Hideous Love: The Story of the Girl Who Wrote Frankenstein (18 page)

my Italian at evening
conversaziones

and find that Claire, Shelley, and I

get along with the language

whereas most other English

do not even try to speak it.

Shelley writes
The Cenci

and
Prometheus Unbound
,

a work of tremendous effort

that may be the best thing

he has ever created.

Some days darken me still

like a blindfold knocking

out all sun. Shelley wishes

to return to Naples

to retrieve the baby Elena.

My father harrows

in money problems once again

and sends distressing letters.

I juggle my moods

by engaging in projects

and enjoying the scenery

stuffed with statues.

William and I tour

the sights of Rome by carriage.

We recline in the gardens

of the Villa Borghese

and try just to breathe.

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WILLMOUSE

May–June 1819

The artist Amelia Curran

paints a beautiful portrait

of my blue-eyed, chubby,

but serious little William.

He chatters away now

in English, Italian, and French.

We delight to find

that Amelia has been living

in Rome the past couple of years.

She warns us that the Corso,

where we are living now,

is no place for a small delicate child

like Willmouse as malaria season

approaches, so we move

into rooms next to Amelia

on the Trinità dei Monti.

On the twenty-third of May

little William falls ill

with worms

according to Dr. Bell’s diagnosis.

He suggests that we leave Rome

because the oppressive heat

could be damaging to William.

For once Shelley

is not keen on travel.

Over a week later

William feels not better,

in fact, he shakes

with a high fever

that reminds me of his sister, Clara.

I fear the worst—

like a prisoner awaiting the guillotine.

We sit at William’s bedside.

I cannot sleep.

The misery of these

hours is beyond calculation

as the hopes of my life

bind up in William.

He contracts malaria

and dies at noon on June 7.

I feel as though

my happiness ends

by the ragged edge of a blade.

I have lost three children now.

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MY SELFISH ILL HUMOR

Summer 1819

I feel that I may not be fit

to live. Had I not

this baby kicking inside me,

my grief might throw

me over a cliff.

What kind of mother

sees three children die?

Father sends me a letter

expressing that if I do not quit

my selfishness and ill humor

my friends and family

will cease to love me.

So I have lost my child

of three. Does that mean

all that is beautiful

in the world is now dead,

that everything else

which has claim upon my kindness

ceases to exist? My shoulders

cave in to read his words.

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SOME SOLACE

August 1819

We receive letters from

the Hunts and Hogg and Peacock

and Maria Gisborne

all with consoling words

about my little William

and concern for me.

I cannot cheer,

but I do feel cared for,

and loved even at my lowest.

Frankenstein
, I hear

through letters, despite

some less than laudatory

reviews, is still being read

and discussed in England

after it is known that

I authored it. Discussion

means that it provokes thought

and creates some controversy.

I am fueled now

by more than

just my pregnancy to carry on.

I retreat like a soldier

without weapons

to the solace of work.

I begin a new journal

on Shelley’s birthday.

I also start a new novel

that I finally decide

to title
Mathilda
. It centers

around a relationship

between a father and a daughter

where the father commits

suicide and the grief-stricken

daughter cannot share

her anguish with anyone

because her father’s love

for her was incestuous.

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PERCY FLORENCE

November 1819

We relocate again,

this time to Florence

so that I can be in the care

of Doctor Bell when I deliver

my new baby.

The labor goes easy

and lasts but two hours.

The baby looks robust and healthy

with a nose that promises

to be as big as my father’s.

I thrill to once again

be a mother,

but fear like one

about to walk a plank

that there may be

shark-infested waters

ahead of me,

that I may also lose this child.

It has been five miserable months

without a baby

and now I walk

until my feet blister

because I believe

that will help me

produce enough milk

to feed my little one.

Shelley worries over my

state of mind still,

but a little less now

that baby Percy has come.

He pleads with Maria Gisborne

to visit us, but she cannot come.

I think Shelley requires

some new companionship

but we are considered

to be radical and therefore

somewhat outcast by many people

wherever we land.

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RADICAL LOVE

December 1819

Shelley says to me,

“Our love is radical

in all its definitions.

It is both

fundamental

and favoring social reform.

So when people

call us radicals

I think perhaps

they know not entirely

of what they speak.”

I hold little Percy

to my breast and proclaim,

“I am proud to live

our beliefs.”

Though sometimes when Claire

crawls under my skin

I favor the fundamental

portion of being radical.

“You are my core, Mary.”

Shelley cups his hand

over his son’s head,

and I can hardly contain

my joy.

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PISA

January 1820

So that we will have

a milder climate

and can be under the care

of a better doctor

we move down the Arno to Pisa.

I find the town drab

and the Italians here scruffy

as well-worn boots.

Claire and I fight daily

as though to quarrel is to breathe.

She has not seen her daughter

for far too long and we haven’t

word of Allegra for months now.

Claire acts as if it is the same

as having lost a child.

I know this to be false

and find her whining more intolerable

than if she lit me on fire.

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DISTRESSING NEWS

Spring 1820

We learn that Lord Byron

now lives in Ravenna

as the acknowledged escort

of Teresa Guiccioli.

He dwells in her household

along with her husband

and so now does Allegra.

Claire writes to ask

if she might not see her daughter

as it has been over a year

since she laid eyes upon her.

Byron does not respond.

And when Claire suggests

that Allegra summer with us in Pisa,

Byron questions what kind

of parents Shelley and I make

with our godlessness,

the return of our vegetarian diet,

and worse than that

the loss of our children.

He will keep Allegra with him

or send her to a convent.

Claire frenzies herself with anguish.

I think Byron ought not point

accusations of blame

unless he himself lies beyond

reproach.

Paolo, our former manservant,

blackmails Shelley over Shelley’s

relationship to Elena Adelaide,

the baby from Naples that we left

in foster care. We hire a lawyer

to intercede for us

and stop the blackmail,