> Skip to content
[]
Play sample
  • Published: 4 August 2008
  • ISBN: 9781408499139
  • Imprint: BBC DL
  • Format: Audio Download
  • Length: 2 hr 0 min
  • Narrators: Michael Maloney, John Wood

Frankenstein

Or The Modern Prometheus




Michael Maloney stars in this dark, brooding dramatisation of Mary Shelley's famous novel.

Frankenstein, first published in 1818, is widely recognised as being one of the first 'science fiction' novels. Starring Michael Maloney as Frankenstein and John Wood as the Creature, this spine-tingling dramatisation perfectly conveys the book's pervasive sense of unease and dread.

Victor Frankenstein, an ambitious young scientist and seeker after knowledge, considers it the pinnacle of his career when he makes a Creature in his own name. But his triumph soon turns to horror, and he is appalled when the Creature, denied a female counterpart, turns against his creator and commits a terrible crime. In a desperate attempt to destroy his creation, the scientist tracks him from Europe to the desolate North Pole, and in this bleak landscape of ice and fog, prepares to confront his nemesis...

  • Published: 4 August 2008
  • ISBN: 9781408499139
  • Imprint: BBC DL
  • Format: Audio Download
  • Length: 2 hr 0 min
  • Narrators: Michael Maloney, John Wood

Other books in the series

Russian Thinkers
The New Penguin Book Of American Short Stories, From Washington Irving To Lydia Davis
When You Are Old
The Black Tulip
The Lady of the Camellias
The Good Soldier
Selected Poetry
Venus in Furs
Man and Superman
Military Dispatches
The Prelude

About the author

Mary Shelley

Mary Shelley was born in London in 1797, the daughter of two of the era’s most radical writers: William Godwin, the anarchist utopian, and feminist Mary Wollstonecraft, who died from the childbirth. After a difficult childhood under a demanding stepmother, she ran off to the Continent at age 17 with her father’s wealthy—and married—benefactor, the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, although they did not get married until the suicide of Shelley’s wife two years later. Despite close intellectual bonds the marriage was unhappy, due to Percy Shelley’s regular campaigning for open “utopian” sexual relationships (with her sister, for one), and the deaths of three out of their four children. In 1817, while visiting Lord Byron at Lake Geneva, the three challenged one another to write a horror story. The result from Mary was the novel Frankenstein, an instant popular (although not critical) success. Four years later her peripatetic husband drowned in a boating accident. Mary Shelley never remarried, but she continued on as a successful writer until her death in London in 1851.

Also by Mary Shelley

See all

Praise for Frankenstein

wonderful retelling of the timeless, classic story. The acting is uniformly impressive, as are the sound effects.

Nick Smithson, www.sci-fi-online.com