Hideous Love: The Story of the Girl Who Wrote Frankenstein

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HIDEOUS LOVE

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—THE STORY OF THE GIRL WHO WROTE
FRANKENSTEIN
—

HIDEOUS
LOVE

STEPHANIE HEMPHILL

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Copyright

This book is a work of fiction. References to real people, events, establishments, organizations, or locales are intended only to provide a sense of authenticity, and are used to advance the fictional narrative. All other characters, and all incidents and dialogue, are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real.

Balzer + Bray is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.

Hideous Love: The Story of the Girl Who Wrote
Frankenstein

Copyright © 2013 by Stephanie Hemphill

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.

ISBN 978-0-06-185331-9

13 14 15 16 17  XX/XXXX  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

First Edition

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Dedication

For Jessica

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I AM MARY

I want to be beauty,

but I am not.

I want to be free,

but I am not.

I want to be equal,

but I am not.

I want to be favorite,

but I am not.

I want to be loved,

and yet I am not.

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MY MOTHER

I never knew my mother.

She did not nurse me from her breast.

She could not soothe my aches and tears.

I learned to walk without her aid.

I never knew my mother.

She did not hold me in the dark.

She could not sing away my fears.

I learned to speak without her voice.

I never knew my mother.

She helped establish women’s rights.

I wear her legacy like a pledge.

I learned to think and fight reading her words.

I never knew my mother

for she died when I was eleven days old.

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LONGING TO BE DADDY’S LITTLE GIRL

My father, William Godwin,

is a political philosopher

highly respected by his peers.

He is progressive,

teaching his daughters

as if they are sons.

When I stand in his presence

I feel as though I must

leap upon a chair

just to meet his shoulders.

My father, William Godwin,

is a tower of light.

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MY STEPMOTHER

She was spawned from creature,

not man, and sends shivers

up one’s arms.

Under her hair must be horns.

She is Medusa

trying to turn me to stone

in the eyes of my father.

At times I swear

she was born to torture me

and for no other purpose.

She needles me

with her incessant blather.

She prods me to misbehave

when she stupidly

misuses language

and forgets facts.

She picks on me

for my impatience with others

as she herself is a dimwit.

She criticizes me for not being

as pretty as her daughter, Jane,

despises me for not being Jane.

She reflects no history,

nothing of which to be proud.

All she bears is the marital hand

of my father which baffles me

more than snow in July.

She shuffles me away

to Dundee, Scotland,

when I am fourteen

and for that I
am
grateful.

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OUR UNUSUAL HOUSEHOLD

1814

Fanny is the eldest,

my half-sister, daughter of my mother

and Gilbert Imlay, an American entrepreneur.

She never seeks trouble

and is quiet and reserved.

Her stated last name

is the same as my father’s, Godwin.

Charles Clairmont, the next eldest,

is the son

of my awful stepmother,

Mary Jane Clairmont

and Charles de Gaulis,

who died when Charles was one.

Charles is fair haired,

and fortunate to be a boy.

I am the third eldest

and best bred.

Learning comes easily to me,

as does frustration.

Clara Jane Clairmont (Jane)

is nearly my age,

the daughter of my stepmother

and some unnamed suitor

my stepmother calls Charles Clairmont,

yet not the same man

as was Charles’s father.

We sometimes get on

and at other times I wish

to pull Jane by the roots of her hair.

And then there is William,

the youngest,

the offspring of

my stepmother and my father,

doted on by my stepmother

until it pains the eyes.

None of us has the same parents.

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MY RETURN FROM DUNDEE, SCOTLAND

Spring 1814

At first I was afraid

to leave my home,

to leave my father’s care

knowing that my banishment

to the Baxters

meant to punish me.

My arm of pustules and pain

represented all the ways

I could not be well and good

in my own house.

But I found a family in Scotland.

A family like I had read about in books

where the mother and father

care for one another

and all the children

are their own.

I found girlfriends in Scotland,

the two daughters of the Baxters,

Isabella and Christina.

We became as inseparable

as words and letters.

My arm healed

and my temper soothed.

My imagination awoke

like a sleeping giant

in that stark landscape,

and I began to write stories.

I return to my house

of chaos, calmer

and more assured.

There is so much

of the greater world

I know now

will be a part of me,

and I am not afraid.

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MR. SHELLEY

May 5, 1814

He is the buzz

of our Spinner Street home

when at sixteen

I return permanently from Dundee.

No other topic passes between anyone’s lips.

Jane declares that when Mr. Shelley

falls silent

the air ceases circulation,

that when a smile flushes his countenance

the room boils with laughter.

And even quiet Fanny agrees.

But I remembered Mr. Shelley

from my visit home

the year before

as more buzzard than noteworthy,

fairylike

with the curly blond hair

of a schoolgirl,

his hands frail as silk stockings.

I remember he stood beside

his wife and I wondered

who wore the dress?

In a voice pert as a baby starling,