हिंदी
Chandigarh December 1, 2021
The Postgraduate Department of English at Mehr Chand Mahajan DAV College for Women, Chandigarh, in association with Gopichand Arya Mahila College, Abohar, organised an online extension lecture titled “Mary Shelley and Birth of Science Fiction”.
Dr. Elisabetta Marino, Associate Professor of English and American literature at the University of Rome “Tor Vergata” was the resource person for this informative lecture. More than 160 participants attended the lecture using virtual mode. MCM Principal Dr. Nisha Bhargava and Dr. Rekha Sood Handa, Principal, Gopichand Arya Mahila College, welcomed Dr. Marino and appreciated her effort to enlighten the participants about the celebrated writer, Mary Shelley and her contribution to the genre of science fiction.
As Dr. Bhargava highlighted the importance of science and technology in human life, she also drew attention to the irony of science and technology being a bane to the human society, thereby impressing upon the relevance of study of science fiction as a genre that provides a reflection of our world and its problems.
Dr. Marino delivered an enlightening talk on the events that prompted an 18-year-old Mary Shelley to produce a classic like ‘Frankenstein’. She further discussed how Shelley’s work is often mischaracterised as a gothic novel and re-emphasised the significance of Shelley to the literary world. She especially raised the moral issues about the perils of scientific interference with nature.
It gave the participants an opportunity to not only understand the birth of science fiction, but also provided them a platform to ponder over the moral and ethical responsibility towards the natural world. The lecture prompted the participants to reflect upon the significance of Science fiction in a post-COVID world.
