Throughout the novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, Geneva, Switzerland is marked as a location that holds significance in Victor Frankenstein’s life. The significance of this location led me to wonder why Mary Shelley chose that specific location, why Geneva? Why not a more widely known and recognized city like Paris or London or even Berlin? Was choosing this location purposeful or was it just chosen randomly? With these questions swirling around my head I decided to find out more so I could finally understand Mary Shelley’s thought process in choosing this location. 

Geneva as a key location to the story of Frankenstein was presented in the very first chapter of the story when Victor Frankenstein “introduces” himself to the reader for the very first time. This introduction begins with Victor saying “I am by birth a Genevese; and my family is one of the most distinguished in the republic” (Shelley 64). From this statement I learned that Geneva is the location of the Frankenstein family’s “legacy,” and is Victor’s original home. Later in the story Geneva also serves as the location where William and Justine’s murder by Victor’s Creature takes place. Sure this provides the reason behind why the location is repeated throughout many points of the story due to the personal connection Victor has to the location, however it doesn’t provide the reason why Shelley chose this location out of all the possible cities in Europe. My questions have still been left unanswered. This then led me to dig deeper to  find out whatever I could about Geneva as a location, and hopefully I would discover the true significance of this location. 

My first step to discovering the true significance of Geneva involved a quick Google search of Geneva’s climate. Throughout the novel images of ice and cold and talks about arctic weather are repeated at multiple different parts. This lead me to my first hypothesis: maybe Shelley chose this location because it went along with the very prevalent ideas arctic exploration seen throughout the story with Walton’s arctic exploration and Victor Frankenstein’s own Arctic Travels. However upon looking at a map of Europe (Image 1), it became exceedingly clear that Switzerland was not located anywhere near the Arctic. If fact it was a landlocked country located in-between France, Germany, Italy, and Austria. Geneva’s climate also doesn’t match that of the arctic locations that Victor and Walton venture to throughout the story, however it does have cold winters that can reach freezing temperatures (https://www.climatestotravel.com/climate/switzerland/geneva). Despite the fact Geneva has cold winters, that still didn’t answer my question of why did Shelley choose this location. There are many places in the world that have cold winters, so why did she choose Geneva?

My next step was to find the answer to my next hypothesis— Mary Shelley chose Geneva Switzerland to be a key location in her story because she had some personal connection to it. This led me to my next Google search: “Mary Shelley and Geneva.” This Google search was far more successful, with the first search result being a history.com article titled “‘Frankenstein’ Was Born During a Ghastly Vacation” written by Erin Blakemore. This article begins by mentioning how Shelley wrote the novel while on a vacation to Lake Geneva which is located in Geneva, Switizerland after the 1815 eruption of Indonesian volcano Mount Tambora, which had a death toll over 100,000. What does a volcanic eruption have to do with a novel?

As an environmental science major I have learned about volcanoes and how in the past they have contributed to climate change in somewhat significant ways, however I would have never thought that this eruption would have led to one of the major pieces of literature. Before reading this article I already knew that large enough volcanic eruptions can create volcanic ash cloud cover covering enough of the atmosphere to the point where it blocks any sunlight from making its way through causing a cooling effect that can last for several months. 

As I continued to read the article, the reason why Shelley chose Geneva, Switzerland became quite clear. From the article I learned that Shelley had arrived in Lake Geneva in May 1816 where she became immediately trapped due to bad weather that had been caused by the Mount Tambora eruption. This poor turn of events most likely provided Shelley with inspiration to write due to there being limited things to do, writing could be used by Shelley as a way to escape the current situation she was in. The reason for Shelley’s “vacation” to Lake Geneva goes further than just the desire to go on a vacation, in fact the main reason had to do with an affair. Mary Shelley went on the trip to Geneva with her husband Percy Shelley and her stepsister Claire Clairmont who had become pregnant with poet Lord Byron. Once it became public knowledge across Europe that Lord Byron had been having an affair with his half sister, Lord Byron exiled himself and left Europe. This then provided Claire with a good enough reason to go on a vacation, which Mary Shelley and her husband accompanied her on, without the knowledge that Lord Byron would also be there. Due to their status as writers, Percy Shelley and Lord Byron became close friends and acquired bought property on Lake Geneva where they spent immense time together at Villa Diodato where they became stuck due to rain, likely to be caused by the cloud cover from the Mount Tambora eruption. 

As most could imagine, being stuck with each other led to conflicts between those staying in Villa Diodato leading them to read horror stories. It is at this point of the article when it became clear that the main reason that Shelley chose to have one of the key locations in the article be Geneva was the fact that it was where she developed the inspiration to write the novel after Lord Byron gave his vacationers a prompt to write a scary story she saw terrifying man assumed to be dead show signs of life. Immediately all my questions were answered, and whether or not I believe this story is to be determined, however in some ways it makes sense. Mary Shelley just happened to be in the right place at the right time with the right conditions to write one of the most famous and well known pieces of literature, Frankenstein. This story also makes senses especially when you consider how rainy and “gloomy” weather is presented as a very present theme throughout the story. So in conclusion, Geneva was used as a location of great importance throughout the novel because it was essentially where the “birth” of Frankenstein as a story and idea was formulated.

Source:

Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft, et al. Frankenstein, or, the Modern Prometheus. Broadview Press, 2012. 

https://www.climatestotravel.com/climate/switzerland/geneva

https://www.history.com/news/frankenstein-true-story-mary-shelley