The Parallel Lives

Two movies were released this past November, “Frankenstein” on the 7th, and “Hamnet” on the 26th. Both were based, in part, on well-known fictional works from previous centuries, Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein; or the Modern Prometheus,” and William Shakespeare’s “Hamlet.”

     Mary Shelley, girlfriend, lover, and future wife of the poet Percy Shelley, began writing her Gothic horror novel, “Frankenstein,” in the summer of 1816, when just 18.

      The English poet Lord Byron had suggested that she, and Percy Shelley, and a group of like-minded literary artists should each try to write a ghost story that summer while the writers enjoyed the rainy, cool summer days near Lake Geneva in Switzerland.

     In mid-June, Mary’s imagination kept her awake. She wondered, “Perhaps a corpse would be reanimated. Galvanism had given token of such things.” 

     She later wrote, “I saw the pale student of unhallowed arts kneeling beside the thing he had put together. I saw the hideous phantasm of a man stretched out, and then, on the working of some powerful engine, show signs of life, and stir with an uneasy, half vital motion.”

     Mary Shelley finished her fictional tale of Victor Frankenstein—a surgeon, and his recreated  being built from a body—in 1817, when she turned 20. The novel was published in 1818, in three volumes, but without Mary’s name listed as author. It was “an overwhelming success.”

     Guillermo del Toro, a filmmaker, author, and artist from Mexico, has filmed the latest of untold numbers of film adaptations. Del Toro is drawn to monsters, Gothic stories, and horror.

     Del Toro says, “There is a difference between eye candy and eye protein. Eye candy is just pretty, but eye protein is telling a story, and it is pretty.”

     Maggie O’Farrell is a writer from Northern Ireland, part of the United Kingdom. The copper-colored hair, blue eyes, and fair skin indicate Irish ancestry.

     In 2020, Maggie published “Hamnet: A Novel of the Plague,” during the covid pandemic, to universal acclaim. The “New York Times Book Review” named it one of the five best works of fiction that year, and O’Farrell won the U.K.’s “Women’s Prize for Fiction” that year.

     Historians acknowledge that William Shakespeare married Anne Hathaway in November 1582, when he was 18, and she 26. Six months later, in May 1583, Anne gave birth to Susanna.

     Then, in February of 1585, Anne gave birth to twins: a second daughter named Judith, and a son Hamnet. William relocated to London, where he luxuriated in a phenomenal success as a poet, playwright, and actor at the Globe Theater.

     Anne remained at home in Stratford-on-the Avon, carrying on with the duties of raising three children alone. In August of 1596, William and Anne suffered a “devastating loss” when Hamnet died at age 11, perhaps due to the bubonic plague, although the exact cause is not known.

     Maggie O’Farrell reimagines life in Anne’s home without husband or father. Maggie never mentions William’s first or last name. She gives Anne the name of “Agnes,” pronounced “ann-yes,” a close variation, and she points out that Hamnet was sometimes spelled as Hamlet.

     Maggie builds her story around the grief that the couple endured, due to Hamnet’s passing.

     She shows how William channelled his grief in his best tragic play, “Hamlet,” about a Danish prince who buries his father, the king, because the prince’s uncle murdered Hamlet’s father.

     Chloé Zhao directed the movie, “Hamnet.” Critics give it either four or five stars, calling it “stunning,” “a masterpiece.” Some critics suggest the film may win Best Picture award.

     Take your pick, Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein,” or Maggie O’Farrell’s “Hamnet,” a dose of eye protein either way.