1. How is the Romantic notion of the Sublime reflected in the ideological, conceptual and linguistic construction of the texts under consideration in this Romanticism reader? Discuss one or two examples...
2. Go online and see if you can find out anything about what really happened at the Villa Diodati that fateful summer in 1816...
3. How many fictional accounts (film and other narrative media) can you find about that? Provide some useful links, including Youtube clips (hint: for a start try Ken Russel Gothic on Youtube).
4. Discuss the links between the Villa Diodati "brat-pack" and the birth of Gothic as a modern genre with reference to specific texts by the authors who gathered there and subsequent texts (e.g. The Vampire >> Dracula, etc).
3. How many fictional accounts (film and other narrative media) can you find about that? Provide some useful links, including Youtube clips (hint: for a start try Ken Russel Gothic on Youtube).
4. Discuss the links between the Villa Diodati "brat-pack" and the birth of Gothic as a modern genre with reference to specific texts by the authors who gathered there and subsequent texts (e.g. The Vampire >> Dracula, etc).
3) How many fictional accounts (film and other narrative media) can you find about the Villa Diodati? Provide some useful links, including Youtube clips (hint: for a start try Ken Russel Gothic on Youtube).
ReplyDelete1. Gothic (Ken Russel)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2hl5Ee5_1E
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0091142/plotsummary?ref_=tt_ov_pl
2. The Real Percy Bysshe Shelley - 1816: The Message Of Villa Diodati (Graham Henderson)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mjJh4Azwz38
3. Villadiodati.com
http://www.villadiodati.nl/main.php
4. Haunted Summer (Ivan Passer)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FEw2P0hFI2k
5. Frankenstein (1910)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TcLxsOJK9bs
Good. Note there were many Frankenstein remakes!
Delete
ReplyDelete2. Go online and see if you can find out anything about what really happened at the Villa Diodati that fateful summer in 1816...
According to Jackson (2016), the true story of the Villa Diodati in 1816 involved a group of English travellers that went to the Hotel d’Angleterre that sat near Lake Geneva. Part of that group was poet, Percy Shelley and his mistress Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin (Later becoming Mary Shelley), and her step sister Clare Clairmont. Mary was suffering from travel sickness and also grief of her premature baby the previous year and Shelley had become ill due to emotional torment set from financial troubles. It was only weeks before that Clare had set her cap at Lord Byron and was also her that suggested they should go to Geneva with him. Mary agreed as she wanted to meet the poet.
At first Byron and Shelly were shy, but quickly found they had a lot in common and became inseparable. This caused the management of the Hotel d’Angleterre to feel as though they may cause a scandal. This meant they had to find somewhere else to stay. They moved to the Villa Diodati due to the bad weather as this was the closest place. Shelley later stated that the terrible weather kept them in the Villa for days, with their idea of entertaining each other was to tell ghost stories. Byron wrote a vampire story and Shelley a story inspired by her childhood. Listening to the poets stories caused Mary to suffer a night of insomnia. This lead to Mary writing in her dairy what came to be part of her novel ‘Frankenstein’.
During this time Polidori who was also present, was inspired through bitterness to write his novel ‘The Vampyre’. Once published many saw this novel as resembling Byrons “wicked adventures”. It became a bestseller and is what started the idea of a vampire being a nobel being rather than an unwanted disturbing demon, this alike with Bram Stoker’s ‘Dracula’.
Within 8 years, the members of the group tragically died apart from Mary who went on to live until 1851. She revisited the Villa Diodati, and decided to call herself “the companion of the dead”.
References:
Jackson, K. Prospect Magazine. (2016). The haunted summer of 1816. Retrieved from https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/arts-and-books/sumer-1816-frankenstein-shelley-byron-villa-diodati
The basics are here. Big volcanic eruption caused weird weather!
DeleteQuestion 4 and 1 combined:
ReplyDeleteThe Gothic genre was born from the minds of the “brat pack”, who were also the Romantics. Their stories including Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein were written during their time at the Villa Diodati in Switzerland. The “brat pack” or Romantics, consisted of Lord Byron, Percy Shelley, Mary Shelley, (spouses), Claire Clermont and John Polidori in 1816. Lord Byron set up a challenge for his guests; create the most horrifying story. This is how Frankenstein was born.
The idea of the “Sublime” is expressed through the gothic examples. Burke says “we find pleasure in the encounter with imagined or fictional pain.” As readers’ we go through the pain because we find pleasure in it. He says we are terrified by “the fear of pain, vastness, obscurity, powerful, infinite.” These poems and novels reflect these fearful proofs, therefore they are sublime.
Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is a story of terror; science’s ability to create a monster. The fear in this is not only the building of a monster coming to life but that there is unknown knowledge about what science can accomplish, especially regarding the time this novel was written, a monster very well could have been created through science.
Around at the time was the science of Galvanism being carried out on Europe. This was the investigation into putting electromagnetics into a living organism to see if this could spark muscles contractions. This was tested by using dissected frog legs. Scientist Luigi Galvani found that this did in fact work.
Included in Shelley’s work is the character of Frankenstein the creator, as being scared himself of what he is creating, furthermore he is scared of himself for coming up with this idea. This could also be a reference to Shelley herself, as she invented this terrifying story. This is what causes the reader to be scared as well. A fictional pain which brings pleasure. We want to be scared, in the way that Mary Shelley was scared, but excitement was what was driving her intentions.
