Mary Shelley was born in London on August 30, 1797. She was the only child of Mary Wollstonecraft and William Godwin. Her mother was an early feminist and her father was a radical philosopher and writer.  Ten days after giving birth Mary’s mother died at the age of thrity nine from puerperal fever.  On December 21,1801 her father, William Godwin married Mary Jane Vial who has two children. When Mary was little he would walk with her to the St. Pancras churchyard where her mother was buried. There she learned to read and write by tracing the inscription on her mother’s gravestone.

            In 1807 the family moved to the headquarters of M. J. Godwin & Co. at 4 Skinner Street, Holborn(the library owned by the family). From the years 1812-1814 she moved back and forth between london and scotland.

            Near the end of 1812  Mary meets her lover, Percy Bysshe Shelley, for the first time. In 1815 her first daughter dies, but she gives birth to a son, William, about a year later. On December 30, 1816 Mary marries Percy Bysshe Shelley. She would have two more children, Clara Everina in 1817 and Percy Florence in 1819. clara would die in 1818 from dysentery and her first child William dies of Malaria in 1819.

             On June 16, 1816 Mary began writing her first novel, Frankeinstein.  Some of her other works include “The Last Man”, “Valperga”, “Matilda”, “Faulkner” and “Lodore”. She also wrote many short stories and poems.

            Mary WollstoneCraft Shelley died in her home in Chester Square, London at age 53 of a brain tumor. Her remains along with her husbands were moved from St. Pancras to the churchyard at St. Peters, Bournemouth. On Feburary 8, 1851 she is buried between her parents.