The original design and formatting of this edition were overseen by Jack Lynch, with consultancy provided by Sam Choi. The keying and markup were created by a team of assistants, including Rebecca Carroll, Yoonmee Chang, Carlos Decena, Max Greenhut, Matthew Hart, Adam Machado, Christopher Marcisz, Alexander Orlovsky, Kallan Resnick, Suzanna Roth, Mark Shanaman, Erik Simpson, Christian Stadler, and Shawn Walker. The University of Pennsylvania provided key support for space and equipment.

All texts are transcribed from reliable standard editions. In the case of translated works, every effort has been made to select an edition known to, or contemporary with, Mary Shelley.

The following silent emendations have been introduced throughout:

There are countless editions of Mary Shelley's novel, many ephemeral and even undated, so any catalog is necessarily incomplete. Below are most of the major editions, reprints, and translations through 1996 that can be found in libraries. All texts after the first and second are based on the 1831 edition unless otherwise noted. Audio and video recordings are excluded, as are adaptations. For any single year, texts are arranged alphabetically by place of publication, with those in English preceding translations into foreign languages.

Frankenstein is best known today through the many films based on the novel, although the most famous movie Frankenstein came after more than a century of popular stage adaptations. As early as 1823, Frankenstein had been adapted for the stage: Richard Brinsley Peake's Presumption; or, the Fate of Frankenstein appeared on the stage only five years after Mary Shelley's novel was published. In response to its success, William Godwin published the second edition of Frankenstein in the same year.