© Bodleian Library, University of Oxford

Oxford's Museum of the History of Science will welcome a rare guest from the world of science gone monstrously wrong next weekend.

On Saturday May 17, a leaf from the original manuscript of Mary Shelley's 'Frankenstein' will go on show for one evening only, accompanied by themed events, as part of the Museums and Galleries Month 'Night of Museums'.

On special loan from the Bodleian Library, the handwritten page is one of the leaves torn from two sets of notebooks in which Mary Shelley wrote the novel. These surviving manuscripts were acquired by the Bodleian in 2004.

"This is a wonderful opportunity to see part of a famous manuscript that is never normally displayed," said Dr Jim Bennett, Director of the Museum of the History of Science.

"We are very grateful to the Bodleian Library for lending us a page, especially one which consists entirely of the monster's own words: 'Listen to me Frankenstein,' he insists, as he explains his miserable state."

At the bottom of this part of the page is the phrase that reads 'Listen to me, Frankenstein'. © Bodleian Library, University of Oxford

An 18-year-old Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin began to write the novel after a summer holiday in Switzerland with her future husband, Percy Bysshe Shelly, during which the weather was so bad that they and their host Lord Byron were forced to stay indoors.

The group read from an anthology of ghost stories, Fantasmagoriana, and talked about science and the supernatural into the early hours. They challenged each other to compose a frightening tale of their own.

Inspired, and encouraged by Shelley, Mary wrote down her story in the notebooks over the course of the next year, producing what has become one of the most famous and influential novels. Shelley's notes can be seen in the manuscript's margins.

About 150 leaves of Mary's first Frankenstein notebooks survive, written in Geneva, Bath and London. A copy of these was taken by Shelley to various publishers before it was accepted and published in January 1818. Of this copy, only about ten per cent of the pages are still in existence.

Boris Karloff in the 1931 film version.

The manuscript page will be on show from 7pm to 10pm on May 17, and activities will include talks, an auction of Frankenstein comics, a live performance by the duo Dr Frankenstein and the Monster, and a showing of the 1931 film adaptation starring Boris Karloff.

"There will be lots of things to enjoy in the museum during the evening but this is surely a chance not to be missed," said Dr Bennett.

Night of Museums, or 'Nuit des Musees', is a European-wide event in which museums stay open late into the night to allow visitors to see collections in a different light and experience unusual events.