I've been writing about demons in The Book of Whispers, but this put me in mind of an earlier literary fascination of mine... Vampires.
What monster does the word vampire
conjure for you? A cloaked creature who hunts by night, with sharp fingernails
and sharper teeth? Do you see eyes glittering with menace? Or do you imagine a
sexy movie star with a perfect body, clear skin and a serious, soulful gaze?
While vampires might be
condemned to walk eternally in the black of night, right now they are red hot.
Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight series of
books and movies have been viral hits. Young Adult book shelves groan under the
weight of super-sized paperbacks from vampire series like Richelle Mead’s Vampire Academy and L.J. Smith’s Vampire Diaries. (Do
teenagers read anything else?)
Then there was the
cult TV show True Blood, based on
Charlaine Harris’s Sookie Stackhouse series. There’s even a rock band - Vampire Weekend. Vampires’ coffins have
never been far from sight – but there are more of them than ever. What explains
the popularity of our fanged friends?
1.
vampires are naughty.
Let’s face it, vampires have never done what they’re told. They
refuse to eat their veggies. They stay up much too late. They’re meticulous about
not crossing thresholds until invited, but once in, they’re after a fix of
blood. Our blood. Vampires frighten us.
The Australian
author Mudrooroo wrote a trilogy of vampire stories beginning with Underground, where a white woman
vampire acts like an invader. Bram Stoker’s Dracula brought the vampire firmly into English novels. But long
before them, the figure had its hold on our imagination. When Charlotte
Bronte’s Jane Eyre met the madwoman
escaped from Mr Rochester’s attic, she described her as “savage... the roll of the red
eyes... the lips were swelled and dark… the black eyebrows widely raised over
the bloodshot eyes... it reminded me... of the foul German spectre--the
Vampyre."
But that was then. Nowadays…
2.
vampires are charming.
Charlotte
Bronte didn’t like Jane Austen’s fiction but the writing of both seems to have
eternal life. Recently, Elizabeth Bennet came close to meeting her sad
end in book and film versions of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies,
and now, one of Austen’s other heroines meets her match in Emma and the Vampires. But Emma’s Mr Knightly, of course, is modern
and charming as well as being a blood-sucker.
These days, vampires
are nurtured and desired. Women love them. A vampire partner might be asleep
when you want to go shopping but at least he’ll never lose his hair - or get
paunchy. Blood must be healthy – vampires seem able to control their food
intake the way they control other impulses. Twilight’s Edward Cullen doesn’t just desire Bella sexually – he
actually wants to eat her. But he doesn’t. Ah, for self control! That’s just
another way that
3. vampires are strong.
Vampires don’t die. Anne Rice wrote Interview with the Vampire while depressed after her child’s death
– and the child who cannot die, the vampire Claudia (played beautifully by
Kirsten Dunst in the otherwise dreary film) is one of her most memorable
creations.
While we fear
blood because of what it threatens – injury and death – vampires literally suck
it up. Like bushfires and cyclones, like Hurricane Katrina which destroyed one
of their favourite hunting grounds – New Orleans, Louisiana (Interview with a Vampire and the Sookie Stackhouse books) – they are a
force of nature. But…
4.
vampires are romantic.
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single vampire in
possession of eternal life must want a woman to protect. This is as true for
the undead in New Orleans as it is for vampires in high school.
Yes – for all the
adults who read it on trains on the way to work, Twilight was originally published for teenaged readers. It was one
of the first assaults in the supernatural takeover of Young Adult shelves. A
decade and a half ago, Buffy the Vampire Slayer
proved that a girl can care about her formal dress and about saving the world. Then, The Vampire Diaries features a dark haired girl torn between two
supernatural loves. It would seem like a Twilight
rip-off were it not based on a trilogy published in 1991. Vampires spend a lot
of time at school! It’s a good thing sunlight won’t destroy them, after all.
There has always been
something sexual to vampire tales. Dracula was furious when Jonathan Harker
killed one of his Brides – and seduced Harker’s fiancée to the dark side in
revenge. Laurell K.
Hamilton’s Anita Blake series creeps
closer to erotica with each installment. The vampire still comes
by night. Is enthralling and powerful. Entices his prey to something dark and
illicit and at the same time absolves them of blame.
All of which
brings me to the question; what do vampires mean? Fear or desire? The answer
seems to be that they’re big, dark, inkblot tests. They can mean – and can be –
anything we want. Perhaps that’s why
we love them so much.
(An earlier version of this article appeared as "Bite me" in Good Reading Magazine, April 2011)
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