The Blood Is the Life: Vampires in Literature

by Leonard G. Heldreth (Editor), Mary Pharr (Editor)

The essays in this volume use a humanistic viewpoint to explore the evolution and significance of the vampire in literature from the Romantic era to the millennium. The nineteenth-century engendered aristocratic but parasitic vampires like Lord Ruthven and Carmilla Karnstein, and the century ended with the creation of Dracula, whose enduring popularity confirmed humanity's fascination with vampire mythology. Now, more than one hundred years later, the vampire has proliferated in literature in a variety of guises--some antagonistic, some heroic, and many falling into a fascinating "in between." If Stephen King's Kurt Barlow is still a monstrous villain and Chelsea Quinn Yarbro's Saint-Germain a true hero, then Anne Rice's re-coded vampires, Fred Saberhagen's re-created Dracula, S. P. Somtow's fragmented Timmy Valentine, and Nancy A. Collins's dangerous Sonja Blue are among those who seem both heroic and antagonistic. Like the ancient vampires of India (also examined in this volume), modern and postmodern literary vampires defy easy labels.

	Hardcover Bowling Green University Popular Press (1999)
	Softbound Bowling Green University Popular Press (1999)