Lessons for the 21st century from a 200-year-old book by ‘Frankenstein’ author Mary Shelley
What if there was just one person left on the planet? David Wall/Moment via Getty Images Even if you have never read it, you know the story of Mary Shelley’s second great work of political science fiction after “Frankenstein.” “ The Last Man ,” published in 1826 but set in the late 21st century, tells the tale of a lethal contagion spread by human conflict and war that sweeps the world and seemingly leaves one sole huma.
Mary Shelley’s 1826 novel The Last Man is a work of political science fiction that tells the story of a deadly plague spreading across the world, seemingly leaving only one human survivor. The novel is set in the late 21st century and explores themes of human conflict, war, and the consequences of irresponsibility. It has influenced the postapocalyptic fiction genre, inspiring numerous books, films, and TV shows such as The Last of Us, Midnight Mass, and Station Eleven. The novel’s themes remain relevant today, particularly in the context of recent global events like the COVID-19 pandemic, which caused 7 million deaths worldwide, and ongoing climate catastrophes.
The Last Man is an epic, three-volume novel that begins as a court romance near Windsor Castle in the late 21st century. By the end of the first volume, personal and political infidelities lead to the destabilization of England’s democracy. In the second volume, leaders like Lord Raymond and Prince Adrian join the war of Greek independence against Turkey, during which a lethal plague spreads from the battlefield near Constantinople to infect people globally. By the third volume, the world descends into postapocalyptic chaos, with governments collapsing, societies breaking down, and anarchy prevailing. The narrator, Lionel Verney, appears to be the last surviving human, though he later hopes others may still exist elsewhere.
Mary Shelley drew deeply personal inspiration for The Last Man from her own life. In 1822, her husband, Percy Bysshe Shelley, drowned in a boating accident at age 29. Three months later, she began her Journal of Sorrow, a diary documenting her grief and isolation. The deaths of three of their four children preceded Percy’s death. In the novel, the deadly plague symbolizes the human-made tragedies that had devastated her life. Politically, Shelley used the plague as a warning about the potential consequences of unchecked global conflict and irresponsibility. She explicitly linked characters in the novel to real people: Lord Raymond represented her late friend Lord Byron, and Adrian represented her late husband Percy.
The novel vividly engages with three major issues facing the 21st century: extreme weather, pandemics, and species extinction. In the story, the siege of Constantinople during wartime exacerbates extreme heat, leading to the city’s ruin and the eventual global spread of the plague. As governments fail to cooperate in containing the contagion, societies collapse into civil war and anarchy. The result is the specter of human extinction, described in the novel as the end of humanity’s role as the 'queller of the elements' and the 'lord of created nature.' Despite this bleak vision, the novel suggests that life persists in other forms, such as animals, plants, and the Earth’s inanimate matter.
In the final part of the novel, Lionel Verney, the narrator, decides to write his own book, *The History of the Last Man*, to document what happened, why it happened, and how it might have been avoided. This meta-fictional moment reveals that Verney’s book is actually Mary Shelley’s *The Last Man*. In the closing scene, Verney expresses hope that other survivors may exist, possibly on an island in the South Indian Ocean. He plans to sail out in a small boat, accompanied only by his dog and the works of Shakespeare and Homer, to forge new and humane forms of community with the remaining life on Earth. This ending offers a model for engaging with contemporary environmental and political disasters.
