127-397: " Goldfish Bowl " is a science fiction short story by American author Robert A. Heinlein , first published in Astounding Science Fiction in March 1942, and collected in one of Heinlein's anthologies, The Menace from Earth . In the story, two scientists and a navy ship investigate two massive pillars of water in the Pacific to discover if they are a natural phenomenon or, as one of
254-765: A computer -like screen , computer viruses , video chat , tanning beds , home treadmills , and more. In 1963, the time travel-themed Doctor Who premiered on BBC Television. The original series ran until 1989 and was revived in 2005. It has been extremely popular worldwide and has greatly influenced later TV science fiction. Other programs in the 1960s included The Outer Limits (1963–1965), Lost in Space (1965–1968), and The Prisoner (1967). Star Trek (the original series), created by Gene Roddenberry , premiered in 1966 on NBC Television and ran for three seasons. It combined elements of space opera and Space Western . Only mildly successful at first,
381-428: A space opera , went on to become a worldwide popular culture phenomenon , and the second-highest-grossing film series of all time. Since the 1980s, science fiction films , along with fantasy , horror , and superhero films, have dominated Hollywood's big-budget productions. Science fiction films often " cross-over " with other genres, including film noir ( Blade Runner - 1982), family film ( E.T.
508-508: A two-storey cottage at Bishopsgate , on the edge of Windsor Great Park . Little is known about this period in Mary Godwin's life, for her journal from May 1815 to July 1816 is lost. At Bishopsgate, Percy wrote his poem Alastor, or The Spirit of Solitude ; and on 24 January 1816, Mary gave birth to a second child, William, named after her father, and soon nicknamed "Willmouse". In her novel ' The Last Man , she later imagined Windsor as
635-663: A Garden of Eden. In May 1816, Mary Godwin, Percy Shelley, and their son travelled to Geneva with Claire Clairmont. They planned to spend the summer with the poet Lord Byron , whose recent affair with Claire had left her pregnant. In History of a Six Weeks' Tour through a part of France, Switzerland, Germany and Holland (1817), she describes the particularly desolate landscape in crossing from France into Switzerland. The party arrived in Geneva on 14 May 1816, where Mary called herself "Mrs Shelley". Byron joined them on 25 May, with his young physician, John William Polidori , and rented
762-427: A bath of ice to stanch the bleeding, an act the doctor later told him saved her life. All was not well between the couple that summer, however, and Percy spent more time with Jane Williams than with his depressed and debilitated wife. Much of the short poetry Shelley wrote at San Terenzo involved Jane rather than Mary. The coast offered Percy Shelley and Edward Williams the chance to enjoy their "perfect plaything for
889-557: A broad range of subjects. He often took the children on educational outings, and they had access to his library and to the many intellectuals who visited him, including the Romantic poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge and the former vice-president of the United States Aaron Burr . Godwin admitted he was not educating the children according to Mary Wollstonecraft's philosophy as outlined in works such as A Vindication of
1016-487: A cloud-like formation which cannot be successfully entered and studied by aircraft or rockets, because their engines shut off when they try to enter the cloud. After an experiment, they confirm the other water pillar is linked to the first and returns the water back to the ocean. While one of the scientists is on deck preparing to ride up the water column in a bathysphere , an energy sphere appears; it engulfs him, and he disappears. The other scientist, still believing that there
1143-423: A corpse would be re-animated", Mary noted; " galvanism had given token of such things". It was after midnight before they retired, and unable to sleep, she became possessed by her imagination as she beheld the grim terrors of her "waking dream", her ghost story: 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
1270-495: A course of reading and cultivated your mind in a manner the most admirably adapted to make you a great and successful author. If you cannot be independent, who should be?" — William Godwin to Mary Shelley After her husband's death, Mary Shelley lived for a year with Leigh Hunt and his family in Genoa , where she often saw Byron and transcribed his poems. She resolved to live by her pen and for her son, but her financial situation
1397-521: A creature & Shelley is afraid of a fever from the milk—for I am no longer a mother now. The loss of her child induced acute depression in Mary Godwin, who was haunted by visions of the baby; but she conceived again and had recovered by the summer. With a revival in Percy Shelley's finances after the death of his grandfather, Sir Bysshe Shelley, the couple holidayed in Torquay and then rented
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#17327650045001524-535: A great and influential film. In 1954, Godzilla , directed by Ishirō Honda , began the kaiju subgenre of science fiction film, which feature large creatures of any form, usually attacking a major city or engaging other monsters in battle . 1968's 2001: A Space Odyssey , directed by Stanley Kubrick and based on the work of Arthur C. Clarke , rose above the mostly B-movie offerings up to that time both in scope and quality, and influenced later science fiction films. That same year, Planet of
1651-540: A happy one, and Mary Shelley and Jane were fond of each other. Mary lived with her son and daughter-in-law at Field Place, Sussex , the Shelleys' ancestral home, and at Chester Square , London, and accompanied them on travels abroad. Mary Shelley's last years were blighted by illness. From 1839, she suffered from headaches and bouts of paralysis in parts of her body, which sometimes prevented her from reading and writing. On 1 February 1851, at Chester Square, she died at
1778-935: A joint journal, and continued their own writing. At Lucerne , lack of money forced the three to turn back. They travelled down the Rhine and by land to the Dutch port of Maassluis , arriving at Gravesend, Kent , on 13 September 1814. The situation awaiting Mary Godwin in England was fraught with complications, some of which she had not foreseen. Either before or during the journey, she had become pregnant. She and Percy now found themselves penniless, and, to Mary's genuine surprise, her father refused to have anything to do with her. The couple moved with Claire into lodgings at Somers Town, and later, Nelson Square. They maintained their intense programme of reading and writing, and entertained Percy Shelley's friends, such as Thomas Jefferson Hogg and
1905-677: A journey to the Moon and how the Earth 's motion is seen from there. Kepler has been called the "father of science fiction". Following the 17th-century development of the novel as a literary form , Mary Shelley 's Frankenstein (1818) and The Last Man (1826) helped define the form of the science fiction novel. Brian Aldiss has argued that Frankenstein was the first work of science fiction. Edgar Allan Poe wrote several stories considered to be science fiction, including " The Unparalleled Adventure of One Hans Pfaall " (1835), which featured
