https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10509580902986369?journalCode=gerr20 excerpt quote: "Long before Mary Shelley's Frankenstein was published in 1818, an author penned a story that resembles it on more than one account: François‐Félix Nogaret, Le Miroir des évènemens contemporains, ou la belle au plus bidder(The Looking Glass of Actuality, or Beauty to the Highest Bidder, 1790). Nogaret's story about an inventor named Frankenstein who builds an artificial man is an astounding precursor, especially since the Revolution and its attempt to make a “new man” have long focused interpretations of Shelley's work. Both texts ask whether technological innovation will help or hinder human progress, and provide answers reflecting their differing historical and ideological contexts. What seemed possible in 1790 was later viewed with skepticism, including by Nogaret himself in subsequent editions of Le Miroir (1795, 1800). The tension between enthusiasm and disdain for t