Episode 3: Frankenstein: Revisited with Brian Gutierrez

Forever Curious: An Osher Lifelong Learning Institute Podcast

The Osher Lifelong Learning Institute is renowned for its extraordinary lecture series, and this episode is no exception. In this talk, Frankenstein expert Brian Gutierrez, PhD, delves into the history behind the famous novel and how it continues to have resonance today.

Brian Gutierrez has particular expertise in poets and writers of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Gothic literature and drama was the most lucrative and popular literature of the time, making it fertile ground for stories such as Frankenstein.

In June of 1816, a group of writers and poets whose names you would probably recognize were gathered together in Geneva and bored by the wet and wearisome weather. They decided a ghost story telling competition would be a great way to past time. Two centuries later, I think most of us would award Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin (later Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley) the Grand Prize.

It turns out to have been a truly wonderful way to pass time, not only for them but for readers (and TV and film and theatre lovers) ever since, since 18-year-old Mary created the story that would become Frankenstein: or, The Modern Prometheus.

There's so much more to the story and the culturally iconic monster than most of us know — but how did a teenager create such a timeless work of fiction? And how did her novel morph into the monster story we are familiar with today?

Join Brian for this fascinating deep dive into the origins and evolution of one of the most re-made and re-told stories of all time. And be sure to tune in for the next episode, in which it's the lecturer's turn to reveal his own story and fascination with Gothic literature.

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Forever Curious is produced by Audiotocracy Podcast Production.