The Sword and Laser discussion

A reminder, I'm doing these chapter-by-chapter topics for people who've never read Frankenstein before. No spoilers for future chapters (or at least use spoiler tags).

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Lots of unexpected stuff here. First of all, the huge diversion to Frankenstein's childhood. Well, I'm making an assumption since the opening letters lead us to assume this is Frankenstein recounting how he ended up on the ship. So interesting he's Genovese. Never seen a Frankenstein movie with an Italian accent. Usually it's German or Eastern European.

Interesting side-note given the step-mother trope in fiction: Frankenstein's uncle by marriage suggests that F's father raise F's cousin when the mother dies rather than having her raised by her step-mother.

Are you reading the 1818 or 1831 edition?

Trike wrote: "Are you reading the 1818 or 1831 edition?"

1818 since we're doing this for the 200th anniversary. Even though Tom is naughtily choosing the latter.

NPR’s Science Friday has run into the same conundrum.

This is a bit nitpicky, but being from Geneva, it would be more likely that Frankenstein is French, not Italian. Still, since this is Switzerland, it would not be completely uncommon that there would be some German influences. Frankenstein is a decidedly German name after all.

@anne oh, I thought Genoa (in Italy, right?) instead of Geneva. Thanks for the correction.

Frankenstein is born in Naples, but the family is from Geneva. A lot of the names and places are inspirations drawn from Mary Shelley's travels around Europe. She was in Geneva with friends when she first came up with the idea for the novel.

I believe later in the book, it does mention speaking French.