Choose one member of your group to act as a recorder. The recorder will be responsible for reporting on your group's discussion to the class at the end of the period. The recorder should read these instructions aloud to the group.
"The publishers of the Standard Novels, in selecting Frankenstein for one of their series, expressed a wish that I should furnish them with some account of the origin of the story. I am the more willing to comply, because I shall thus give a general answer to the question, so very frequently asked me--'How I, then a young girl, came to think of and to dilate upon so very hideous an idea?'" ("Author's Introduction," v.)
1. Adopt the viewpoint of Mary Shelley's early critics and argue that Frankenstein is not recognizable as the work of a woman writer. Identify as much evidence as you can to support this conclusion.
2. Now, adopt the opposite position and argue that Frankenstein is recognizable as the work of a woman writer. Identify as much evidence as you can to support this conclusion.
3. Finally, try to reach a consensus about whether or not Frankenstein is identifiable as the work of a woman writer. What evidence weighed most heavily with you in reaching this conclusion? If you are unable to reach a consensus, make a record of your differences
4. "And now, once again, I bid my hideous progeny to go forth and prosper." ("Author's Introduction," ix.) Why does Shelley refer to the novel as "my hideous progeny"? Who or what else in the novel might be described as someone's "hideous progeny"? What connection, if any, do you see between the story of Victor Frankenstein and his creature and the story about the composition of the novel that Shelley tells in the "Author's Introduction"?