Vampire Genre Storms Popular Culture (Again)
The vampire genre is today’s most popular form of pop culture. Vampire movies and literature have risen to fame in American popular culture today, but vampire genre popularity dates back further than many people realize. Sprouting from humble origins of fireside lore, vampire fiction has been a mainstay in the literary realm. It is in literature today that we see this ever-popular fragment of popular culture truly blossom in Stephenie Meyer’s hit-novel series, Twilight. In the novels, Meyer’s characters display an incessant whirlwind of complexities involving the rare, seemingly non-existent, romantic bond between vampire and human. Most importantly, she influences American culture by tempting readers, and eventual viewers of the film version of the series, of an almost tangible adolescent fantasy of undying adoration, romance, and lust that vicariously plays out through the vaunted fictional vampires. Meyer’s popular novel series and films have ignited a craze that has stormed American popular culture and reshaped the perspective of the vaunted vampire entirely.
Currently, vampires are the ruling picturesque protagonists of the pre-teen genre, but the undead have not always been the heroes. According to ancient eastern European myths, the undead phantom was a decrepit corpse named Nosferatu. Nosferatu “is a Slavic word for ‘plague carrier’ from the Greek word nosophoros” (Shaurette) and was greatly feared by the townspeople. Another early cousin of the modern vampire was “the Incubus from the Latin incubare, meaning ‘to lie upon’” (Shaurette) which was a spirit that took the form of a man and would sexually force itself upon unsuspecting, sleeping women. The similarities bet...
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...e romance between the dashing Edward and the everyday Bella, Meyer effectively reshapes the historical bond between vampire and victim. Although spiffed and tweaked, the new relationship succeeds because it has embraced and embellished a sturdy and historical foundation. Society has used the vampire, in some form, as a catalyst for protecting the human virtues of life and chastity, while managing to enthrall generations of movie goers.
Works Cited
Meyers, Stephanie. Twilight. Little Brown and Company. New York, New York. 2005.
Poe, Edgar Allen. Think Exist. 20 October 2009.
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Shaurette, Dan. “Ancient to Modern History of Vampire Lore”. 21 January 2009. 20
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J. Gordon Melton, in the excerpt “Sexuality and the Vampire” published in his The Vampire Book: The Encyclopedia of the Undead (1998), explains that vampires have a sexual appearance that started from their origin in Dracula. Melton supports his statement by analyzing the monsters' transition to sexual beings through the stories of Dracula’s desires, multiple countries’ erotic tales revolving around vampire-like beings, the manifestation of sensual themes in literary, stage, and screen works, and their current evolution of the once terrified immortals to loved heroes. The purpose of this essay was to outline the seductiveness of the written immortal creatures in order to explain the fanged-mammals’ appeal beyond their terrifying monster abilities.
Carmilla is an example of a woman who loves her food far too much. Carmilla is consumed entirely by her food, even sleeping in a coffin of blood: “The limbs were perfectly flexible, the flesh elastic; and the leaden coffin floated with blood, in which to a depth of seven inches, the body lay immersed” (Le Fanu 102). There exists a unique relationship between the vampire and their victims. Food becomes defined in terms of victimhood, distinctly separated from humanity’s general consumption of meat. The need for human victims makes hunting synonymous with courtship, as intense emotional connections are established between the vampiress and her food. As seen in the intense relationship developed between Laura and Carmilla, the vampire is “prone to be fascinated with an engrossing vehemence, resembling the passion of love, by particular persons” (105). For Carmilla, cruelty and love are inseparable (33). The taking of the victims’ blood for sustenance is a highly sexualized exchange of fluids from one body to another. The act of consumption is transformed into an illicit carnal exchange between the hunter and the hunted.
The late nineteenth century Irish novelist, Bram Stoker is most famous for creating Dracula, one of the most popular and well-known vampire stories ever written. Dracula is a gothic, “horror novel about a vampire named Count Dracula who is looking to move from his native country of Transylvania to England” (Shmoop Editorial Team). Unbeknownst of Dracula’s plans, Jonathan Harker, a young English lawyer, traveled to Castle Dracula to help the count with his plans and talk to him about all his options. At first Jonathan was surprised by the Count’s knowledge, politeness, and overall hospitality. However, the longer Jonathan remained in the castle the more uneasy and suspicious he became as he began to realize just how strange and different Dracula was. As the story unfolded, Jonathan realized he is not just a guest, but a prisoner as well. The horror in the novel not only focuses on the “vampiric nature” (Soyokaze), but also on the fear and threat of female sexual expression and aggression in such a conservative Victorian society.
Stevenson, John Allen. A Vampire in the Mirror: The Sexuality of Dracula. 2nd ed. Vol. 103. N.p.: Modern Language Association, 1988. JSTOR. Web. 6 Jan. 2014. .
While Bram Stoker’s Dracula has been described as the “quintessence of evil creatures we meet in our everyday lives” and “the Darkness” in the hearts of men (Herbert, 2004, pp. 62), Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight
In the famous novel and movie series, Twilight by Stephenie Meyer, an average teenage girl, Bella Swan, is forced to move from Arizona (where she lived with her mother) to Washington to start an almost new life with her father. She attends a small-town high school with mostly average people, besides one family, the Cullens. As Bella and Edward Cullen get closer, she uncovers a deep secret about him and his family. Their relationship faces many hard challenges and conflicts as the story develops. Both the novel and movie share very similar storylines, however, differ in many ways. From themes to author’s craft, or to relationships, these important parts of the story highlight the significant differences and similarities of Twilight.
