William Godwin, Mary Wollstonecraft, Mary Shelley, and Their Offspring, Victor Frankenstein: A Family of Rebels PDF
Preview William Godwin, Mary Wollstonecraft, Mary Shelley, and Their Offspring, Victor Frankenstein: A Family of Rebels
WILLIAM GODWIN, MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT, MARY SHELLEY, AND THEIR OFFSPRING, VICTOR FRANKENSTEIN A Family of Rebels WILLIA~'I GODWIN, MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT, MARY SHELLEY, AND THEIR OFFSPRING, VICTOR FRANI<:ENSTEIN A Family of Rebels Gonlil Bakay With a Foreword by Mihaela Irimia The Edwin Mellen Press Lewiston* Lampeter Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Bakay, Gonnl. Title: William Godwin, Mary Wollstonecraft, Mary Shelley, and their offspring, Victor Frankenstein : a family of rebels I Gonnl Bakay ; with a foreword by Mihaela lrimia. Description: Lewiston, NY: The Edwin Mellen Press, 2016. I Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 20160108101 ISBN 9781495504525 (hardcover) I ISBN 1495504522 (hardcover) Subjects: LCSH: Godwin, William, 1756-1836-Family. I Wollstonecraft, Mary, 1759-1797-Family. I Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft, 1797-1851. Franlcenstein. I Authors, English-18th century-Biography. I Anarchism in literature. 1 Frankenstein, Victor (Fictitious character). I Frankenstein's monster (Fictitious character). Classification: LCC PR4723.B35 20161 DDC 828/.609 [B]--dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.aov/2016010810 hors serie. A CIP catalog record for this book is available from the British Library. o Copyright 2016 Gonnl Bakay All rights reserved. For information contact The Edwin Mellen Press The Edwin Mellen Press, Ltd Box450 Lampeter, Lewiston, New York Ceredigion, Wales USA 14092-0450 UNITED KINGDOM SA48 8LT Printed in the United States of America Table of Contents Foreword by Prof. Mihaela Irimia I m Preface Introduction 6 Chapter 1: The Apostle of Philosophical Anarchism: William Godwin 20 Godwin's General Philosophy 24 An Enquiry Concerning Political Justice 28 Reception ofP olitical Justice 38 Other Works 41 47 ~m Chapter 2: Mary Wollstonecraft 52 A Vindication oft he Rights ofWoman 58 Other Works 75 Chapter 3: Mary Shelley 85 Life 87 Other Works 92 Chapter 4: Frankenstein 105 Victor Frankenstein: The Making of a Fallen God 109 us Frankenstein's Monster or Victim? The Monster and His Creator 122 Feminist Criticism of Frankenstein 127 Conclusion 138 Works Cited .149 Index 151 FOREWORD Tile Long Eighteenth Century has been approached from such an amazing number and variety of critical stances and viewpoints 1hat even outstanding names like that of William Godwin, Mary WoUstonecraft, Mary Shelley and, indeed, Percy Bysshe Shelley have witnessed exciting revaluations in recent years. More than ever since the late 1990s, these have been of the engage critical agenda nature, whether in terms of Colonila!Postcolonial, Feminist or Cultural Identity Studies. Little wonder works by anti Establishment writers like the ones apprOOched in this book have kept leading positions on the current critical list. Tile present study carries as direct a title as it is indicative of cultural mutations at the individual and collective level: A Family of Rebels: William Godwin, Mary Wollstonecraft, Mary Shelley and Their Offspring, Victor Frankenstein. Its author, the distinguished intellectual and academic GooUl Bakay based in Istanbul and culturally alert to West(em)-East(ern) cultural relations, takes on board facts and details of the lives of the above-mentioned authors' only to pursue their surfucing and role in the literary life of their works, with special emphasis on subversive, progressive and alternative views advanced by their "family of rebels". Thus, the celebrated thinker and political philosopher William Godwin, his beloved fWlcee and, for too short a while, wife, Mary Wollstonecraft, their daughter, the remarkable Mary Shelley (nee Wollstonecraft Godwin) and the literary-cultural son of their symbolic family, Victor Frankenstein feature as a set of historical-cultural specimens able to impress and stir audiences at a time of revived gothic interest and curiosity fo:r the dark side of humanity's existence. I In so doing. OOOUI Bakay's book brings up the issue of anarchism, so much on the daily agenda of intemati~ life these days, the demographic question, again, from our vantage point, the problematic of political justice and, by the same token, feminine and fetninist identity issues in the context. These, alongside renewed fascination with gothic subjects, have kept critical attention and general awareness awake and have not fililed. to increase the numbers of those desirous to pursue their ~ mctual and actual deployment in our lives. It is from this particular perspective that this book can be read with a view to making the Long Eigbteefttb. Centmy an even longer and more exciting interval in our cultural history. I do not doubt but it will meet with exciting responses from its readers and critics and would like to recommend it to a variegated potential readership. Pntt: Milaaela lrimia, PhD University ofBadum.st n
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