2032-403: A limited annual allowance (which she had to repay when Percy Florence inherited the estate), but to the end of his days, he refused to meet her in person and dealt with her only through lawyers. Mary Shelley busied herself with editing her husband's poems, among other literary endeavours, but concern for her son restricted her options. Sir Timothy threatened to stop the allowance if any biography of
2159-409: A much higher form of Earth life. From the complete lack of communicative contact, they decide that they are not even being studied but are merely being kept as pets, similar to the pet goldfish kept by one of the men. They may even have been put together in the hope that they will breed, suggesting that their captors know nothing of human biology. When one of the scientists dies and his body is removed,
2286-545: A paradise inhabited by devils, remain shrouded in mystery. The only certainty is that she herself was not the child's mother. Elena Adelaide Shelley died in Naples on 9 June 1820. After leaving Naples, the Shelleys settled in Rome, the city where her husband wrote "the meanest streets were strewed with truncated columns, broken capitals...and sparkling fragments of granite or porphyry...The voice of dead time, in still vibrations,
2413-473: A physician. In 1820, they found themselves plagued by accusations and threats from Paolo and Elise Foggi, former servants whom Percy Shelley had dismissed in Naples shortly after the Foggis had married. The pair revealed that on 27 February 1819 in Naples, Percy Shelley had registered as his child by Mary Shelley a two-month-old baby girl named Elena Adelaide Shelley. The Foggis also claimed that Claire Clairmont
2540-649: A police chief into seizing Gatteschi's papers, including the letters, which were then destroyed. Shortly afterwards, Mary Shelley bought some letters written by herself and Percy Bysshe Shelley from a man calling himself G. Byron and posing as the illegitimate son of the late Lord Byron . Also in 1845, Percy Bysshe Shelley's cousin Thomas Medwin approached her, claiming to have written a damaging biography of Percy Shelley. He said he would suppress it in return for £250, but Mary Shelley refused. In 1848, Percy Florence married Jane Gibson St John. The marriage proved
2667-588: A political radical throughout her life. Shelley's works often argue that cooperation and sympathy, particularly as practised by women in the family, were the ways to reform civil society. This view was a direct challenge to the individualistic Romantic ethos promoted by Percy Shelley and the Enlightenment political theories articulated by her father, William Godwin. Mary Shelley was born Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin in Somers Town, London , in 1797. She
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#17327650045002794-543: A professional author. The last decade of her life was dogged by illness, most likely caused by the brain tumour which killed her at the age of 53. Until the 1970s, Shelley was known mainly for her efforts to publish her husband's works and for her novel Frankenstein , which remains widely read and has inspired many theatrical and film adaptations. Recent scholarship has yielded a more comprehensive view of Shelley's achievements. Scholars have shown increasing interest in her literary output, particularly in her novels, which include
2921-437: A profit, and Godwin was forced to borrow substantial sums to keep it going. He continued to borrow to pay off earlier loans, compounding his difficulties. By 1809, Godwin's business was close to failure, and he was "near to despair". Godwin was saved from debtor's prison by philosophical devotees such as Francis Place , who lent him further money. Though Mary Godwin received little formal education, her father tutored her in
3048-473: A series of friends who were writing memoirs of Byron and Percy Shelley—the beginnings of her attempts to immortalise her husband. She also met the American actor John Howard Payne and the American writer Washington Irving , who intrigued her. Payne fell in love with her and in 1826 asked her to marry him. She refused, saying that after being married to one genius, she could only marry another. Payne accepted
3175-418: A society (on Earth or another planet) that has developed in wholly different ways from our own." There is a tendency among science fiction enthusiasts as their own arbiter in deciding what exactly constitutes science fiction. David Seed says it may be more useful to talk about science fiction as the intersection of other more concrete subgenres. Damon Knight summed up the difficulty, saying "Science fiction
3302-458: A success. Mary Godwin, in contrast, came to detest her stepmother. William Godwin's 19th-century biographer Charles Kegan Paul later suggested that Mrs Godwin had favoured her own children over those of Mary Wollstonecraft. Together, the Godwins started a publishing firm called M. J. Godwin, which sold children's books as well as stationery, maps, and games. However, the business did not turn
3429-576: A time of intense intellectual and creative activity for both Shelleys. While Percy composed a series of major poems, Mary wrote the novel Matilda , the historical novel Valperga , and the plays Proserpine and Midas . Mary wrote Valperga to help alleviate her father's financial difficulties, as Percy refused to assist him further. She was often physically ill, however, and prone to depressions. She also had to cope with Percy's interest in other women, such as Sophia Stacey , Emilia Viviani, and Jane Williams . Since Mary Shelley shared his belief in
3556-479: A time, Mary Shelley found comfort only in her writing. The birth of her fourth child, Percy Florence , on 12 November 1819, finally lifted her spirits, though she nursed the memory of her lost children till the end of her life. Italy provided the Shelleys, Byron, and other exiles with political freedom unattainable at home. Despite its associations with personal loss, Italy became for Mary Shelley "a country which memory painted as paradise". Their Italian years were
3683-495: A total estimated readership of at least 1 million), making it the world's most popular science fiction periodical . In 1984, William Gibson 's first novel, Neuromancer , helped popularize cyberpunk and the word " cyberspace ", a term he originally coined in his 1982 short story Burning Chrome . In 1986, Shards of Honor by Lois McMaster Bujold began her Vorkosigan Saga . 1992's Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson predicted immense social upheaval due to
3810-532: A trip to the Moon . Jules Verne was noted for his attention to detail and scientific accuracy, especially in Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas (1870). In 1887, the novel El anacronópete by Spanish author Enrique Gaspar y Rimbau introduced the first time machine . An early French/Belgian science fiction writer was J.-H. Rosny aîné (1856–1940). Rosny's masterpiece
3937-483: A two-month premature baby girl, who was not expected to survive. On 6 March, she wrote to Hogg: My dearest Hogg my baby is dead—will you come to see me as soon as you can. I wish to see you—It was perfectly well when I went to bed—I awoke in the night to give it suck it appeared to be sleeping so quietly that I would not awake it. It was dead then, but we did not find that out till morning—from its appearance it evidently died of convulsions—Will you come—you are so calm