After analyzing The Scarlet Letter, Roger Chillingworth is the ideal vampiric figure, supporting Thomas Foster’s perspective about vampirism from his book, How to Read Literature Like a Professor. In fact, Roger Chillingworth, presents many instances of how vampires might act and appear in literature. Even though he is not a literal vampire, it does not
Conclusively, while Bram Stokers novel Dracula is seen as a gothic and horror story, I argue that it is a novel that seeks to address female sexuality directly. Seen through numerous passages, Stoker confronts and battles the views between sexuality during the Victorian era though his genius of characterization of characters present within the novel. As it seems highly intentional to me, I respect the way in which he criticizes and critiques upon female sexuality by bringing into light new ideas regarding female desires. When contrasting his text upon today’s culture, the differences to how one perceived the vampire has changed significantly.
From Transylvania to Hollywood, vampires have transformed from unfamiliar, mysterious personalities to one of the most dominant monsters in the horror genre today. Vampires are one of the oldest and most noted creatures in mythology, with many variations of them around the world. Although the most famous version is Bram Stoker’s Dracula, many variants have come before and after telling of the same legend with their own added ideas and modifications to relate to their cultures. Today, there is a multitude of literary and film works that convey and resurface peoples’ fear of vampires. As gothic works like Dracula, by Bram Stoker and Scooby-Doo! and the Legend of the Vampire directed by Scott Jeralds share certain traits reflective of the genre; These factors include setting, actions of each vampire, the initial reactions to news of them, and how their presence affects the people who live within the region the vampires inhabit.
Stevenson, John Allen. “A Vampire in the Mirror: The Sexuality of Dracula.” PMLA 103.2 (1988): 139-149. JSTOR. Web. 17 Feb. 2011. .
In Twilight, Edward Cullen presents the question; “ But what if I’m not the hero? What if I’m the bad guy?” The role of vampires is very controversial. Back in the day they were evil, soulless monsters and people genuinely feared them. However, in the present day it seems that we have grown to love them and even hope to one day be them. There are a plethora of vampire stories and many of them have become immense hits. With so many vampire stories, it is not uncommon that readers are able to identify a vast amount of similarities. Although similar in aspects, there are still many differences between the classic and modern day vampires. Two highly popular stories, in which we can easily identify similarities and differences, are Bram Stoker’s Dracula and Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight.
At first glance, Joss Whedon's "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," the hour-long TV series which premiered in 1997 and is now in its third season, bears little resemblance to the book which started the vampire craze -- Bram Stoker's Dracula, published a century earlier. And yet, looks can be deceiving. Although the trendy -- and often skimpy -- clothing and bandied about pop-culture references of "Buffy" clearly mark the series as a product of a far different culture than that of the Victorian England of Dracula, the underlying tensions of the two texts are far similar than one might think. Beneath the surface differences in the treatment of their heroines, the two texts converge in similarly problematic anxieties about gender and sexuality.
The “Otherness” Dracula possesses reinforces our own norms and beliefs through his transgression that separates him from society and the polarity to Western norms and ideals makes him an effective device for extorting revulsion and horror. Stoker’s novel employs Gothic tradition, providing “the principle embodiments and evocations of cultural anxieties” from which the very Gothic mood and horror is produced, establishing the baseline used to distinguish the modern vampires, as part of vampire mythology within the Gothic (Botting Aftergothic 280). Differences Between Dracula and Twilight The similarities between the two novels are namely Gothic imagery and theme, but the Gothic mood predominates in Dracula over Twilight and it is this difference that makes Twilight not belong in the vampire canon. Horror is the element that Dracula possesses that Edward does not, and it is crucial in the interplay between transgression and limit.
This fetish has been manifested in the movies I view, the television shows I watch, and the books I read. When my obsession with reading is crossed with my obsession with monsters, the result is a bookshelf containing more vampire novels than most people would consider healthy. I have discovered that every vampire novel varies vastly; no two books are ever alike. For example, the Twilight Series, the Anita Blake Series and the Vampire Chronicles Series have different legends and lore, different relationships between vampires and society, and different genres, theme, and purpose; this array of novels displays most clearly the range of audience the vampire genre can cater. The Twilight series is a bestselling series written by Stephanie Meyer that has captivated millions of teenage girls.
The author’s op-ed piece was published in 2009, the very peak of the vampire contagion, where one could find these creatures wherever they looked. This pandemonium that arose from vampires is what drove del Toro and Hogan to pen “Why Vampires Never Die.” Furthermore, the purpose behind this essay is to give an abridged description of the past of vampires for the people who had become fanatics of the creatures. Also, this essay showed how vampires have persisted in pop culture. They suggest that vampires have been remade by diverse cultures at different times, and this change echoes that society's angst and concerns. The novelist’s imply that Stroker’s Dracula may mirror an exaggerated human on a prim...