Valperga
by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
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Not reprinted since its first edition, Mary Shelley's second novel is sure to be a major discovery of the Mary Shelley bicentenary of 1997. The novel's lack of success as a follow-up to Frankenstein was the result of its subject matter and unconventional approach to the genre of historicalfiction, attributes that can only delight the twentieth-century reader. Shelley's mastery of the intricate details of thirteenth-century Tuscan politics is unique among women of her time, and her resolute show more filtering of the bloody heroics of the age through the sensibilities of two women who aredestroyed by them reveals the feminist perspective missing so conspicuously from her first novel. The latest addition to the acclaimed Women Writers in English series, this glittering novel from Romanticism's premier woman storyteller belongs on the shelves of all serious readers of Englishfiction. show lessTags
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Member Reviews
Read for a graduate seminar on Romantic Era women writers at CU Boulder.
This was a sprawling, ambitious novel. And while parts of it were downright boring, other parts were equally interesting. I can't imagine the research and labor that went into putting such a detailed story together- so I give it three stars for that alone.
Would I recommend it to friends? Maybe, if you're up for a bit of torture and not a lot of reward. It takes a plethora of precursory knowledge to understand and is a very slow, involved read.
This was a sprawling, ambitious novel. And while parts of it were downright boring, other parts were equally interesting. I can't imagine the research and labor that went into putting such a detailed story together- so I give it three stars for that alone.
Would I recommend it to friends? Maybe, if you're up for a bit of torture and not a lot of reward. It takes a plethora of precursory knowledge to understand and is a very slow, involved read.
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Author Information
439+ Works 73,808 Members
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley was born in England on August 30, 1797. Her parents were two celebrated liberal thinkers, William Godwin, a social philosopher, and Mary Wollstonecraft, a women's rights advocate. Eleven days after Mary's birth, her mother died of puerperal fever. Four motherless years later, Godwin married Mary Jane Clairmont, bringing show more her and her two children into the same household with Mary and her half-sister, Fanny. Mary's idolization of her father, his detached and rational treatment of their bond, and her step-mother's preference for her own children created a tense and awkward home. Mary's education and free-thinking were encouraged, so it should not surprise us today that at the age of sixteen she ran off with the brilliant, nineteen-year old and unhappily married Percy Bysshe Shelley. Shelley became her ideal, but their life together was a difficult one. Traumas plagued them: Shelley's wife and Mary's half-sister both committed suicide; Mary and Shelley wed shortly after he was widowed but social disapproval forced them from England; three of their children died in infancy or childhood; and while Shelley was an aristocrat and a genius, he was also moody and had little money. Mary conceived of her magnum opus, Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus, when she was only nineteen when Lord Byron suggested they tell ghost stories at a house party. The resulting book took over two years to write and can be seen as the brilliant creation of a powerful but tormented mind. The story of Frankenstein has endured nearly two centuries and countless variations because of its timeless exploration of the tension between our quest for knowledge and our thirst for good. Shelley drowned when Mary was only 24, leaving her with an infant and debts. She died from a brain tumor on February 1, 1851 at the age of 54. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
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Common Knowledge
- Original publication date
- 1823
- Important places*
- Lucca, Toscane, Italië; Toscane, Italië
*Some information comes from Common Knowledge in other languages. Click "Edit" for more information.
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Statistics
- Members
- 172
- Popularity
- 190,950
- Reviews
- 1
- Rating
- (3.83)
- Languages
- English, French, Italian
- Media
- Paper, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 28
- ASINs
- 3
