A Stormy Night of Ghost-Telling: Fantasmagoriana and the Villa Diodati

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Join us in celebrating the bicentenary of the publication of Frankenstein, as we host a festival of events later this month that explore various aspects of Mary Shelley's gothic classic.

A collaboration between the School of English, Communication and Philosophy and Special Collections at Cardiff University, and directed by Professor Anthony Mandal, Cardiff Frankenfest is part of the global Frankenreads initiative—a celebration of the novel's anniversary by over 400 partners around the world, taking place in the lead-up to Halloween 2018.

In this seminar, Dr Maximiliaan van Woudenberg (Cambridge) will explore Fantasmagoriana, the collection of ghost stories in French read by Byron and the Shelleys during a summer stay in Switzerland. It was these tales that inspired the infamous ghost-storytelling completion, resulting in Mary's creation of Frankenstein. The seminar will consist of a talk, followed by a hands-on discussion based on close readings of two short stories from Fantasmagoriana. This event is co-organised by the Cardiff Romanticism and Eighteenth-Century Seminar and the Centre for Editorial and Intertextual Research.