Metamorphoses of the Vampire in Literature and Film: Cultural Transformations in Europe, 1732-1933For the last three hundred years, fictions of the vampire have fed off anxieties about cultural continuity. Though commonly represented as a parasitic aggressor from without, the vampire is in fact a native of Europe, and its "metamorphoses," to quote Baudelaire, a distorted image of social transformation. Because the vampire grows strong whenever and wherever traditions weaken, its representations have multiplied with every political, economic, and technological revolution from the eighteenth century on. Today, in the age of globalization, vampire fictions are more virulent than ever, and the monster enjoys hunting grounds as vast as the international market. Metamorphoses of the Vampire explains why representations of vampirism began in the eighteenth century, flourished in the nineteenth, and came to eclipse nearly all other forms of monstrosity in the early twentieth century. Many of the works by French and German authors discussed here have never been presented to students and scholars in the English-speaking world. While there are many excellent studies that examine Victorian vampires, the undead in cinema, contemporary vampire fictions, and the vampire in folklore, until now no work has attempted to account for the unifying logic that underlies the vampire's many and often apparently contradictory forms. Erik Butler holds a PhD from Yale University and has taught at Emory University and Swarthmore College. His publications include The Bellum Gramaticale and the Rise of European Literature (2010) and a translation with commentary of Regrowth (Vidervuks) by the Soviet Jewish author Der Nister (2011). |
Contents
Cultural Teratology | 1 |
Vampire Country Borders of Culture and Power | 27 |
Vampires and Satire in the Enlightenment and Romanticism | 52 |
The Bourgeois Vampire and NineteenthCentury | 85 |
Dracula Vampiric Contagion in | 107 |
Vampirism the Writing Cure and Realpolitik | 129 |
Vampires in Weimar Shades of History | 152 |
The Vampire in the Americas and Beyond | 177 |
Works Cited | 199 |
215 | |
Other editions - View all
Metamorphoses of the Vampire in Literature and Film: Cultural ... Erik Butler No preview available - 2011 |
Common terms and phrases
appears associated become beginning blood body Bram Caligari calls Cambridge Central Europe century chapter character claims concerns connection Count creature critical cultural dead death desire discussion Dracula England English Europe European example existence explores fact fear fiction figure film follow forces foreign German hand Harker human identity Jews kind literary literature living London Mabuse means Memoirs Metamorphoses mind monster murder myth narrative nature nineteenth Nosferatu notes novel observes occurred offers origin Oxford Paris Paul person play political popular possesses presents produced reason refers reflects relations René Girard reports represents reveals Romantic Ruthven Schreber seems sense shows social society soul stage Stoker’s story supernatural takes term tion tradition trans transformation turn undead vampire vampire’s victims woman writing York young