Who wrote Frankenstein?
Sir – I see that University of Delaware professor Charles Robinson has written a new book, The Original Frankenstein, in which he identifies 5,000 changes made to Mary Shelley’s manuscript by her husband (report, August 25). Professor Robinson claims that Frankenstein should therefore be credited: “Mary Shelley with Percy Bysshe Shelley”. I disagree. Prof Robinson is one of the most highly respected experts on Mary Shelley and I depended upon him for my research for Requiem for the Author of Frankenstein, a novel on the life of Mary Shelley. Clearly Shelley edited Mary’s manuscript. However, I would argue that Shelley was Mary’s editor in the same way that Gordon Lish was Raymond Carver’s. The demands the publishing industry makes on authors fall into a shady area. Prof Robinson’s research opens a discussion on the nature of the author/editor relationship. Until that conversation takes place, it seems unfair to assert that Shelley should be listed as a co-author. It is also worth notin
Who wrote Frankenstein?