Frankenstein

At the beginning of May, I attended a performance of 500 Clown's adaptation of Frankenstein. To be honest, I attended it twice. I had been lucky enough to do a workshop with this troupe and several of my friends the previous week and frankly I was smitten. So the least I could do as a devoted fan was go to all of their shows.

I really can't begin to do justice to their performance. They basically used the story of Frankenstein as a framework for their own brand of physical comedy, the set consisting only of a table which could be manipulated for a variety of uses, a door and a couple of bare hanging lights. There were only 3 of them, Adrien, Paul and Molly, and that's all they needed.

At points in the show, Molly would read from the actual text. I am always inspired by the sound of someone reading aloud and this was no different. I needed to re-read Frankenstein and that's all there was to it. I actually had to buy a new copy because I didn't even own it (Thank you Barnes and Noble Classics!)

I had to wait until I finished the book I was already reading, but I finally dove in and within a few pages I was entranced. I didn't remember it like this before. The first time that I read Frankenstein I was only 14 maybe. I don't remember exactly but I was fresh off Stephen King and I didn't think much of it to be honest. I was bored and it wasn't scary enough. I wonder if I even finished it and I didn't read it again until now. So it was a wonderful surprise that I found it so beautiful. Apparently my taste has become more sophisticated over the years.

At it's heart, this is a book about overwhelming passions, a common enough theme of the Romantic era which is what makes it one of my favorites. These people knew how to live and I thank them for allowing me the chance to escape from my tedious pragmatic modern life and live for awhile too.