Born on August 30
Mary Shelley's Birthday
One stormy night, a new kind of story.
Next: August 30, 2027
Where it comes from
Mary Shelley was born Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin in Somers Town, London, on 30 August 1797, and this Story marks her birthday. Her parents were two famous thinkers: the philosopher William Godwin and Mary Wollstonecraft, the defender of women's rights, who died days after her birth.
How it's celebrated
There is no formal observance. Readers mark the day by opening Frankenstein, a short novel that is quite different from the films it inspired, or by telling their own ghost stories on a dark evening, as she and her friends once did.
Did you know
At eleven she published a rhymed children's tale, Mounseer Nongtongpaw, in a series from her family's publishing house.
Read the full story of Mary Shelley's Birthday
Star sign
Virgo · August 23 – September 22 · Earth sign
Careful and kind, the one who notices what everyone else missed.