Bernie Wrightson, “Frankenstein” Illustrations
Frankenstein was a comics adaptation of the novel of the same name, first published in 1983 by American company Marvel Comics, with script and art by Bernie Wrightson.
This edition reprints the full novel by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley published in 1831, with illustrations by Wrightson. It includes an introduction by Stephen King and from Wrightson himself. The illustrations themselves are not based upon the Boris Karloff or Lee films, but on the actual book’s descriptions of characters and objects. Wrightson also used a period style, saying “I wanted the book to look like an antique; to have the feeling of woodcuts or steel engravings, something of that era” and basing the feel on artists like Franklin Booth, J.C. Coll and Edwin Austin Abbey.
“I’ve always had a thing for Frankenstein, and it was a labor of love. It was not an assignment, it was not a job. I would do the drawings in between paying gigs, when I had enough to be caught up with bills and groceries and what-not. I would take three days here, a week there, to work on the Frankenstein volume. It took about seven years.” -Bernie Wrightson
For the 25th anniversary of the first edition in October 2008, a new edition was prepared and released in 1994 by Dark Horse Comics in an oversized (9″ x 12″), hardcover format scanned from the original artwork. It is still available through Amazon books.