 Until the 1970s , Mary Shelley was known mainly for her efforts to publish her husband 's works and for her novel Frankenstein , which remains widely read and has inspired many theatrical and film adaptations . Recent scholarship has yielded a more comprehensive view of Mary Shelley ’ s achievements . Scholars have shown increasing interest in her literary output , particularly in her novels , which include the historical novels Valperga ( 1823 ) and Perkin Warbeck ( 1830 ) , the apocalyptic novel The Last Man ( 1826 ) , and her final two novels , Lodore ( 1835 ) and Falkner ( 1837 ) . Studies of her lesser @-@ known works , such as the travel book Rambles in Germany and Italy ( 1844 ) and the biographical articles for Dionysius Lardner 's Cabinet Cyclopaedia ( 1829 – 46 ) , support the growing view that Mary Shelley remained a political radical throughout her life . Mary Shelley 's works often argue that cooperation and sympathy , particularly as practised by women in the family , were the ways to reform civil society . This view was a direct challenge to the individualistic Romantic ethos promoted by Percy Shelley and the Enlightenment political theories articulated by her father , William Godwin . 
