Perfect creatures: A social and cultural interpretation of vampires in fiction and film.

摘要

The goal of this study is to explore the vampire figures used as embodiments of various apprehensions throughout time. This study examines the figure's use in connection to the themes of female empowerment, scientific advancement, disintegration of the nuclear family, male gender anxiety, and religion. It focuses on figures coming from fiction, cinema, and television. Much has been said about the vampire through the years, but much of the criticism has been concerned with the psychoanalytical ramifications of the figure. This text considers the social and cultural ramifications of the vampire and what it is reflecting about the human condition at the text's historical moment.;Chapter One deals with the role of gender in Sheridan Le Fanu's "Carmilla" (1872) and Bram Stoker's Dracula (1897). It focuses on how Stoker is providing a possible solution to the problematic male sexuality that is illustrated by Le Fanu's gender inverting female vampire Carmilla. Chapter Two examines how the fear of scientific advancement is illustrated through a vampire that represents deformed humanity. This apprehension is seen in reference to the text I Am Legend (1954) and the films Underworld (2003), Underworld: Evolution (2006), and Perfect Creatures (2006). Chapter Three moves away from science to a discussion of the changing family unit in the late twentieth century as seen in Rice's novel Interview with the Vampire (1976) and the films Near Dark (1987) and The Lost Boys (1987). Chapter Four examines the changes that occur in the battle for gender freedom from the time of early vampire text as illustrated in the television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer (BTVS). While the show was created with the promise of providing the image of female in charge, mainly through the character of Buffy, it does so at the price of emasculating the men that surround her. Chapter Five examines Christian imagery, and its ramifications, in Stephen King's 'Salem's Lot (1976), Dan Simmons' Children of the Night (1992) and Masterpiece Theater's recent adaptation of Dracula (2007).