‘Frankenweek’ will take the measure of the monster

One of the organizers of the celebration is Professor Deidre Lynch, a longtime 'Frankenstein' fan who teaches 'Modern Monsters in Literature and Film,' a course that works its way through 19th-century horror. Her students, Lynch said, are “really into it.” They have also been shocked to learn of the genre’s deep roots.

'I think that they are just so surprised to find out that this tradition exists — in some ways that horror isn’t just a thing of the slasher films,' said Lynch, Ernest Bernbaum Professor of Literature. 'They are interested in how much the literature depicts monsters as things that are created by humans. Monsters are made rather than monsters being born.'

For Lynch, who on Friday will take part in the panel discussion 'The Afterlives of Frankenstein: Extinction, Emergence, and the Haunted Screen,' the book was the perfect match for the screen.

'Shelley’s novel in some ways is almost a recipe for film,' she said. 'You have dead matter animated by the power of electricity, and filmmakers seem to recognize that it is almost allegorizing their own way of working.'"

Read the full Harvard Gazette article here.