Did Victor Frankenstein try to create life in a test tube?Frankenstein by Mary Shelley

Mary Shelley's original title for Frankenstein
was Frankenstein, or the Modern
Prometheus; Prometheus was the Titan god who was entrusted with the task of
molding man out of clay.  Added to this concept of creation from matter, Mrs. Shelley
and her husband both were intrigued with the ideas of Eramus Darwin, a scientist whose
ideas concerning biological evolution prefigured those of his more famous grandson,
Charles Darwin.  Also, Mary and Percy Shelley attended a lecture by Andrew Crosse, a
British scientist whose experiments with electricity greatly interested
them.

With these influences in mind, as well as the
historical context of the novel, it seems more appropriate to believe that Frankenstein
molded his creature and charged him with electricity than having created him in a test
tube.  After all, Dolly the sheep was "created" much later than Shelley's time.  In
fact, in the novel itself, Victor relates how he used cadavers' flesh and bones to
create his creature:

readability="6">

I collected bones from charnel-houses; ....The
dissecting room and the slaughterhouse furnished many of my
materials....

Frankenstein's
more "filthy creation" as himself calls it serves Shelley's gothic theme, as well as the
Romantics antipathy for science.