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Who really said it

Invention does not consist in creating out of void, but out of chaos

Written by Mary Shelley 1797–1851 · English novelist
Verified Free to reuse

This is genuine — it is the opening line of the new introduction Mary Shelley wrote for the 1831 revised edition of Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, in which she reflects on where the idea for her novel actually came from.

Last verified 8 Jul 2026 · how we verify · spot an error?

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“Invention does not consist in creating out of void, but out of chaos” Mary Shelley, Introduction to the 1831 edition of Frankenstein

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Provenance

The source

Work
Introduction to the 1831 revised edition of Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus
Signed
London, 15 October 1831
First published
1831, Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley (Standard Novels series)

Every thing must have a beginning, to speak in Sanchean phrase; and that beginning must be linked to something that went before. The Hindoos give the world an elephant to support it, but they make the elephant stand upon a tortoise. Invention, it must be humbly admitted, does not consist in creating out of void, but out of chaos; the materials must, in the first place, be afforded: it can give form to dark, shapeless substances, but cannot bring into being the substance itself. — Introduction, 1831

Popular quotations of this line usually drop the opening clause “it must be humbly admitted” — the sense and attribution are unchanged.

Read the 1831 Introduction on Wikisource

How we verified this

  • Mary Shelley added this line to the new introduction she wrote for the 1831 revised edition of Frankenstein, signed “London, October 15, 1831,” as transcribed at Wikisource ↗.
  • The identical sentence appears in the public-domain full text hosted by Project Gutenberg ↗.
  • Wikiquote's sourced-quotes page for Mary Shelley lists the line under “Introduction to the 1831 edition of Frankenstein,” matching the same wording, at Wikiquote ↗.
Public domain

This passage comes from the introduction Mary Shelley wrote for the 1831 edition of “Frankenstein,” first published in London that year — the text has long been in the public domain in the United States.

Context

The ghost-story summer behind the line

Shelley wrote this introduction nine years after Frankenstein first appeared anonymously in 1818, using the new preface to finally tell readers how the story began: a ghost-story-writing challenge among herself, Lord Byron, Percy Shelley, and John Polidori during a stormy summer at Lake Geneva in 1816.

In it she also addresses a broader question about where a writer's ideas come from, arguing that invention reshapes existing material rather than conjuring something from nothing — a line now often quoted on its own, detached from the novel it introduces.

Invention…does not consist in creating out of void, but out of chaos.

Explore

Filed under

More provenance-checked quotes on the same theme, each with its reuse status.

Creativity

Go further

Dig deeper

Trusted places to keep pulling the thread — primary archives, fact-checks, and scholarship. We show how we used each one before you leave.

Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus (Revised Edition, 1831) — Introductionen.wikisource.org

Full transcription of Mary Shelley's 1831 introduction, containing the exact quoted sentence.
Frankenstein: or, The Modern Prometheus (plain text)gutenberg.org

Project Gutenberg's public-domain full text of the 1831 edition, including the introduction.
Mary Shelley — sourced quotationsen.wikiquote.org

Lists this line under the sourced 'Introduction to the 1831 edition of Frankenstein' section.
'Frankenstein' Author Mary Shelley on Creativitythemarginalian.org

Essay discussing the passage in the context of Shelley's reflections on invention and imagination.

The author

About Mary Shelley

Mary Shelley

1797–1851 · English novelist, short-story writer & editor

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley wrote Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus (1818) at just nineteen, after a ghost-story-writing challenge at Lake Geneva with Lord Byron and Percy Bysshe Shelley. She went on to write further novels and short fiction, and to edit and champion Percy Shelley’s poetry after his death, until her own death in 1851.

For writers & researchers

Cite this

Primary source — Chicago

Shelley, Mary. “Introduction.” In Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, rev. ed. London: Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley (Standard Novels), 1831.

MLA (9th ed.)

Shelley, Mary. “Introduction.” Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, rev. ed., Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley, 1831.

APA (7th ed.)

Shelley, M. (1831). Frankenstein; or, the modern Prometheus (Rev. ed.). Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley.

This verification page

Quotle.info. “Who really said ‘Invention does not consist in creating out of void, but out of chaos’?” Last verified 8 Jul 2026. https://quotle.info/who-said/invention-does-not-consist-in-creating-out-of-void-but-out

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