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Frankenstein’s Creature

Mary Shelley, 1818 · fictional

Based on the author's description

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Frankenstein’s Creature

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From the author's text

Mostly myth. The famous flat head is cinema. Shelley’s creature is terrifying because he is almost human — but wrong in every detail.

What the author tells us

Victor Frankenstein’s created being. Shelley describes not a green brute, but a tall, assembled body with unsettling skin, hair, eyes, lips, and teeth.

“His yellow skin scarcely covered the work of muscles and arteries beneath... his watery eyes... his shrivelled complexion and straight black lips.”— Mary Shelley, Frankenstein (1818)

What the author leaves to the reader

The exact design of the body. The novel gives vivid features, but every reconstruction chooses how to interpret ‘almost human’.

Based on:

Shelley’s physical description · early 19th-century context

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Portrait

Frankenstein’s Creature

Portrait in preparation

Frankenstein’s Creature

Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus · Mary Shelley

Author text

Victor Frankenstein’s created being. Shelley describes not a green brute, but a tall, assembled body with unsettling skin, hair, eyes, lips, and teeth.

“His yellow skin scarcely covered the work of muscles and arteries beneath... his watery eyes... his shrivelled complexion and straight black lips.”— Mary Shelley, Frankenstein (1818)

Based on: Shelley’s physical description · early 19th-century contextFaceLore

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