The Volcano That Painted the Sky and Wrote a Novel

Its eruption turned sunsets blood-red around the world—and helped create one of literature’s greatest monsters.

In 1815, Mount Tambora in Indonesia erupted in the most powerful volcanic explosion in recorded history. It blasted 100 cubic kilometers of ash into the sky, killing over 70,000 people and altering the global climate. The next year, 1816, became known as “The Year Without a Summer”—with snow in June, failed crops, and famine across Europe and North America. But something else happened: trapped indoors by freezing weather during a Swiss summer retreat, a group of young writers—Mary Shelley, Lord Byron, and Percy Shelley—held a ghost story contest. That eerie, ash-darkened summer gave birth to Frankenstein.

“Never was a scene more awfully desolate. The sun itself was shorn of its beams.”

~ Lord Byron, 1816 letter from Lake Geneva

“The trees are black, the grass is black, and the people are black with famine and despair.”

~ Anonymous German diary, 1816

“The volcano altered weather patterns globally—temperatures dropped 3°C in some regions.”

~ Dr. Gillen D’Arcy Wood, environmental historian

“This eruption influenced art, literature, and migration. It was a cultural detonation.”

~ Prof. Clive Oppenheimer, volcanologist at Cambridge

“Without Tambora, there would be no Frankenstein. The monster was born of climate chaos.”

~ Dr. Roslynn Haynes, science historian

Knock-on effect: Tambora’s eruption didn’t just affect climate and literature—it also helped launch modern climate science. Scientists began systematically tracking volcanic aerosols and their effects on weather. And today, researchers are studying how similar eruptions could cool the planet—leading to the controversial idea of geoengineering Earth’s climate to combat global warming. One monster begot another.