The era in which the Romanticism movement took place was a period of invention, social revolution, and cultural innovation. One of the most influential and representative novels of the Romantic period is Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. For this Applied History class assignment, I designed a book cover for Frankenstein that would appeal to contemporary readers by evoking a nostalgic, Gothic feeling indicative of the Romanticism movement. I created a book cover, title page, and page design for the novel. The overall design of the cover and inner pages are based on book designs from the 1800s to the early 1900s.
For the cover, I created a Gothic-style illustration that represents prominent themes from the book—specifically, emotion, nature, and science. The sunken, bloodshot eye, which represents emotion, is based on how the monster’s eyes are described in the novel: “watery” and a “dull yellow” in color. The trees represent nature and how Frankenstein’s creation is abandoned in the woods in the novel. The contorted tree branches are designed to be reminiscent of electricity, lightning, and blood vessels. White and black are used to contrast with one another to represent the light and dark themes of the story. The illustration uses several key themes that embody the Romanticism movement, including strong emotions, imagination, the idealism of the past, and awe of nature.