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4064-582: A very palatable form... New adventures pictured for us in the scientifiction of today are not at all impossible of realization tomorrow... Many great science stories destined to be of historical interest are still to be written... Posterity will point to them as having blazed a new trail, not only in literature and fiction, but progress as well. In 1928, E. E. "Doc" Smith 's first published work, The Skylark of Space , written in collaboration with Lee Hawkins Garby , appeared in Amazing Stories . It
4191-603: A walk in the French countryside, he suggested that they both take the plunge into a stream naked; this offended her principles. She was partly consoled by the visits of Hogg, whom she disliked at first but soon considered a close friend. Percy Shelley seems to have wanted Mary Godwin and Hogg to become lovers; Mary did not dismiss the idea, since in principle she believed in free love . In practice, however, she loved only Percy Shelley and seems to have ventured no further than flirting with Hogg. On 22 February 1815, she gave birth to
4318-409: A woman disallowed for by her husband for alleged adultery. Shelley wrote in her diary about her assistance to the latter: "I do not make a boast-I do not say aloud-behold my generosity and greatness of mind-for in truth it is simple justice I perform-and so I am still reviled for being worldly". Mary Shelley continued to treat potential romantic partners with caution. In 1828, she met and flirted with
4445-629: A world of harmony and conformity within a united totalitarian state . It influenced the emergence of dystopia as a literary genre . In 1926, Hugo Gernsback published the first American science fiction magazine , Amazing Stories . In its first issue he wrote: By 'scientifiction' I mean the Jules Verne, H. G. Wells and Edgar Allan Poe type of story—a charming romance intermingled with scientific fact and prophetic vision... Not only do these amazing tales make tremendously interesting reading—they are always instructive. They supply knowledge... in
4572-476: Is Les Navigateurs de l'Infini ( The Navigators of Infinity ) (1925) in which the word astronaut, "astronautique", was used for the first time. Many critics consider H. G. Wells one of science fiction's most important authors, or even "the Shakespeare of science fiction". His works include The Time Machine (1895), The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896), The Invisible Man (1897), and The War of
4699-457: Is an intelligence behind these phenomena, decides to take the other's place and ride in the bathysphere up the water column in hopes of finding his colleague and/or further insight. The two men find themselves in an utterly featureless (and inescapable) environment where they are provided solely with bland food and water. Eventually they are placed together, and they conclude that they are in the hands of other intelligences, possibly alien or possibly
4826-521: Is breathed from these dumb things, animated and glorified as they were by man". Rome inspired her to begin writing the unfinished novel Valerius, the Reanimated Roman , where the eponymous hero resists the decay of Rome and the machinations of "superstitious" Catholicism. The writing of her novel was broken off when her son William died of malaria. Shelley bitterly commented that she had come to Italy to improve her husband's health, and instead
4953-418: Is great, and her perseverance in everything she undertakes almost invincible." In June 1812, Mary's father sent her to stay with the dissenting family of the radical William Baxter, near Dundee , Scotland. To Baxter, he wrote, "I am anxious that she should be brought up ... like a philosopher, even like a cynic." Scholars have speculated that she was sent away for her health, to remove her from
5080-635: Is often called the first great space opera . The same year, Philip Francis Nowlan 's original Buck Rogers story, Armageddon 2419 , also appeared in Amazing Stories . This was followed by a Buck Rogers comic strip , the first serious science fiction comic . Last and First Men: A Story of the Near and Far Future is a " future history " science fiction novel written in 1930 by the British author Olaf Stapledon . A work of unprecedented scale in
5207-512: Is one of the most influential examples of social science fiction , feminist science fiction , and anthropological science fiction . In 1979, Science Fiction World began publication in the People's Republic of China . It dominates the Chinese science fiction magazine market , at one time claiming a circulation of 300,000 copies per issue and an estimated 3–5 readers per copy (giving it
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5334-560: Is related to fantasy , horror , and superhero fiction and contains many subgenres . Its exact definition has long been disputed among authors, critics, scholars, and readers. Subgenres include hard science fiction , which emphasizes scientific accuracy, and soft science fiction , focusing on social sciences. Other notable subgenres are cyberpunk , which explores the interface between technology and society, and climate fiction , addressing environmental issues. Precedents for science fiction are argued to exist as far back as antiquity, but
5461-542: Is what we point to when we say it." Forrest J Ackerman has been credited with first using the term "sci-fi" (analogous to the then-trendy " hi-fi ") in about 1954. The first known use in print was a description of Donovan's Brain by movie critic Jesse Zunser in January 1954. As science fiction entered popular culture , writers and fans active in the field came to associate the term with low-budget, low-tech " B-movies " and with low-quality pulp science fiction . By
5588-542: The Golden Age of Science Fiction . Science fiction has been called the "literature of ideas ", and continues to evolve, incorporating diverse voices and themes, influencing not just literature but film, TV, and culture at large. Besides providing entertainment it can also criticize present-day society and explore alternatives, and inspiration a " sense of wonder ". According to Isaac Asimov , "Science fiction can be defined as that branch of literature which deals with
5715-618: The Chancery Court ruled Percy Shelley morally unfit to assume custody of his children and later placed them with a clergyman's family. Also in March, the Shelleys moved with Claire and Alba to Albion House at Marlow, Buckinghamshire , a large, damp building on the river Thames . There Mary Shelley gave birth to her third child, Clara, on 2 September. At Marlow, they entertained their new friends Marianne and Leigh Hunt , worked hard at their writing, and often discussed politics. Early in
5842-482: The Russian writer and paleontologist Ivan Yefremov presented a view of a future interstellar communist civilization and is considered one of the most important Soviet science fiction novels. In 1959, Robert A. Heinlein 's Starship Troopers marked a departure from his earlier juvenile stories and novels. It is one of the first and most influential examples of military science fiction , and introduced
5969-488: The Villa Diodati , close to Lake Geneva at the village of Cologny ; Percy Shelley rented a smaller building called Maison Chapuis on the waterfront nearby. They spent their time writing, boating on the lake, and talking late into the night. "It proved a wet, ungenial summer", Mary Shelley remembered in 1831, "and incessant rain often confined us for days to the house". Sitting around a log fire at Byron's villa,
