Profs & Pints Nashville: Frankenstein Unbound

Profs and Pints Nashville presents: “Frankenstein Unbound,” on the continual reimagining of Mary Shelley’s novel and what adaptations reveal about our evolving anxieties, by Stephanie A. Graves, scholar of horror and the Gothic and adjunct lecturer of English at Middle Tennessee State University.

[Doors open at 6 pm. Talk starts at 7.]

The new Guillermo del Toro film adaptation of Frankenstein is just one of countless iterations of a tale that have haunted the cultural imagination for more than two centuries.

Join Stephanie A. Graves, whose excellent talks on horror have earned her a big following among Profs and Pints audiences, for a fascinating exploration of Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel and how it has continued to shape human understanding of science, creation, hubris, and monstrosity.

We’ll start by examining the remarkable origins of a novel conceived by an 18-year-old Mary Shelley during a ghost story competition. We’ll consider how its biographical and historical context enriches our reading of this foundational Gothic text, with its themes of scientific hubris, blind ambition, and the construction of the Other.

Turning to key adaptations across different media, Graves will offer a brief survey of differing versions of the story, including James Whale's iconic 1931 film, Kenneth Branagh's devoted 1994 interpretation, and even Mel Brooks’ hilarious 1974 Young Frankenstein. We’ll particularly focus on Guillermo del Toro's adaptation, which itself references many of these previous adaptations in its revival of Shelly’s novel. We’ll consider how he asks audiences to reconsider who the real monster is—a question that resonates powerfully in our current moment.

In assessing Frankenstein’s influence, we’ll look at what makes Frankenstein so adaptable and why does this story about creation and responsibility continues to speak to contemporary audiences.

Among the questions Graves will tackle: How do these different adaptations reflect their historical moments? And what does our fascination with the story reveal about humanity's relationship with technology and Otherness? (Advance tickets: $13.50 plus sales tax and processing fees. Doors: $17, or $15 with a student ID.)

Image: A screen shot from the trailer for the 1964 film The Evil of Frankenstein (Hammer / Wikimedia Commons).