Frankenstein (1823) is a work by the British writer Mary Shelley. The novel has a very curious origin, as it arises from a literary competition between writer friends. In the summer of 1816, in fact, Mary Shelley was staying, along with John Polidori in the large house owned by Lord Byron near Lake Geneva: on a rainy day, the home owner challenged his friends to write the best horror story. Thus was born the myth of "Frankenstein". The story is told through the letters that Captain Walton writes to his sister to tell her about his mission to the North Pole:during this trip Walton meets Victor Frankenstein, a young Swiss interested in scientific studies. During the mission, however, Victor becomes more and more obsessed with the idea of giving life to inanimate matter.Victor spends months thus trying to create a living being assembled with body parts from corpses, which he studies at night by uncovering the graves of cemeteries. One night, finally, the creature comes to life but, when he sees the monster move, Frankenstein escapes in terror...