6096-451: The information revolution . In 2007, Liu Cixin 's novel, The Three-Body Problem , was published in China. It was translated into English by Ken Liu and published by Tor Books in 2014, and won the 2015 Hugo Award for Best Novel , making Liu the first Asian writer to win the award. Emerging themes in late 20th and early 21st century science fiction include environmental issues ,
6223-400: The 1970s, critics within the field, such as Damon Knight and Terry Carr , were using "sci fi" to distinguish hack-work from serious science fiction. Peter Nicholls writes that "SF" (or "sf") is "the preferred abbreviation within the community of sf writers and readers." Robert Heinlein found even "science fiction" insufficient for certain types of works in this genre, and suggested
6350-559: The Apes (the original), directed by Franklin J. Schaffner and based on the 1963 French novel La Planète des Singes by Pierre Boulle , was released to popular and critical acclaim, its vivid depiction of a post-apocalyptic world in which intelligent apes dominate humans . In 1977, George Lucas began the Star Wars film series with the film now identified as " Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope . " The series, often called
6477-636: The Author of A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1798), which he intended as a sincere and compassionate tribute. However, because the Memoirs revealed Wollstonecraft's affairs and her illegitimate child, they were seen as shocking. Mary Godwin read these memoirs and her mother's books, and was brought up to cherish her mother's memory. Mary's earliest years were happy, judging from the letters of William Godwin's housekeeper and nurse, Louisa Jones. But Godwin
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#17327650045006604-454: The Bay of Lerici . Once they were settled in, Percy broke the "evil news" to Claire that her daughter Allegra had died of typhus in a convent at Bagnacavallo . Mary Shelley was distracted and unhappy in the cramped and remote Villa Magni, which she came to regard as a dungeon. On 16 June, she miscarried , losing so much blood that she nearly died. Rather than wait for a doctor, Percy sat her in
6731-583: The Extra-Terrestrial - 1983), war ( Enemy Mine - 1985), comedy ( Spaceballs - 1987, Galaxy Quest - 1999), animation ( WALL-E – 2008, Big Hero 6 – 2014), Western ( Serenity – 2005), action ( Edge of Tomorrow – 2014, The Matrix – 1999), adventure ( Jupiter Ascending – 2015, Interstellar – 2014), mystery ( Minority Report – 2002), thriller ( Ex Machina – 2014), drama ( Melancholia – 2011, Predestination – 2014), and romance ( Eternal Sunshine of
6858-435: The French writer Prosper Mérimée , but her one surviving letter to him appears to be a deflection of his declaration of love. She was delighted when her old friend from Italy, Edward Trelawny , returned to England, and they joked about marriage in their letters. Their friendship had altered, however, following her refusal to cooperate with his proposed biography of Percy Shelley; and he later reacted angrily to her omission of
6985-576: The Hill herself so that Percy could attend as a day scholar. Though Percy went on to Trinity College, Cambridge , and dabbled in politics and the law, he showed no sign of his parents' gifts. In 1840 and 1842, mother and son travelled together on the continent, journeys that Mary Shelley recorded in Rambles in Germany and Italy in 1840, 1842 and 1843 (1844). In 1844, Sir Timothy Shelley finally died at
7112-605: The Italian climate had just killed her two children, leading her to write: "May you my dear Marianne never know what it is to lose two only and lovely children in one year—to watch their dying moments—and then at last to be left childless and forever miserable". To deal with her grief, Shelley wrote the novella The Fields of Fancy , which became Matilda , dealing with a young woman whose beauty inspired incestuous love in her father, who ultimately commits suicide to stop himself from acting on his passion for his daughter, while she spends
7239-505: The Rights of Woman (1792), but Mary Godwin nonetheless received an unusual and advanced education for a girl of the time. She had a governess and a daily tutor and read many of her father's children's books on Roman and Greek history in manuscript. For six months in 1811, she also attended a boarding school in Ramsgate . Her father described her at age 15 as "singularly bold, somewhat imperious, and active of mind. Her desire of knowledge
7366-464: The Spotless Mind – 2004, Her – 2013). Science fiction and television have consistently been in a close relationship. Television or television-like technologies frequently appeared in science fiction long before television itself became widely available in the late 1940s and early 1950s. The first known science fiction television program was a thirty-five-minute adapted excerpt of
7493-559: The States and Empires of the Moon (1657) and The States and Empires of the Sun (1662), Margaret Cavendish 's " The Blazing World " (1666), Jonathan Swift 's Gulliver's Travels (1726), Ludvig Holberg 's Nicolai Klimii Iter Subterraneum (1741) and Voltaire 's Micromégas (1752). Isaac Asimov and Carl Sagan considered Somnium the first science fiction story; it depicts
7620-521: The Worlds (1898). His science fiction imagined alien invasion , biological engineering , invisibility , and time travel . In his non-fiction futurologist works he predicted the advent of airplanes , military tanks , nuclear weapons , satellite television , space travel , and something resembling the World Wide Web . Edgar Rice Burroughs 's A Princess of Mars , published in 1912,
7747-479: The age of fifty-three from what her physician suspected was a brain tumour. According to Jane Shelley, Mary Shelley had asked to be buried with her mother and father; but Percy and Jane, judging the graveyard at St Pancras to be "dreadful", chose to bury her instead at St Peter's Church, Bournemouth , near their new home at Boscombe . On the first anniversary of Mary Shelley's death, the Shelleys opened her box-desk. Inside they found locks of her dead children's hair,
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#17327650045007874-511: The age of ninety, "falling from the stalk like an overblown flower", as Mary put it. For the first time, she and her son were financially independent, though the estate proved less valuable than they had hoped. In the mid-1840s, Mary Shelley found herself the target of three separate blackmailers. In 1845, an Italian political exile called Gatteschi, whom she had met in Paris, threatened to publish letters she had sent him. A friend of her son bribed
8001-566: The atheistic section of Queen Mab from Percy Shelley's poems. Oblique references in her journals, from the early 1830s until the early 1840s, suggest that Mary Shelley had feelings for the radical politician Aubrey Beauclerk , who may have disappointed her by twice marrying others. Mary Shelley's first concern during these years was the welfare of Percy Florence. She honoured her late husband's wish that his son attend public school and, with Sir Timothy's grudging help, had him educated at Harrow . To avoid boarding fees, she moved to Harrow on
