THE BIG SIX #1: F R A N K E N S T E I N, Continued.

Frankenstein's creator, Mary Shelley.

Add this to her interest in Luigi Galvani's 1783 experiments in animating the legs of dead frogs with electricity, and those of his nephew, Giovanni Aldini in 1803. Aldini performed his most famous feat at the Royal College of Surgeons in London on a hanged man named George Forster. Aldini had a pair of conducting rods connected to a powerful battery. When he touched the rods to parts of the body it seemed to come back to life. When he applied the rods to the dead man's mouth and ear the jaw quivered, adjoining muscles contorted, and the left eye opened. When a rod touched the rectum the whole body convulsed, giving the appearance of re-animation. The result, in 1816, was the 'waking dream' Mary experienced.

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