Universal Vampire

Barbara Brodman is professor of humanities at Nova Southeastern University. She has published a variety of scholarly works that deal with international arts and affairs.James E. Doan is professor of humanities at Nova Southeastern University, where he teaches courses in literature, the arts, folklore and mythology, including a course on the vampire that he has taught for twenty years.

This book presents the vampire as a truly international phenomenon, not restricted to the original folk character, the literary vampire (such as Dracula), or 20th and 21st-century film versions. Instead, we find examples of vampires from literally around the world: each culture and age reshaping the legend in its own image and even seeking psychological and scientific explanations to explain the phenomenon.

ContentsAcknowledgementsBarbara Brodman and James E Doan, IntroductionPart 1: The Western Vampire: From Draugr to DraculaMatthias Teichert,"Draugula": The draugr in Old Norse-Icelandic Saga Literature and His Relationship to the Post-Medieval Vampire MythPaul E. H. Davis, Dracula Anticipated: The "Undead" in Anglo-Irish LiteratureAlexis M. Milmine, Retracing the Shambling Steps of the Undead: The Blended Folkloric Elements of Vampirism in Bram Stoker's DraculaCristina Artenie, Dracula's Kitchen: A Glossary of Transylvanian Cuisine, Language and EthnographyPart 2: Medical Explanations for the VampireEdward O. Keith, Biomedical Origins of VampirismLeo Ruickbie, Evidence for the Undead: The Role of Medical Investigation in the 18th-Century Vampire EpidemicClemens Ruthner, Undead Feedback: Adaptations and Echoes of Johann Flückinger's Report, Visum et Repertum (1732), until the MillenniumPart 3: The Female Vampire in World Myth and the ArtsNancy Schumann, Women with Bite: Tracing Vampire Women from Lilith to TwilightAngela Tumini, Vampiresse: Embodiment of Sensuality and Erotic Horror in Carl Th. Dreyer's Vampyr and Mario Bava's The Mask of SatanJames E. Doan, The Vampire in Native American and Mesoamerican LoreKatherine Allocco, Vampiric Viragoes: Villainizing and Sexualizing Arthurian Women in Dracula vs. King Arthur (2005)Jamieson Ridenhour,'If I Wasn't a Girl, Would You Like Me Anyway?' Le Fanu's Carmilla and Alfredson's Let the Right One InPart 4: Old and New World Manifestations of the VampireMasaya Shimokusu, A Cultural Dynasty of Beautiful Vampires: Japan's Acceptance, Modifications and Adaptations of VampiresTomas Jesús Garza, From Russia with Blood: Imagining the Vampire in Contemporary Russian Popular CultureAdriana Gordillo, Dracula Comes to Mexico: Carlos Fuentes' "Vlad," Echoes of Origins, and the Return of ColonialismRaúl Rodríguez-Hernández and Claudia Schaefer, Sublime Horror: Transparency, Melodrama and the Mise-en-Scène of Two Mexican Vampire FilmsBibliographyAbout the ContributorsIndex