Catalog Description
These days, we’re awash in vampires—vampire movies and TV shows, vampire dolls, comic books, role-playing games, action figures, pajamas, rock bands, and breakfast cereals, and more. But what accounts for their enormous popular allure? In this major study, literary critic Mary Y. Hallab examines this mythic figure from its origins in early Greek and Slavic folklore, its transformation by Romantics like Byron, Le Fanu, and Stoker, and its diverse resurrections in contemporary pop culture. The vampire’s popularity, she argues, lies in its persistent undeadness--its refusal to accept its mortal destiny of death and decay. Vampires appeal to our fear of dying and our hope for immortality. As a focus for our doubts and speculations, vampire literature asks and offers answers to many of our most urgent questions about the meaning of death, the nature of the human soul, and its possible survival of bodily dissolution. This is a thoroughly researched, ambitious study that takes a broad cultural, anthropological, and religious perspective, exploring the significance of the vampire and its function in relation to the scientific, social, psychological and religious beliefs of its time and place. A seminal study, The Vampire God will be of vital interest to scholars and teachers of literature, folklore studies, and cultural criticism. Clearly written, with wry humor, vivacity, and verve, it will also appeal to any general reader interested folklore, horror literature, or popular culture.
|
