Poor Things by Alasdair Gray📖

Summary of Poor Things

According to her husband, Bella Baxter was brought to life by a scientist who transported the brain of an unborn child into the corpse of a drowned woman. According to herself, she is very much a real person, and her husband a fool enthralled by gothic horror stories. She elopes in search of passion and adventure but eventually returns to Glasgow, where she attempts to resists the constraints of patriarchal Victorian society. 

Reasons to read Poor Things

“Poor Things” is a captivating, extravagant, and surreal retelling of Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein”, relocated to 1880s Victorian Glasgow. The novel offers a critique of how women are perceived through the eyes of men. In 1992, “Poor Things” won both the Whitbread Award and the Guardian Fiction Prize. It was adapted into a film in 2023, starring Emma Stone and Willem Dafoe. Alasdair Gray, one of Scotland’s most celebrated authors, is also known for his books “Lanark” and “1982, Janine”.

Setting: Glasgow (Scotland, UK)

Bella Baxter’s home is at 18 Park Circus, Glasgow.

Original title: Poor Things

Year of publication: 1992

Nr of pages: 318