8128-408: The churchyard of St Pancras Old Church , and they fell in love—she was 16, and he was 21. On 26 June 1814, Shelley and Godwin declared their love for one another as Shelley announced he could not hide his "ardent passion", leading her in a "sublime and rapturous moment" to say she felt the same way; on either that day or the next, Godwin lost her virginity to Shelley, which tradition claims happened in
8255-414: The churchyard. Godwin described herself as attracted to Shelley's "wild, intellectual, unearthly looks". To Mary's dismay, her father disapproved, and tried to thwart the relationship and salvage the "spotless fame" of his daughter. At about the same time, Mary's father learned of Shelley's inability to pay off the father's debts. Mary, who later wrote of "my excessive and romantic attachment to my father",
8382-420: The company amused themselves with German ghost stories , which prompted Byron to propose that they "each write a ghost story". Unable to think of a story, young Mary Godwin became anxious: " Have you thought of a story? I was asked each morning, and each morning I was forced to reply with a mortifying negative." During one mid-June evening, the discussions turned to the nature of the principle of life. "Perhaps
8509-413: The concept of powered armor exoskeletons . The German space opera series Perry Rhodan , written by various authors, started in 1961 with an account of the first Moon landing and has since expanded in space to multiple universes , and in time by billions of years. It has become the most popular science fiction book series of all time. In the 1960s and 1970s, New Wave science fiction
8636-506: The creation of microrobots and micromachinery , nanotechnology , smartdust , virtual reality , and artificial intelligence (including swarm intelligence ), as well as developing the ideas of "necroevolution" and the creation of artificial worlds. In 1965, Dune by Frank Herbert featured a much more complex and detailed imagined future society than had previously in most science fiction. In 1967 Anne McCaffrey began her Dragonriders of Pern science fantasy series. Two of
8763-667: The deaths of both her children—Clara, in September 1818 in Venice, and William, in June 1819 in Rome. These losses left her in a deep depression that isolated her from Percy Shelley, who wrote in his notebook: My dearest Mary, wherefore hast thou gone, And left me in this dreary world alone? Thy form is here indeed—a lovely one— But thou art fled, gone down a dreary road That leads to Sorrow's most obscure abode. For thine own sake I cannot follow thee Do thou return for mine. For
8890-472: The devoted aficionado or fan—has a hard time trying to explain what science fiction is," and the lack of a "full satisfactory definition" is because "there are no easily delineated limits to science fiction." Another definition comes from The Literature Book by DK and is, "scenarios that are at the time of writing technologically impossible, extrapolating from present-day science...[,]...or that deal with some form of speculative science-based conceit, such as
9017-452: The disadvantaged. Percy Shelley, therefore, had difficulty gaining access to money until he inherited his estate because his family did not want him wasting it on projects of "political justice". After several months of promises, Shelley announced that he either could not or would not pay off all of Godwin's debts. Godwin was angry and felt betrayed. Mary and Percy began meeting each other secretly at her mother Mary Wollstonecraft 's grave in
9144-439: The episodes, ran from 1959 to 1964. It featured fantasy , suspense , and horror as well as science fiction, with each episode being a complete story. Critics have ranked it as one of the best TV programs of any genre . The animated series The Jetsons , while intended as comedy and only running for one season (1962–1963), predicted many inventions now in common use: flat-screen televisions , newspapers on
9271-438: The fading hope that their husbands were still alive. Ten days after the storm, three bodies washed up on the coast near Viareggio , midway between Livorno and Lerici. Trelawny, Byron, and Hunt cremated Percy Shelley's corpse on the beach at Viareggio. "[ Frankenstein ] is the most wonderful work to have been written at twenty years of age that I ever heard of. You are now five and twenty. And, most fortunately, you have pursued
9398-762: The first science fiction novel . Some of the stories from The Arabian Nights , along with the 10th-century The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter and Ibn al-Nafis 's 13th-century Theologus Autodidactus , are also argued to contain elements of science fiction. Written during the Scientific Revolution and later the Age of Enlightenment are considered true science-fantasy books. Francis Bacon 's New Atlantis (1627), Johannes Kepler 's Somnium (1634), Athanasius Kircher 's Itinerarium extaticum (1656), Cyrano de Bergerac 's Comical History of
9525-534: The form in which it was presented to the world." She wrote that the preface to the first edition was Percy's work "as far as I can recollect". There are differences in the 1818, 1823 and 1831 editions, which have been attributed to Percy's editing. James Rieger concluded Percy's "assistance at every point in the book's manufacture was so extensive that one hardly knows whether to regard him as editor or minor collaborator", while Anne K. Mellor later argued Percy only "made many technical corrections and several times clarified
9652-486: The genre, it describes the history of humanity from the present onwards across two billion years. In 1937, John W. Campbell became editor of Astounding Science Fiction , an event that is sometimes considered the beginning of the Golden Age of Science Fiction , which was characterized by stories celebrating scientific achievement and progress . The "Golden Age" is often said to have ended in 1946, but sometimes
9779-490: The grounds belonging to our house, or on the bleak sides of the woodless mountains near, that my true compositions, the airy flights of my imagination, were born and fostered." Mary Godwin may have first met the radical poet-philosopher Percy Bysshe Shelley in the interval between her two stays in Scotland. By the time she returned home for a second time on 30 March 1814, Percy Shelley had become estranged from his wife and
9906-689: The help of Payne, whom she kept in the dark about the details, Mary Shelley obtained false passports for the couple. In 1828, she fell ill with smallpox while visiting them in Paris; weeks later she recovered, unscarred but without her youthful beauty. During the period 1827–40, Mary Shelley was busy as an editor and writer. She wrote the novels The Fortunes of Perkin Warbeck (1830), Lodore (1835), and Falkner (1837). She contributed five volumes of Lives of Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and French authors to Dionysius Lardner 's Cabinet Cyclopaedia . She also wrote stories for ladies' magazines. She
10033-427: The historical novels Valperga (1823) and Perkin Warbeck (1830), the apocalyptic novel The Last Man (1826) and her final two novels, Lodore (1835) and Falkner (1837). Studies of her lesser-known works, such as the travel book Rambles in Germany and Italy (1844) and the biographical articles for Dionysius Lardner 's Cabinet Cyclopaedia (1829–1846), support the growing view that Shelley remained
