We're starting a virtual book club! This April, read Frankenstein with Ilan Stavans and Restless Books.
On April 2 and 9, readers from Houston, Brooklyn, China, and beyond joined Ilan Stavans to talk Frankenstein. Here are recordings of their discussion:
On April 2 and 9, we’re meeting up on the internet to discuss Frankenstein, a story that’s familiar and yet endlessly strange, with an origin story practically ripped from the headlines of 2020: overwhelming natural phenomena, global disaster, social distancing.
When Mary Shelley conceived of Frankenstein, ash was raining down on Europe from one of the largest volcanic eruptions in history, blotting out the sun and leading to food shortages and mass starvation. Shelley herself was just a teenager, on the edge of poverty, mourning her dead infant and holed up in a house with her lover (who was married to someone else), her difficult stepsister, and Lord Byron’s ego. “One can hardly think of worse circumstances under which to create fiction than this ur–writers colony from hell,” observes Francine Prose in her introduction to our Restless Classics edition, “but Mary Shelley persevered.”
So why read Frankenstein now?
It’s an opportunity to lose ourselves in a winding, gripping, strange story from another time and place. It’s a chance to face head-on the monstrousness—and goodness—in all of us. And it’s a reminder of how one young woman managed to wrench art from unbearable pain, two hundred years ago. What more could we ask for from a book?
“One can hardly think of worse circumstances under which to create fiction than this ur–writers colony from hell, but Mary Shelley persevered.”
Our Restless Classics edition of Frankenstein is introduced by Francine Prose, with woodcut illustrations by Eko.
Here’s how to join us.
Acquire a copy of Frankenstein, if you don’t have one already. Now's an excellent time to buy from a local bookstore! Lots of brick-and-mortars are still fulfilling orders online; find one near you in this round-up put together by Literary Hub.
Meet with us for two online discussion sessions via Zoom, led by Ilan Stavans, our publisher and the Lewis-Sebring Professor of Humanities, Latin American and Latino Culture at Amherst College.
Mary Shelley’s Nightmares
When: Thursday, April 2 at 8 pm EST
What to read: the first half, through Chapter III of Vol. II
(pp. 13–135 in our edition)
The Monster in All of Us
When: Thursday, April 9 at 8 pm EST
What to read: the rest of it! (pp. 137–280 in our edition)
Join us on April 9 here:
https://amherstcollege.zoom.us/j/284128075?pwd=dVZ5ZTF0NDUvaXRKTzRRcWhJSGcydz09
Meeting ID: 284 128 075
Password: 004448
RSVP on Facebook here.
Those page numbers are suggestions but certainly not requirements, by the way. Maybe the last time you read Frankenstein was junior year of high school in [year redacted]—that’s fine! Anyone who wants to have a good book chat (or eavesdrop on one) is welcome.
Check out our free reading group guides.
Did you know that we have reading group guides to accompany you on your new adventures in collective reading? They're all free on our website here, including one for Frankenstein.
About the Book
About Ilan Stavans
© Kevin Gutting
Ilan Stavans is the Publisher of Restless Books and the Lewis-Sebring Professor of Humanities, Latin American and Latino Culture at Amherst College. His books include On Borrowed Words, Spanglish, Dictionary Days, The Disappearance, and A Critic’s Journey. He has edited The Norton Anthology of Latino Literature, the three-volume set Isaac Bashevis Singer: Collected Stories, The Poetry of Pablo Neruda, among dozens of other volumes. He is the recipient of numerous awards and honors, including a Guggenheim Fellowship, Chile’s Presidential Medal, the International Latino Book Award, and the Jewish Book Award. Stavans’s work, translated into twenty languages, has been adapted to the stage and screen. A cofounder of the Great Books Summer Program at Amherst, Stanford, Chicago, Oxford, and Dublin, he is the host of the NPR podcast "In Contrast."
by Mary Shelley
Introduction by Francine Prose
Illustrations by Eko
Video Lecture Series by Wendy Steiner
Restless Classics
With a new introduction by Francine Prose and stunning original artwork by Eko, the Restless Classics edition of Frankenstein brings Mary Shelley’s paragon of horror vividly back to life—published to coincide with the two-hundredth anniversary of the infamous night of its creation.
Deluxe Paperback • ISBN: 9781632060785
Publication date: June 14, 2016