The Vampyre
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| "The Vampyre" | |
|---|---|
| Author | John William Polidori |
| Country | England |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Horror short story |
| Publication type | Magazine |
| Publisher | New Monthly magazine and universal register; London: H. Colburn, 1814–1820. Vol. 1, No. 63. |
| Media type | Print (Periodical & Paperback) |
| Publication date | 1 April 1819 |
"The Vampyre" is a short story written by John William Polidori and is a progenitor of the romantic vampire genre of fantasy fiction.
The work is described by Christopher Frayling as "the first story successfully to fuse the disparate elements of vampirism into a coherent literary genre."[1]
Contents |
[edit] Characters
- Lord Ruthven - a suave British nobleman, the vampire
- Aubrey — a young gentleman, an orphan
- Ianthe — a beautiful woman Aubrey meets on his journeys with Ruthven.
- Aubrey's sister — who becomes engaged to the Earl of Marsden
- Earl of Marsden — who is also Lord Ruthven
[edit] Publication
"The Vampyre" was first published on 1 April 1819 by Henry Colburn in the New Monthly Magazine with the false attribution "A Tale by Lord Byron". The name of the work's protagonist, "Lord Ruthven", added to this assumption, for that name was originally used in Lady Caroline Lamb's novel Glenarvon (from the same publisher), in which a thinly-disguised Byron figure was also named Lord Ruthven. Despite repeated denials by Byron and Polidori, the authorship often went unclarified.
The story was an immediate popular success, partly because of the Byron attribution and partly because it exploited the gothic horror predilections of the public. Polidori transformed the vampire from a character in folklore into the form that is recognized today—an aristocratic fiend who preys among high society.[2]
The story has its genesis in the summer of 1816, the Year Without a Summer, when Europe and parts of North America underwent a severe climate abnormality. Lord Byron and his young physician John Polidori were staying at the Villa Diodati by Lake Geneva and were visited by Percy Bysshe Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley and Claire Clairmont. Kept indoors by the "incessant rain" of that "wet, ungenial summer",[3] over three days in June the five turned to telling fantastical stories, and then writing their own. Fueled by ghost stories such as the Fantasmagoriana, William Beckford's Vathek and quantities of laudanum, Mary Shelley produced what would become Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus. Polidori was inspired by a fragmentary story of Byron's and in "two or three idle mornings" produced "The Vampyre".
[edit] Influence
Polidori's work had an immense impact on contemporary sensibilities and ran through numerous editions and translations. An adaptation appeared in 1820 with Cyprien Bérard’s novel, Lord Ruthwen ou les Vampires, falsely attributed to Charles Nodier, who himself then wrote his own version, Le Vampire, a play which had enormous success and sparked a "vampire craze" across Europe. This includes operatic adaptations by Heinrich Marschner and Peter Josef von Lindpaintner, both published in the same year and called "The Vampire". Edgar Allan Poe, Nikolai Gogol, Alexandre Dumas, and Alexis Tolstoy all produced vampire tales, and themes in Polidori's tale would continue to influence Bram Stoker's Dracula and eventually the whole vampire genre. Dumas makes explicit reference to Lord Ruthwen in The Count of Monte Cristo, going so far as to state that his character "The Comtesse G..." had been personally acquainted with Lord Ruthwen. [4]
[edit] Plot
Aubrey, a young Englishman, meets Lord Ruthven, a man of mysterious origins who has entered London society. Aubrey accompanies Ruthven to Rome, but leaves him after Ruthven seduces the daughter of a mutual acquaintance. Aubrey travels to Greece where he becomes attracted to Ianthe, an innkeeper's daughter. Ianthe tells Aubrey about the legends of the vampire. Ruthven arrives at the scene and shortly thereafter Ianthe is killed by a vampire. Aubrey does not connect Ruthven with the murder and rejoins him in his travels. The pair are attacked by bandits and Ruthven is mortally wounded. Before he dies, Ruthven makes Aubrey swear an oath that he will not mention his death or anything else he knows about Ruthven for a year and a day. Looking back, Aubrey realizes that everyone who Ruthven met ended up suffering.
Aubrey returns to London and is amazed when Ruthven appears shortly thereafter, alive and well. Ruthven reminds Aubrey of his oath to keep his death a secret. Ruthven then begins to seduce Aubrey's sister while Aubrey, helpless to protect his sister, has a nervous breakdown. Ruthven and Aubrey's sister are engaged to marry on the day the oath ends. Just before he dies, Aubrey writes a letter to his sister revealing Ruthven's history, but it does not arrive in time. Ruthven marries Aubrey's sister, kills her on their wedding night, and escapes.
[edit] Notes
[edit] References
- Christopher Frayling; Vampyres: Lord Byron to Count Dracula, 1992. ISBN 0-571-16792-6.
[edit] External links
- The Vampyre at Project Gutenberg
- Text of Byron's fragmentary story at sff.net
- Goreau, Angeline. "Physician, Behave Thyself" The New York Times, September 3, 1989. A review of the novel Lord Byron's Doctor by Paul West, which describes the famed night.