10160-413: The idea for her novel Frankenstein . The Shelleys left Britain in 1818 for Italy, where their second and third children died before Shelley gave birth to her last and only surviving child, Percy Florence Shelley . In 1822, her husband drowned when his sailboat sank during a storm near Viareggio . A year later, Shelley returned to England and from then on devoted herself to raising her son and her career as
10287-477: The implications of the Internet and the expanding information universe, questions about biotechnology , nanotechnology , and post-scarcity societies . Recent trends and subgenres include steampunk , biopunk , and mundane science fiction . The first, or at least one of the first, recorded science fiction film is 1902's A Trip to the Moon , directed by French filmmaker Georges Méliès . It
10414-414: The initial idea by Lord Byron that they each write a ghost story. While her husband Percy encouraged her writing, the extent of Percy's contribution to the novel is unknown and has been argued over by readers and critics. Mary Shelley wrote, "I certainly did not owe the suggestion of one incident, nor scarcely of one train of feeling, to my husband, and yet but for his incitement, it would never have taken
10541-415: The late 1940s and the 1950s are included. In 1942, Isaac Asimov started his Foundation series , which chronicles the rise and fall of galactic empires and introduced psychohistory . The series was later awarded a one-time Hugo Award for "Best All-Time Series". Theodore Sturgeon 's More Than Human (1953) explored possible future human evolution . In 1957, Andromeda: A Space-Age Tale by
10668-456: The modern genre primarily arose in the 19th and early 20th centuries when popular writers began looking to technological progress and speculation. Mary Shelley 's Frankenstein , written in 1818, is often credited as the first true science fiction novel . Jules Verne and H.G. Wells are pivotal figures in the genre's development. In the 20th century, expanded with the introduction of space operas , dystopian literature, pulp magazines , and
10795-525: The moment "when I first stepped out from childhood into life". The story of the writing of Frankenstein has been fictionalised several times and has formed the basis for a number of films. In September 2011, the astronomer Donald Olson , after a visit to the Lake Geneva villa the previous year, and inspecting data about the motion of the moon and stars, concluded that her waking dream took place "between 2am and 3am" on 16 June 1816, several days after
10922-611: The morning of 10 October, Fanny Imlay was found dead in a room at a Swansea inn, along with a suicide note and a laudanum bottle. On 10 December, Percy Shelley's wife, Harriet, was discovered drowned in the Serpentine , a lake in Hyde Park, London . Both suicides were hushed up. Harriet's family obstructed Percy Shelley's efforts—fully supported by Mary Godwin—to assume custody of his two children by Harriet. His lawyers advised him to improve his case by marrying; so he and Mary, who
11049-490: The most radical passages as too shocking and atheistical, but Mary prevailed, thanks to Harriet de Boinville , who agreed to Mary's request to borrow her own original copy gifted by Percy Shelley. Mary was paid £500 to edit the Poetical Works (1838), which Sir Timothy insisted should not include a biography. Mary found a way to tell the story of Percy's life, nonetheless: she included extensive biographical notes about
11176-571: The narrative and thematic continuity of the text." Charles E. Robinson, editor of a facsimile edition of the Frankenstein manuscripts, concluded that Percy's contributions to the book "were no more than what most publishers' editors have provided new (or old) authors or, in fact, what colleagues have provided to each other after reading each other's works in progress." Writing on the 200th anniversary of Frankenstein , literary scholar and poet Fiona Sampson asked, "Why hasn't Mary Shelley gotten
11303-456: The non-exclusivity of marriage, she formed emotional ties of her own among the men and women of their circle. She became particularly fond of the Greek revolutionary Prince Alexandros Mavrokordatos and of Jane and Edward Williams . In December 1818, the Shelleys travelled south with Claire Clairmont and their servants to Naples , where they stayed for three months, receiving only one visitor,
11430-478: The novellas included in the first novel, Dragonflight , made McCaffrey the first woman to win a Hugo or Nebula Award . In 1968, Philip K. Dick 's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? was published. It is the literary source of the Blade Runner movie franchise . In 1969, The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin was set on a planet in which the inhabitants have no fixed gender . It
11557-607: The ocean, but the message is not understood. Floyd C. Gale of Galaxy Science Fiction praised "Goldfish Bowl" as one of the "up-to-the-minute masterworks" of The Menace from Earth . Science fiction Science fiction (sometimes shortened to SF or sci-fi ) is a genre of speculative fiction , which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology , space exploration , time travel , parallel universes , and extraterrestrial life . It often explores human responses to changes in science and technology. Science fiction
11684-634: The party's first tasks on arriving in Italy was to hand Alba over to Byron, who was living in Venice . He had agreed to raise her so long as Claire had nothing more to do with her. The Shelleys then embarked on a roving existence, never settling in any one place for long. Along the way, they accumulated a circle of friends and acquaintances who often moved with them. The couple devoted their time to writing, reading, learning, sightseeing, and socialising. The Italian adventure was, however, blighted for Mary Shelley by
11811-614: The play RUR , written by the Czech playwright Karel Čapek , broadcast live from the BBC's Alexandra Palace studios on 11 February 1938. The first popular science fiction program on American television was the children's adventure serial Captain Video and His Video Rangers , which ran from June 1949 to April 1955. The Twilight Zone (the original series), produced and narrated by Rod Serling , who also wrote or co-wrote most of
11938-408: The poems. Shelley continued to practise her mother's feminist principles by extending aid to women of whom society disapproved. For instance, Shelley extended financial aid to Mary Diana Dods, a single mother and illegitimate herself, who appears to have been a lesbian, and gave her the new identity of Walter Sholto Douglas, husband of her lover Isabel Robinson. Shelley also assisted Georgiana Paul,
12065-594: The poet were published. In 1826, Percy Florence became the legal heir of the Shelley estate after the death of his half-brother Charles Shelley, his father's son by Harriet Shelley. Sir Timothy raised Mary's allowance from £100 a year to £250 but remained as difficult as ever. Mary Shelley enjoyed the stimulating society of William Godwin's circle, but poverty prevented her from socialising as she wished. She also felt ostracised by those who, like Sir Timothy, still disapproved of her relationship with Percy Bysshe Shelley. In
