Talk:Prometheus Unbound (Shelley)

A fact from Prometheus Unbound (Shelley) appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 4 October 2008, and was viewed approximately 864 times (disclaimer) (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:

Did you know... that Mary Shelley's edition of Percy Bysshe Shelley's Prometheus Unbound was delayed 19 years because Percy's father, Timothy Shelley, refused to allow any of his son's poetry to be published?

A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2008/October.

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Comments

When did Frankenstein gain the subtitle ? Before or after Percy's work ? -- Beardo 03:25, 15 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I understand where your question is coming from, but at the same time I don't know quite how to answer it. On the one hand, one could probably sift through journal entries, drafts/editions etc. and find out, chronologically, who wrote the word "Prometheus" in their title first (and I assume the answer would be Shelley). On the other hand, I would say that such an endeavour is meaningless (or at least of superficial significance), because they were apparently working on their respective works at the same time (sorry don't have any solid refs on hand, but one can concider the publication dates and the fact that the publication of Percy's was delayed). Also, the figure of Prometheus flourished in art and other cultural/political media during the Romantic period all over Europe, and so Prometheus, the symbolism connected to this mythological figure, and even the idea of a "modern Prometheus" is not something that can be easily traced chronologically or particular for the Shelleys. I hope this helped.--Zimablume (talk) 22:52, 20 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Regardless of which came first, shouldn't the article mention, as part of the background, that Mary Shelley's Frankenstein (of which Percy wrote 4000 to 5000 of its 72000 words) is subtitled The Modern Prometheus, and was first published in 1818, just as the Frankenstein article, discussing this subtitle, mentions that Percy would soon give us Prometheus Unbound in 1820? The reader is thus left free to choose whether or not to speculate on the significance of this, if any. By failing to mention it, the reader is denied this opportunity unless he or she is already aware of the subtitle. I'd add it in myself, except that I've grown tired of having similar contributions deleted as allegedly irrelevant by self-appointed authority figures.Tlhslobus (talk) 08:19, 1 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Wikiproject Theater?

Does this article really belong under the project Theater? There has got to be a better project this article can be listed under. The thing is, I am such a noob here that I haven't been able to figure out what to do to change this. Please help!--Zimablume (talk) 23:24, 20 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

This user is completely correct. While Shelley wrote Prometheus Unbound in the form of a play, he primarily considered it a "closet drama," and therefore not necessarily designed for the stage. Now, Shelley may indeed have enjoyed attempts at staging the play, and both I at UPenn and my colleague Omar Miranda at NYU have attempted staged productions in the past few years. Under these circumstances, one might understand how, as a work of theatre, this Wikipedia article might be deemed to be of "low-importance." However, Prometheus Unbound exists primarily as a work of poetry, and as such is almost always understood to be one of the two dozen or so most important works of poetry in the English language. Thus this Wikipedia article must be considered wrongfully classified, and should find its rightful place among Wikipedia articles dealing with Poetry in English, and its importance should be reclassified as "high."---Eric Alan Weinstein, The Unbinding Prometheus Project, UPenn Feb 2016Eric Alan Weinstein (talk) 03:50, 23 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]