Mary Shelley
Mary Shelley
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelleywas an English novelist, short story writer, dramatist, essayist, biographer, and travel writer, best known for her Gothic novel Frankenstein: or, The Modern Prometheus. She also edited and promoted the works of her husband, the Romantic poet and philosopher Percy Bysshe Shelley. Her father was the political philosopher William Godwin, and her mother was the philosopher and feminist Mary Wollstonecraft...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionAuthor
Date of Birth30 August 1797
bring cannot consist creating form humbly materials substance
Invention, it must be humbly admitted, does not consist in creating out of the void, but out of chaos; the materials must, in the first place, be afforded: it can give form to dark, shapeless substances, but cannot bring into being the substance itself.
alloy apply destroy human pleasures possibly simple study taste tendency
If the study to which you apply yourself has a tendency to weaken your affections, and to destroy your taste for those simple pleasures in which no alloy can possibly mix, then that study is not befitting the human mind.
agreeable dreams english-author
My dreams were at once more fantastic and agreeable than my writings.
agony allowed extract feelings food incident misery occurred rage
The agony of my feelings allowed me no respite; no incident occurred from which my rage and misery could not extract its food . . .
account accuse appear averse bringing confined connection english-author former forward hardly personal topics
I am very averse to bringing myself forward in print, but as my account will only appear as an appendage to a former production, and as it will be confined to such topics as have connection with my authorship alone, I can hardly accuse myself of a personal intrusion.
english-author
Teach him to think for himself? Oh, my God, teach him rather to think like other people!
describe haunted terrified terrify
What terrified me will terrify others; and I need only describe the spectre which had haunted my midnight pillow.
fix mind point steady
Nothing contributes so much to tranquilize the mind as a steady purpose - a point on which the soul may fix its intellectual eye.
bolt cease entered exhibit felt miserable others shall soon spectacle survive wrecked
But I am a blasted tree; the bolt has entered my soul; and I felt then that I should survive to exhibit what I shall soon cease to be - a miserable spectacle of wrecked humanity, pitiable to others and intolerable to myself.
consist humbly
Invention, it must be humbly admitted, does not consist in creating out of void, but out of chaos.
english-author life obstinate
Life is obstinate and clings closest where it is most hated.
affection bid death echo forth found grief hideous offspring true
And now, once again, I bid my hideous progeny go forth and prosper. I have an affection for it, for it was the offspring of happy days, when death and grief were but words, which found no true echo in my heart.
english-author nature soothing winds
The very winds whispered in soothing accents, and maternal Nature bade me weep no more.
appeared break dark death ideal life pour torrent
Life and death appeared to me ideal bounds, which I should first break through, and pour a torrent of light into our dark world.