12192-520: The project. Throughout this period, she also championed Percy Shelley's poetry, promoting its publication and quoting it in her writing. By 1837, Percy's works were well-known and increasingly admired. In the summer of 1838 Edward Moxon , the publisher of Tennyson and the son-in-law of Charles Lamb , proposed publishing an edition of the collected works of Percy Shelley. Mary wanted to include in this collection an unexpurgated version of Percy Shelley's epic poem Queen Mab. Moxon wanted to leave out
12319-468: The reaction of human beings to changes in science and technology ." Robert A. Heinlein wrote that "A handy short definition of almost all science fiction might read: realistic speculation about possible future events, based solidly on adequate knowledge of the real world, past and present, and on a thorough understanding of the nature and significance of the scientific method ." American science fiction author and editor Lester del Rey wrote, "Even
12446-462: The rejection, and tried – without success – to talk his friend Irving into proposing himself. Mary Shelley was aware of Payne's plan, but how seriously she took it is unclear. In 1827, Mary Shelley was party to a scheme that enabled her friend Isabel Robinson and Isabel's lover, Mary Diana Dods , who wrote under the name David Lyndsay, to embark on a life together in France as husband and wife. With
12573-1110: The respect she deserves?" She noted that "In recent years Percy's corrections, visible in the Frankenstein notebooks held at the Bodleian Library in Oxford, have been seized on as evidence that he must have at least co-authored the novel. In fact, when I examined the notebooks myself, I realized that Percy did rather less than any line editor working in publishing today." Sampson published her findings in In Search of Mary Shelley (2018), one of many biographies written about Shelley. On their return to England in September 1816, Mary and Percy moved—with Claire Clairmont, who took lodgings nearby—to Bath , where they hoped to keep Claire's pregnancy secret. At Cologny, Mary Godwin had received two letters from her half-sister, Fanny Imlay , who alluded to her "unhappy life"; on 9 October, Fanny wrote an "alarming letter" from Bristol that sent Percy Shelley racing off to search for her, without success. On
12700-423: The rest of her life full of despair about "the unnatural love I had inspired". The novella offered a feminist critique of a patriarchal society as Matilda is punished in the afterlife, though she did nothing to encourage her father's feelings. In the summer of 1822, a pregnant Mary moved with Percy, Claire, and Edward and Jane Williams to the isolated Villa Magni, at the sea's edge near the hamlet of San Terenzo in
12827-474: The return journey to Lerici with their eighteen-year-old boat boy, Charles Vivian. They never reached their destination. A letter arrived at Villa Magni from Hunt to Percy Shelley, dated 8 July, saying, "pray write to tell us how you got home, for they say you had bad weather after you sailed Monday & we are anxious". "The paper fell from me," Mary told a friend later. "I trembled all over." She and Jane Williams rushed desperately to Livorno and then to Pisa in
12954-512: The scientists conjectures, created by intelligent beings. His belief is based on another strange recent occurrence in the Pacific: " Lagrange fireballs", spheres of energy which move in a seemingly intelligent manner and appear to be responsible for the disappearance of people in Hawaii. While on the naval ship, more is learned about the pillars: one shoots water far up into the sky, where it enters
13081-402: The seamy side of the business, or to introduce her to radical politics. Mary Godwin revelled in the spacious surroundings of Baxter's house and in the companionship of his four daughters, and she returned north in the summer of 1813 for a further stay of 10 months. In the 1831 introduction to Frankenstein , she recalled: "I wrote then—but in a most common-place style. It was beneath the trees of
13208-717: The series gained popularity through syndication and extraordinary fan interest . It became a very popular and influential franchise with many films , television shows , novels , and other works and products. Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987–1994) led to six additional live action Star Trek shows: Deep Space Nine (1993–1999), Voyager (1995–2001) , Enterprise (2001–2005), Discovery (2017–2024), Picard (2020–2023), and Strange New Worlds (2022–present), with more in some form of development. Mary Shelley Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley ( UK : / ˈ w ʊ l s t ən k r ɑː f t / ; née Godwin ; 30 August 1797 – 1 February 1851)
13335-511: The summer of 1817, Mary Shelley finished Frankenstein , which was published anonymously in January 1818. Reviewers and readers assumed that Percy Shelley was the author, since the book was published with his preface and dedicated to his political hero William Godwin. At Marlow, Mary edited the joint journal of the group's 1814 Continental journey, adding material written in Switzerland in 1816, along with Percy's poem " Mont Blanc ". The result
13462-415: The summer of 1824, Mary Shelley moved to Kentish Town in north London to be near Jane Williams. She may have been, in the words of her biographer Muriel Spark , "a little in love" with Jane. Jane later disillusioned her by gossiping that Percy had preferred her to Mary, owing to Mary's inadequacy as a wife. At around this time, Mary Shelley was working on her novel, The Last Man (1826); and she assisted
13589-518: The summer", a new sailing boat. The boat had been designed by Daniel Roberts and an admirer of Byron, Edward Trelawny , who had joined the party in January 1822. On 1 July 1822, Percy Shelley, Edward Ellerker Williams , and Captain Daniel Roberts sailed south down the coast to Livorno . There Percy Shelley discussed with Byron and Leigh Hunt the launch of a radical magazine called The Liberal . On 8 July, he and Edward Williams set out on
13716-401: The survivor believes that the only way back home is to die. Believing that it is imperative to warn humanity, he methodically scratches a message on the only medium available to him: his skin. The message is "Beware. Creation took eight days", the implication being that man was created only on the sixth day and a higher earthly being was created on the eighth. His body is ultimately recovered from
13843-515: The term speculative fiction to be used instead for those that are more "serious" or "thoughtful". Some scholars assert that science fiction had its beginnings in ancient times , when the line between myth and fact was blurred. Written in the 2nd century CE by the satirist Lucian , A True Story contains many themes and tropes characteristic of modern science fiction, including travel to other worlds, extraterrestrial lifeforms , interplanetary warfare, and artificial life . Some consider it
13970-508: The trio travelled to Paris, and then, by donkey, mule, carriage, and foot, through a France recently ravaged by war , to Switzerland. "It was acting in a novel, being an incarnate romance," Mary Shelley recalled in 1826. Godwin wrote about France in 1814: "The distress of the inhabitants, whose houses had been burned, their cattle killed and all their wealth destroyed, has given a sting to my detestation of war...". As they travelled, Mary and Percy read works by Mary Wollstonecraft and others, kept
