Rating: 
Summary: Be warned: this book is an argument in disguise
Review: If you read "The Memoirs of Elizabeth Frankenstein" expecting to find a horror story similar to Mary Shelley's classic, then you will be extremely disappointed. But Theodore Roszak's novel is an excuse to make an argument, albeit in narrative form, concerning what Dr. Frankenstein wrought up in his laboratory. After all, Roszak is not only a novelist ("Flicker") but also a historian ("The Making of a Counter Culture"). The novel "Frankenstein" represents an important paradigm shift in human history, where science became God, replacing religion. In that regard you can say that the myth of Frankenstein replaced that of Faustus. Essentially "Frankenstein" argues that "there are some things man was not meant to tamper with," a tale that you can trace back to the Tower of Babel or see behind the story of the Titanic for that matter. Roszak makes a similar and no less compelling case for a different kind of shift. For Roszak the science of Dr. Frankenstein represents the "masculine," which replaces the older "feminine" wisdom represented by Elizabeth. As an infant, Elizabeth Lavenza is given to a wandering gypsy. She is illegitimate, without a mother and rejected by her father. Nine years later she is adopted by the strange wife of Baron Alphonse Frankenstein. Elizabeth discovers that Lady Caroline Frankenstein belongs to a secret witches' coven. She has adopted Elizabeth to create an intellectual companion for her son Victor. Lady Caroline has the two children tutored by an old crone, Seraphina, who teaches the "women's mysteries," which includes a series of erotic devotions that serve to reveal the ancient secrets of life. However, Victor would rather dissect animals and study electrical storms. Rejecting magic, instinct and sensuality for the power of aggressive intellect, Victor destroys his friendship with Elizabeth in a brutal act. This sets up Roszak's one ironic twist on the original novel, for when the creature finally emerges in the final chapters of the novel, he befriends Elizabeth; of course, this is before he strangles her on her wedding night. Ultimately, Roszak has written an allegory that despite its willingness to wallow in arcane sexual rites argues for the privileged position of supposedly "feminist" ideals. For Roszak, Dr. Frankenstein is more Pandora than "The Modern Prometheus." If you have read Shelley's novel (not to be confused with the various film versions) and have an appreciation for how the dawn of the Age of Science changed things, then you will find "The Memoirs of Elizabeth Frankenstein" to be a provocative story.
Rating: 
Summary: That's not the Mary Shelley I know.
Review: Roszak claims to have written the Frankenstein Mary Shelley would have written if her times had let her. I doubt it. There are moments at which his conscientiously feminist plot curve is fascinating -- it does in fact highlight the constraints within which Mary Shelley wrote, focusing on men and the male world and discounting the feminine in deed and spirit. But lesbian witch rituals? No way. Mary Shelley was much more cerebral than that
Rating: 
Summary: Hmmm Try a library before you buy
Review: The reviewer before me states that this book is mostly just silly, and yes that sums this book up for me too. The premise is good as is the first 100 pages or so before a downhill spiral into overstated feminism that is trumpeted rather than suggested and what is pretty much nonesense. The book becomes trashy to say the least, and full of inconsistancies obvious to anyone who has read the original. Lets have an example. The book it says in the 'about the author' section was written by a Frankenstein scholar who has taught courses on the novel. If this is so how is it that he conveniently forgot the existance of Elizabeth's little foster brother William, murdered by the monster, or Justine the nursemaid wrongfully accused of his murder? These characters are simply missing. It says on the cover "The shocking tale Mary Shelley dared not write', I didn't find it shocking, shockingly bad perhaps and Mary would never dare write such a bad novel. It strikes me as a book the author was writing anyway before he decided to change the names of the characters and stick the monster in the final 20 pages so he could cash in on the name. I would suggest reading 'Frankenstein Unbound' by Brian Aldyss, a far more erudite and entertaining retelling of the story :)
Rating:
Summary: a more feminine re-telling of a feminist classic
Review: Theodore Roszak wrote _The Memoirs of Elizabeth Frankenstein_ to further explore the character that Mary Shelley based on herself in _Frankenstein_: the foster sister and wife of the scientist main character. Roszak is eerily accurate in his portrayal of some of the most difficult female emotional situations (menstruation, childbirth, and rape), and I loved his invocation of the Reason versus Nature and God versus Science conflicts. However, Roszak took some risks by choosing the same narrator as Shelley did. By allowing Robert Walton to re-tell the story (upon finding Elizabeth's journals), the deletion of important characters seems even more glaring. Victor's youngest brother, William, was completely left out, and as a result so was the character Justine, who had come to stay with the family. Also never mentioned was Victor Frankenstein's best friend Clavel. Both William and Clavel were victims of his creation before Elizabeth, but were left out by Roszak which marred my enjoyment of the novel somewhat. For the most part however, I found _The Memoirs of Elizabeth Frankenstein_ to be a fascinating read and a wonderful study of a classic work of literature. The most amazing statement lies at the very heart of the novel: the desired result of the alchemic union Victor's mother was planning between Victor and Elizabeth was to stop the masculinization of science. I think Mary Shelley would have understood that.
Rating:
Summary: a more feminine re-telling of a feminist classic
Review: Theodore Roszak wrote _The Memoirs of Elizabeth Frankenstein_ to further explore the character that Mary Shelley based on herself in _Frankenstein_: the foster sister and wife of the scientist main character. Roszak is eerily accurate in his portrayal of some of the most difficult female emotional situations (menstruation, childbirth, and rape), and I loved his invocation of the Reason versus Nature and God versus Science conflicts. However, Roszak took some risks by choosing the same narrator as Shelley did. By allowing Robert Walton to re-tell the story (upon finding Elizabeth's journals), the deletion of important characters seems even more glaring. Victor's youngest brother, William, was completely left out, and as a result so was the character Justine, who had come to stay with the family. Also never mentioned was Victor Frankenstein's best friend Clavel. Both William and Clavel were victims of his creation before Elizabeth, but were left out by Roszak which marred my enjoyment of the novel somewhat. For the most part however, I found _The Memoirs of Elizabeth Frankenstein_ to be a fascinating read and a wonderful study of a classic work of literature. The most amazing statement lies at the very heart of the novel: the desired result of the alchemic union Victor's mother was planning between Victor and Elizabeth was to stop the masculinization of science. I think Mary Shelley would have understood that.
Rating: 
Summary: Lyrical, sensitive... and not for light readers.
Review: This is a novel that works in amny levels. Of course, it is indeed, a masterful gothic. A bouquet to Mary Shelley and a very modern horror story, but beyond these layers it is also a study of the secrets of the women at a time when they were best thought of "in the dark"... and this is a dark story all right. For those of use who longed for more about the enigmathic and tragic Elizabeth Lavenza-Frankenstein here is a book that won't be easily read, but neither will it be easily forgotten.
Rating:
Summary: Lyrical, sensitive... and not for light readers.
Review: This is a novel that works in amny levels. Of course, it is indeed, a masterful gothic. A bouquet to Mary Shelley and a very modern horror story, but beyond these layers it is also a study of the secrets of the women at a time when they were best thought of "in the dark"... and this is a dark story all right. For those of use who longed for more about the enigmathic and tragic Elizabeth Lavenza-Frankenstein here is a book that won't be easily read, but neither will it be easily forgotten.
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