The Vampire: Origins of a European Myth

by Thomas M. Bohn

“An illuminating contribution to scholarship on the vampire figure.”― Slavic Review Even before Bram Stoker immortalized Transylvania as the homeland of his fictional Count Dracula, the figure of the vampire was inextricably tied to Eastern Europe in the popular imagination. Drawing on a wealth of previously neglected sources, this book offers a fascinating account of how vampires―whose various incarnations originally emerged from folk traditions from all over the world―became so strongly identified with Eastern Europe. It demonstrates that the modern conception of the vampire was born in the crucible of the Enlightenment, embodying a mysterious, Eastern otherness that stood opposed to Western rationality. From the From Original Sin to Eternal Life For a broad contemporary public, the vampire has become a star, a media sensation from Hollywood. Bestselling authors such as Bram Stoker, Anne Rice and Stephenie Meyer continue to fire the imaginations of young and old alike, and bloodsuckers have achieved immortality through films like Dracula , Interview with a Vampire and Twilight . It is no wonder that, in the teenage bedrooms of our globalized world, vampires even steal the show from Harry Potter. They have long since been assigned individual personalities and treated with sympathy. They may possess superhuman powers, but they are also burdened by their immortality and have to learn to come to terms with their craving for blood. Whereas the Southeast European vampire, discovered in the 1730s, underwent an Americanization and domestication in the media landscape of the twentieth century, the creole zombies that first became known through the cheap novels and horror films of the 1920s still continue to serve as brainless horror figures. Do bloodsuckers really exist and should we really be afraid of the dead? These are the questions that I seek to tackle, following the wishes of my daughter, who was ten when I started this project.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Vampires

304 pages, Paperback

Published April 8, 2022

Reviews

[Emmett · Rating 4 out of 5]

Finally done with this monster of an academic text! I checked this out from my university library during the, how shall we say, "before times". This text delved into the regional culture aspects of the vampire myth, detailing differences and similarities between different areas as well as how the major religious organizations of the time as well as politics responded to this cases. It's interesting to see how, similar to the witch craze that plagued Europe, the vampire was also used as a way to blame the uncontrollable circumstances on life on a scapegoat. Plagues, famines, mysterious deaths - vampires could be dragged into all those scenarios as an explanation.
It's also important when considering the vampire myths, when they discuss that the body didn't have what they deemed to be the "appropriate" level of decay that people at the time didn't understand decaying human bodies. Considering this was pre-embalming, it would be faster than current funeral practices, but it still takes a considerable amount of time before the body really begins to reach significant standards of change.

[sapphopipo]

be prepared because I have a research paper to do….