14097-564: The working of some powerful engine, show signs of life, and stir with an uneasy, half vital motion. Frightful must it be; for supremely frightful would be the effect of any human endeavour to mock the stupendous mechanism of the Creator of the world. She began writing what she assumed would be a short story. With Percy Shelley's encouragement, she expanded this tale into her first novel, Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus , published in 1818. She later described that summer in Switzerland as
14224-508: The writer Thomas Love Peacock . Percy Shelley sometimes left home for short periods to dodge creditors. The couple's distraught letters reveal their pain at these separations. Pregnant and often ill, Mary Godwin had to cope with Percy's joy at the birth of his son by Harriet Shelley in late 1814 and his constant outings with Claire Clairmont. Shelley and Clairmont were almost certainly lovers, which caused much jealousy on Godwin's part. Shelley greatly offended Godwin at one point when, during
14351-537: Was an English novelist who wrote the Gothic novel Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus (1818), which is considered an early example of science fiction . She also edited and promoted the works of her husband, the Romantic poet and philosopher Percy Bysshe Shelley . Her father was the political philosopher William Godwin and her mother was the philosopher and women's rights advocate Mary Wollstonecraft . Mary's mother died 11 days after giving birth to her. She
14478-491: Was confused. She saw Percy Shelley as an embodiment of her parents' liberal and reformist ideas of the 1790s, particularly Godwin's view that marriage was a repressive monopoly, which he had argued in his 1793 edition of Political Justice but later retracted. On 28 July 1814, the couple eloped and secretly left for France, taking Mary's stepsister, Claire Clairmont , with them. After convincing Mary Jane Godwin, who had pursued them to Calais , that they did not wish to return,
14605-404: Was influential on later filmmakers , bringing a different kind of creativity and fantasy . Méliès's innovative editing and special effects techniques were widely imitated and became important elements of the cinematic medium . 1927's Metropolis , directed by Fritz Lang , is the first feature-length science fiction film. Though not well received in its time, it is now considered
14732-484: Was known for its embrace of a high degree of experimentation, both in form and in content, and a highbrow and self-consciously " literary " or " artistic " sensibility . In 1961, Solaris by Stanisław Lem was published in Poland . The novel dealt with the theme of human limitations as its characters attempted to study a seemingly intelligent ocean on a newly discovered planet . Lem's work anticipated
14859-402: Was often deeply in debt; feeling that he could not raise the children by himself, he cast about for a second wife. In December 1801, he married Mary Jane Clairmont , a well-educated woman with two young children of her own – Charles and Claire . Most of Godwin's friends disliked his new wife, describing her as quick-tempered and quarrelsome; but Godwin was devoted to her, and the marriage was
14986-473: Was precarious. On 23 July 1823, she left Genoa for England and stayed with her father and stepmother in the Strand until a small advance from her father-in-law enabled her to lodge nearby. Sir Timothy Shelley had at first agreed to support his grandson, Percy Florence, only if he were handed over to an appointed guardian. Mary Shelley rejected this idea instantly. She managed instead to wring out of Sir Timothy
15113-419: Was pregnant again, married on 30 December 1816 at St Mildred's Church, Bread Street , London. Her father gave consent to her marriage as required for a minor aged under twenty-one and Mr and Mrs Godwin were present as witnesses who signed the register, the marriage ending the family rift. Claire Clairmont gave birth to a baby girl on 13 January, at first called Alba, later Allegra . In March of that year,
15240-399: Was pregnant with Percy's child. Over the next two years, she and Percy faced ostracism, constant debt and the death of their prematurely born daughter. They married in late 1816, after the suicide of Percy Shelley's wife, Harriet. In 1816, the couple and Mary's stepsister famously spent a summer with Lord Byron and John William Polidori near Geneva , Switzerland, where Shelley conceived
15367-533: Was raised by her father, who provided her with a rich informal education, encouraging her to adhere to his own anarchist political theories. When she was four, her father married a neighbour, Mary Jane Clairmont , with whom Mary had a troubled relationship. In 1814, Mary began a romance with one of her father's political followers, Percy Bysshe Shelley, who was already married. Together with her stepsister, Claire Clairmont , she and Percy left for France and travelled through Europe. Upon their return to England, Mary
15494-433: Was regularly visiting William Godwin, whom he had agreed to bail out of debt. Percy Shelley's radicalism , particularly his economic views, which he had imbibed from William Godwin's Political Justice (1793), had alienated him from his wealthy aristocratic family: they wanted him to follow traditional models of the landed aristocracy, and he wanted to donate large amounts of the family's money to schemes intended to help
15621-438: Was still helping to support her father, and they looked out for publishers for each other. In 1830, she sold the copyright for a new edition of Frankenstein for £60 to Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley for their new Standard Novels series. After her father's death in 1836 at the age of eighty, she began assembling his letters and a memoir for publication, as he had requested in his will; but after two years of work, she abandoned
15748-600: Was the History of a Six Weeks' Tour , published in November 1817. That autumn, Percy Shelley often lived away from home in London to evade creditors. The threat of a debtor's prison , combined with their ill health and fears of losing custody of their children, contributed to the couple's decision to leave England for Italy on 12 March 1818, taking Claire Clairmont and Alba with them. They had no intention of returning. One of
15875-409: Was the baby's mother. Biographers have offered various interpretations of these events: that Percy Shelley decided to adopt a local child; that the baby was his by Elise, Claire, or an unknown woman; or that she was Elise's by Byron. Mary Shelley insisted she would have known if Claire had been pregnant, but it is unclear how much she really knew. The events in Naples, a city Mary Shelley later called
16002-408: Was the first of his three- decade -long planetary romance series of Barsoom novels , which were set on Mars and featured John Carter as the hero . These novels were predecessors to YA novels , and drew inspiration from European science fiction and American Western novels . In 1924, We by Russian writer Yevgeny Zamyatin , one of the first dystopian novels, was published. It describes
16129-467: Was the second child of the feminist philosopher, educator, and writer Mary Wollstonecraft and the first child of the philosopher, novelist, and journalist William Godwin . Wollstonecraft died of puerperal fever shortly after Mary was born. Godwin was left to bring up Mary, along with her older half-sister, Fanny Imlay , Wollstonecraft's child by the American speculator Gilbert Imlay . A year after Wollstonecraft's death, Godwin published his Memoirs of
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