A study of the manuscript shows that she was a careful workman, and that in polishing this bizarre story she strove consistently for greater credibility and realism, more dramatic (if sometimes melodramatic) presentation of events, better motivation, conciseness, and exclusion of purple passages.

In the revision and rewriting, many additions were made, so that _Mathilda_ is appreciably longer than _The Fields of Fancy_.

But the additions are usually improvements: a much fuller account of Mathilda's father and mother and of their marriage, which makes of them something more than lay figures and to a great extent explains the tragedy; development of the character of the Steward, at first merely the servant who accompanies Mathilda in her search for her father, into the sympathetic confidant whose responses help to dramatise the situation; an added word or short phrase that marks Mary Shelley's penetration into the motives and actions of both Mathilda and her father.

Therefore _Mathilda_ does not impress the reader as being longer than _The Fields of Fancy_ because it better sustains his interest.

And with all the additions there are also effective omissions of the obvious, of the tautological, of the artificially elaborate.[xviii] The finished draft, _Mathilda_, still shows Mary Shelley's faults as a writer: verbosity, loose plotting, somewhat stereotyped and extravagant characterization.