Question 2 and 3
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p03h6wyh
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/3rvWSR2rhndMTylClzGzTDy/frankenstein-freak-events-that-gave-birth-to-a-masterpiece
This is a useful video that talks about the eruption in Indonesia, that had brought un-summer like weather with constant rain and cloud. Also mentions how Mary could not think of a story idea at first. She then had a nightmare which is where the idea came to her. They were having a conversation about “the principal of life” the night of, so is thought to be how the dream arose.
The video was on the website which has a whole story about the background of the “brat pack” and their visit to the Villa Diodati. The video also takes place in the very building, with a reporter from the BBC.
Good answer. What do you mean by: 'especially regarding the time this novel was written, a monster very well could have been created through science.' Also, the notion of the sublime has a wider definition than Burke's. Could we regard the novel as prophetic? And how does this interest on Gothic relate to the Romantic movement?
ReplyDeleteThanks Mike. i think what i meant is that during the 1800's when this novel was written, science such as galvanism and evolution were being developed, so Mary Shelley's imagination seemed not so wild. A monster could have been created through science, as scientists were proving immortality. Experimentation was being carried out as there was little knowledge about what science could do, so why not a monster made out of corpses.
ReplyDeleteThis could lead in to say that yes we could regard this novel as prophetic, as most of the science we know now was because of the discoveries and developments that were made generations ago. Not just biological science but engineering has been more highly formed. Mechanisms such as robots have been made through technology, as well as submarines and airplanes, which were created after this novel was written (1816).
Lastly this interest on Gothic relates to the Romantic movement in that, christianity and religions were no longer the dominance of western peoples thought. Gothic style was born from the Romantic movement and added to the movement, as it included science fiction which far from religious grounds.
A good answer, Caitlin
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ReplyDeleteQuestion 2
ReplyDeleteIt was the summer of 1816 but the weather was horrible with much rain, thunder and ugly skies. This was reportedly due to the volcanic eruption of Mt Tambora a year before in Indonesia during the month of April. The summer was cold and damp with darkness emerging much earlier than usual. Poet Lord Byron who was in Geneva that summer describes it in detail in his apocalyptic poem “Darkness” with lines such as “The bright sun was extinguish'd” and “Morn came and went—and came, and brought no day”("Darkness by Lord Byron (George Gordon) | Poetry Foundation," n.d.). Percy Shelley, another poet along with his partner Mary Godwin who is now better know as Mary Shelley travelled with their son William to Geneva also that fateful summer. Alongside them was Mary’s stepsister Claire Claremont who was pregnant at the time with Lord Byron’s baby.
Within the first week and a bit of Percy and Mary’s arrival, Lord Byron made his grand entrance taking up a hotel in a Napoleonic carriage with Doctor Polidori who was his physician at the time. The following day, Percy and Byron met for the first time and right away the two ditched their hotels and moved into two properties near each other. Byron and his physician stayed at the Villa Diodati, which was formerly owned by famous poet John Milton whilst Percy and his family stayed at a small chalet named Montalegere. Most days were spent indoors discussing literary projects well into the late night while the rain fell heavily outside. The Villa Diodati became a discussion forum about galvanism as well as the principles of animation. Mary talks about being a silent listener of these discussions in the preface of her 1831 Frankenstein edition. “Many and long were the conversations between Lord Byron and Shelley to which I was a devout but nearly silent listener. During one of these, various philosophical doctrines were discussed, and among others the nature of the principle of life, and whether there was any probability of its ever being discovered communicated”("Mary Shelley, Frankenstein and the Villa Diodati - The British Library," n.d.). It was here where Mary’s sudden interest in anatomy, galvanism and the spark of life, ignited a flame of imagination, which soon led to the nightmare that her famous novel Frankenstein is based off.
On one particular night, Lord Byron suggested the idea of ghost story writing. At first, Mary was stuck and could not seem to conjure up anything horrid enough to write about. However, she later had a nightmare that would change her life forever. She recalls in her preface… “I saw with shut eyes but acute mental vision, I saw the pale student of unhallowed arts kneeling beside the thing he had put together… I saw the hideous phantasm of a man stretched out and then on the workings of some powerful engine show signs of life and stir with an uneasy half vital motion… he sleeps but he is awakened, he opens his eyes, behold the horrid thing stands at his bedside opening his curtains and looking on him with yellow watery but speculative yes, I opened mine in terror"(Mary Shelley’s conception of Frankenstein - The Secret Life of Books - BBC Four, n.d.). This was the birth of Frankenstein, which was one of the many horrors that were conjured that fateful summer.
References
http://www.bargaintraveleurope.com/08/Switzerland_Villa_Diodoti_Geneva.htm
https://www.bl.uk/romantics-and-victorians/articles/mary-shelley-frankenstein-and-the-villa-diodati
https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/arts-and-books/sumer-1816-frankenstein-shelley-byron-villa-diodati
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poems/detail/43825
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VM1D_xUjuOE
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ReplyDeleteQuestion 3
ReplyDelete1. Frankenstein (1910) - http://www.watchfree.to/watch-5a54-Frankenstein-movie-online-free-putlocker.html
2. Gothic (1986) (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N8qH_3qk_dY)
3. Frankenstein (1931) - https://archive.org/details/Frankenstein1931_877
4. Haunted summer (1988) - Movie (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TQwwVThTuZM)
5. Frankenstein (1970) - http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x22bux9_frankenstein-1970_shortfilms
6. How to make a monster - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dn0XIINjVlg