A first photoplay edition of <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Mary%20Shelley&amp;tab=objects&amp;sortBy=bsp_dotcom_prod_en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Mary Shelley</a>'s masterpiece, <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Frankenstein&amp;tab=objects&amp;sortBy=bsp_dotcom_prod_enhttps://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Frankenstein&amp;tab=objects&amp;sortBy=bsp_dotcom_prod_en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Frankenstein</a>.<ul><li>Mary Shelley (English).</li><li>New York: Grosset &amp; Dunlap, 1931.</li><li>With 8 photo illustrations.</li><li>Bound in the original publisher’s red cloth, with dustjacket.</li></ul> The first photoplay edition of Mary Shelley's&nbsp;Frankenstein, published to coincide with Universal’s legendary 1931 film starring Boris Karloff. A remarkable survivor, as most copies are heavily worn.

Frankenstein

First edition of Shelley's second novel Valperga.<ul><li>Sold as a set of 3.</li><li>Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (English).</li><li>Valperga: or, The Life and Adventures of Castruccio, Prince of Lucca.</li><li>London: for G. &amp; W. B. Whittaker, 1823.</li><li>Bound in half tan speckled calf, gilt decorated spines, gilt lettered black morocco spine labels, marbled edges.</li></ul>

Valperga

The <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/luxury/books-&amp;-manuscripts/book/first-edition?locale=en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">first American edition </a>of Lodore, by <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Mary%20Shelley&amp;tab=objects&amp;sortBy=bsp_dotcom_prod_en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Mary Shelley</a>.<ul><li>Mary Shelley (English).&nbsp;</li><li>New York: Wallis &amp; Newell, 1835.</li><li>228 pages.</li><li>Bound in floral grained mauve cloth, gilt title to spine.</li></ul> Mary Shelley's most autobiographical work, also published under the title of The Beautiful Widow. Lodore follows the fortunes of Cornelia, Lord Lodore's estranged wife, and his daughter Ethel, as they navigate societal expectations and personal struggles after Lodore's death, with a focus on the relationships between women and the exploration of gender roles.

Lodore

A copy of H.M. Milner's adaptation of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein.<ul><li>By H.M. Milner after Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (English, 1797-1851).</li><li>Frankenstein; or, The Man and the Monster!</li><li>London: J. Duncombe, n.d., [1826].</li><li>With the engraved frontis portrait plate, with Shelley's name misspelled "Shelly."</li><li>Hardbound in modern brown cloth, gilt title and date to front cover.</li></ul>

A <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=playbill&amp;tab=objects&amp;sortBy=bsp_dotcom_prod_en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">playbill</a> for Presumption! Or The Fate of Frankenstein, by <a href="sothebys.com/en/search?query=Richard%20Brinsley%20Peake&amp;tab=objects&amp;sortBy=bsp_dotcom_prod_en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Richard Brinsley Peake</a>.<ul><li>Richard Brinsley Peake (English).</li><li>After Mary Shelley's Frankenstein.</li><li>Presumption! Or The Fate of Frankenstein. Last Night... Of Mr. T. P. Cooke. This Present Evening, Saturday, March 9, 1833, will be performed the Celebrated Romance... Theatre-Royal, Edinburgh.</li><li>&nbsp;Edinburgh: Theatre-Royal, 1833.</li><li>A playbill for the last performance by Thomas Potter Cooke at the Theatre-Royal, Edinburgh for 1833.&nbsp;</li><li>Printed letterpress playbill, laid down on early cardstock.</li></ul> The play's author, Richard Brinsley Peake (1792-1847), was a prolific dramatist of the London popular theater from 1818 until the time of his death. Presumption! appeared at the Lyceum (the English Opera House) in the late summer of 1823. During the autumn of the same year, other serious adaptations of Frankenstein appeared at the Royalty and the Coburg. The part of the Monster was taken by Thomas Potter Cooke (1786-1864), a former sailor who had already earned popular and critical attention by his performance as Ruthven in The Vampire in 1820. Although Presumption! was not the first successful Gothic melodrama of the 1820s, the popularity it achieved had an immediate effect on London theatre managements. Presumption! had helped to illuminate a public appetite for horrifying stage fantasies with morally unambiguous resolutions. The play was seen by Mary Shelley and her father William Godwin on 29 August 1823 at the English Opera House, shortly after her return to England. Shelley approved of the way the Creature, played by T.P. Cooke, was represented by a series of dashes in the advertising. Mary Shelley had mixed feelings about the play when it opened but, echoing Lord Byron, wrote: "But lo and behold I found myself famous! Frankenstein had prodigious success as a drama and was about to be repeated for the twenty-third night at the English Royal Opera House."

Presumption! Or The Fate of Frankenstein Playbill

Third edition, fourth printing of the first revised edition of <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Mary+Shelley&amp;pfilters.dateRange=upcoming" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Mary Shelley</a>'s masterpiece <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=frankenstein&amp;pfilters.dateRange=past" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Frankenstein</a>, and the last to contain an illustration with the first printing of the engraved frontis and additional engraved title-page dated 1831.<ul><li>Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (English).</li><li>Frederick Schiller (German)[Author of The Ghost-Seer].&nbsp;</li><li>London: Richard Bentley, 1839.</li><li>Bound in the publisher's original blind stamped straight grained brown-maroon cloth.</li></ul> In her introduction, Shelley contextualizes the creation of her tale: "It proved a wet, ungenial summer, and incessant rain often confined us for days to the house. Some volumes of ghost stories, translated from the German into French, fell into our hands… 'We will each write a ghost story,' said Lord Byron; and his proposition was acceded to."

Frankenstein: Or, The Modern Prometheus, [bound with] The Ghost-Seer

A third edition, fourth printing of <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Frankenstein&amp;redirect=true&amp;tab=objects&amp;sortBy=bsp_dotcom_prod_en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Frankenstein</a> by <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Mary%20Shelley&amp;redirect=true&amp;tab=objects&amp;sortBy=bsp_dotcom_prod_en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Mary Shelley</a>, bound with The Ghost-Seer by <a href="https://www.sothebys.com/en/search?query=Frederick%20Schiller&amp;redirect=true&amp;tab=objects&amp;sortBy=bsp_dotcom_prod_en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Frederick Schiller</a>.<ul><li>Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (English).</li><li>Frederick Schiller (German).</li><li>Frankenstein: Or, The Modern Prometheus - bound with - The Ghost-Seer.</li><li>London: Richard Bentley, 1839.</li><li>Bound in contemporary half tan calf, blind tooled spine, hand written paper spine label.</li></ul> The first revised edition of Shelley's masterpiece and the last to contain an illustration with the first printing of the engraved frontis and additional engraved title-page dated 1831. The frontis depicts the creature coming to life. In her introduction, Shelley contextualizes the creation of her tale: "It proved a wet, ungenial summer, and incessant rain often confined us for days to the house. Some volumes of ghost stories, translated from the German into French, fell into our hands… 'We will each write a ghost story,' said Lord Byron; and his proposition was acceded to." This printing was apparently issued with and without the additional engraved frontis dated 1831.

Frankenstein: Or, The Modern Prometheus, bound with The Ghost-Seer

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