True Blood,' 'Vampire Diaries'--'Twilight,' are all modern versions of vampire fiction. Whether you like them or not, I'm making a point here, so have a read!
Take Sookie Stackhouse. Personally 'True Blood' is my favorite of these examples. Set 'True Blood' in 1897 London. Imagine Ye Olde True Blood Pub is right in the heart of Whitechapel! The tavern keeper is a shape-shifter and the customers are eccentric, as in very.
The most popular waitress (tavern wench) is Mina Stackhouse and she's as cute as a button. She happens to meet a certain toff (rich guy) who takes one look at her and feels a lot of different things all at once.
Mina likes this count guy. It does occur to her he might be sinister, well it's how he looks see, there aren't too many blood suckers in London then. Just barristers but few people care about them.
Mina lets the count take her home because Jack the Ripper has not been caught and people still worry especially barmaids that have to travel home at night along Whitechapel's dark streets...
Mina lets the count take her home because Jack the Ripper has not been caught and people still worry especially barmaids that have to travel home at night along Whitechapel's dark streets...
Okay, I'll stop now even though I don't want to because I'm having a lot of fun.
The point I'm making is, how adaptable vampire fiction is! There can always be a new spin on it.
It keeps morphing into new and exciting things. It doesn't stagnate. It inspires and amuses, it frightens and thrills. That's why we like it and some of us write it, like me.
It keeps morphing into new and exciting things. It doesn't stagnate. It inspires and amuses, it frightens and thrills. That's why we like it and some of us write it, like me.
Vampire fiction can be set in any time period. Vampires can be vicious, funny, loving (kind of) and scary. I think what makes them as popular as they are is that most readers can and do identify with them.
Now, that's funny you might say! Well it certainly was not the case until John Polidori wrote 'The Vampyre' because until then vampires were only represented in myth and legend. Yup, his was the first recognized depiction of a vampire in a story. And being 'mad, bad and dangerous to know, Lord Byron's physician, he might have had an agenda in naming the aristocratic vampire in his story, Lord Ruthven.
Vampires are so varied. Think about it. They can be vicious bikers as in John Carpenter's 'Vampires.' They can be elegant, tortured beings as in Anne Rice's 'Interview With A Vampire.'
Maybe they vary because we vary. Perhaps they are the darkest mirror image of ourselves. They are gross, blood sucking creatures basically but they live forever. Now, that is attractive. Immortality! Hey, I'd go for it, wouldn't you? Okay, look maybe the blood is a turn off, but there are ways around it as we see in 'True Blood' with the synthetic blood.
Vampires rock because we want them to and they rock because the possiblities are endless. They can be anything we want them to be. And in my opinion that makes them great!
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