'Frankenstein' to live on as an interactive app

Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, one of English literature's most famous classics, is being reinterpreted for a digital edition.

A leading independent British publisher has commissioned a complete reworking of the original 1818 story of the "mad scientist" who creates a monster.

Profile Books will launch "a literary, interactive book app" this week, featuring classics into whose narrative readers are drawn by a series of options at crucial decision-points.

Academics who have been given a preview say it is closer to Shelley's original than many of the numerous film adaptations.

Dr Dale Townshend of the University of Stirling told i the app avoided the "cheap visuality" of many filmic retellings and offered "a thoroughly literary experience" in the spirit of Shelley's original. "I really like it," he said.

Professor John Sutherland of University College London, said: "This might actually drive people back to the printed word."