Several critics (e.g. Joseph 1975, 109; Ward 2000, 20–31) have suggested that Henry Fuseli's Nightmare (or -mares, as there were at least three versions of it: 1781, 1791, 1793) was an inspiration for Elizabeth's death in Volume III, chapter 6 in the first edition of Frankenstein (1818). This chapter will show that certain motifs borrowed from the paintings can be found elsewhere in the novel and its paratext, notably in the 1831 ‘Introduction’, thus playing an important part in Mary Shelley's creative process and narration. It is important, however, to be careful in identifying elements borrowed from Fuseli, as they may differ from one version of the Nightmare to the next, and also since the nightmarish bedside scenes of Gothic literature were perhaps an even more significant influence on Shelley. Critics have often overlooked those two obstacles to a transaesthetic study, but they may also have been misled by the author's own confusion between the versions of the paintings. This analysis will therefore start with the 1831 ‘Introduction’, since it is supposed to relate the genesis of the story, before turning to the seminal chapter 4 of Volume I and, following the study of various passages, the scene of Elizabeth's death in Volume III.

Mary Shelley's Nightmares in the 1831 ‘Introduction’

The creation of Frankenstein, as narrated in the ‘Introduction’ to the 1831 edition, is at once rooted in the reading of Gothic tales and in the author's own ‘imagination’ (Shelley 1990, 170):

I opened mine in terror. (Shelley 1990, 170)

Such mise-en-abyme of the sleeper reproduces the various viewpoints in Fuseli's painting and announces the novel's embedded narratives.