By Joseph Pearce
Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is one of the most influential novels of the nineteenth century. From the very beginning, on the title page itself, we are given tantalizing clues concerning the aesthetic and philosophical roots of Mary Shelley's inspiration and perhaps an inkling of her purpose. In giving Frankenstein the alternative title of The Modern Prometheus, and coupling it with the epigraph conveying Adam's complaint from Paradise Lost, we see the leitmotif established concerning the relationship between Creator, creature, and creativity. The allusion to the Prometheus myth conjures images of the creation of man in defiance of the gods; the citation of Adam's complaint conjures the image of the creation of man in defiance of man:
"Did I request thee, Maker, from my clay
To mould me man?
Did I solicit thee
From darkness to promote me?"
