READERS GUIDE

Reader’s Guide
Her Lost Words by Stephanie Marie Thorton 
Discussion Questions:

1.   Mary Wollstonecraft styles herself as a revolutionary, even traveling to Paris to witness the French Revolution firsthand while others are fleeing. How did her early life experiences shape her character and bring her to that point?

2.   Mary Shelley—then Godwin—is so young when she decides to elope with Percy Shelley. Why do you think she made this fateful decision? Was it the right choice for her to make?

3.   Mary Wollstonecraft and William Godwin experienced the opposite of love at first sight—loathing at first sight—when they met at Johnson’s dinner party before Mary’s departure to Paris. What experiences most changed them in the intervening years so they could become friends and then lovers after Mary’s return to London?

4.   Claire Clairmont and Percy Shelley reputedly had a very close relationship, which often caused friction between Claire and Mary. What did you think of their unique living arrangement, both before and after Claire met Lord Byron?

5.   Mary Wollstonecraft railed against women losing themselves to love in A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, but then finds herself in the same situation with Gilbert Imlay. What lessons did she learn from that relationship, and how did they guide her relationship with William Godwin?

6.   William Godwin—a liberal philosopher in his own right—plays a huge role in Mary Wollstonecraft’s later life. How did her death shape his relationship with Mary Shelley?

7.   Lord Byron is an example of the type of man Mary Wollstonecraft warned about in A Vindication of the Rights of Woman—the domineering sort who saw women only as trinkets and who was protected by the law when it came to property rights, divorce, and custody of children. How did Percy and Mary Shelley try to circumvent him? Was there anything they should have done differently?

8.   While Mary Wollstonecraft and Mary Shelley take center stage in this novel, other women from history had important roles as well. How would the story—and both Mary Wollstonecraft’s and Mary Shelley’s lives—have been different without Théroigne de Méricourt, Maria Reveley, and Jane and Claire Clairmont?

9.   The title of the novel is Her Lost Words. Whom do you think this applies to more: Mary Wollstonecraft or Mary Shelley?