter 4. She goes on to assert, "The morning after Shelley's return, December 15, . . . Mary was about halfway through Frankenstein . . ." (128). Sunstein has assumed, because Chapter VI of Volume Two of the 1818 edition marks roughly the halfway point, that the manuscript material which Mary drafted between 3 January 1817 (when Sunstein asserts, "Mary Shelley recommenced Frankenstein at about the point where the monster is driven off by the horrified De Lacys [a spelling at Rieger 128.17 which replaces the previous 'De Lacey']" [129]) and 9 April 1817 (the day Sunstein claims that Mary reached "the end of the last volume" [131]), corresponds to the second half of the 1818 edition, i.e., Chapter VII of Volume Two through to the end of Volume Three.

So, on the one hand, Joseph (who consulted a microfilm of what he calls accurately enough the "rough copy" [xv]) claims that Frankenstein was about done by late December 1816 while, on the other, Sunstein (who examined the actual Last Draft but apparently believed it to be the original rough draft of the novel) claims that Mary was only halfway there. Who is correct? For the moment I note only that Mary's extant journal records writing on 63 days in 1816 beginning on 24 July. To that figure must be added an unknown number of days between 22 June (at the latest) and 20 July 1816 (a period for which Mary's journal is missing). If Mary wrote every day during that period, her total of potential Frankenstein writing days in 1816 amounts to ninety-two (forty-eight of which apply to the period back in England). This plausible number should be weighed against the ambiguously recorded possible twenty-one days of potential Frankenstein writing in 1817. That figure includes the period when she claims to have written "every day" — presumably 19 March — 1 April 1817. That period was followed by a visit from William Godwin (2 — 6 April), and whatever dates in early April applied to "A[lba] comes. C.[laire] has been with us a week before" (Alba was Claire's baby daughter by Byron; Journals I: 166). The figures here are obviously in Joseph's favour.[17] It remains to determine, on the basis of altered character names in the Last Draft, the likelihood as to whether or not that draft was written, as Sunstein for the most part assumes, in the narrative order of the 1818 edition (only the initial Walton frame letters were added out of that order according to Sunstein [126]). If Sunstein's hypothesis

is false, it would be possible to account for Mary's writing a midpoint chapter in December 1816 and essentially completing the Last Draft of the novel around the same time.