Homosexuality

Previous articles expounded upon the topics of sexuality and the female vampire and cross-dressing vampires. Following that train of thought, we reach the topic of homosexuality and the vampire.

In literature, the vampire "mixed elements of horror and sexuality. To many, it became a symbol of the release of the powerful emotional energies believed to be bottled up by restrictions on sexual behavior common to many societies" (Melton 341). Samuel Taylor Coleridge introduces the lesbian vampire relationship in his poem "Christabel". In the following verses, we read how "Geraldine leapt upon the bed, and with sudden vehemence enfolded Christabel in her arms".

She took two paces and a stride
And lay down by the maiden's side
And in her arms the maid she took (Coleridge 10).

In the short story "Carmilla", Sheridan Le Fanu draws out the idea of lesbian vampires: "Sometimes after an hour of apathy, my strange and beautiful companion would take my hand and hold it with a fond pressure, renewed again and again; blushing softly, gazing in my face with languid and burning eyes, and breathing so fast that her dress rose and fell with the tumultuous respiration. It was like the ardour of a lover; it embarrassed me; it was hateful and yet overpowering; and with gloating eyes she drew me to her, and her hot lips travelled along my cheek in kisses; and she would whisper, almost in sobs, "You are mine, you shall be mine, and you and I are one for ever" (Le Fanu, Ch 4).

These early works introduce female homosexuality into vampire fiction; however, nearly a hundred years pass before male homosexuality rears its head. "Not until the sexual revolution of the 1960s did a male homosexual vampire appear...During the 1970s several...titles with gay vampires appeared," but "only Tenderness of Wolves was released to the general public. The movie was devoted to the case of Fritz Haarmann [Graphic violence warning], a homosexual serial killer who murdered a number of young boys and drank their blood" (Melton 342).

After the 1970s, homosexual vampires became common place. Most vampires were regarded as ambiguous in gender and sensual in nature. The product of these notions is the homosexual or bisexual vampire. However, the "most significant expression of a vampiric gay relationship" may be contained within Anne Rice's Vampire Chronicles, in which vampires are unable to consummate sex. Their sexual expression is translated to the sharing of blood, which is, according to Rice, "far superior" to sexual intercourse.

Whether or not blood transfer is more pleasing than a purely sexual connection, I will not say. However, it is important to note how the vampire in literature spearheads the evolution of social norms. The vampire rejects society's taboos and acknowledges alternative lifestyles. The creature of the night, who is considered dark and dead, acts as a guiding light for liberal lives.

Kisses,
Ana
I acknowledge that the above post contains a (quite obvious) pun. It's not meant to be offensive. I'm trusting that you have and exercise a sense of humor in the same way that I laugh off the stereotypes that seek to constrain me.

Sources:
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor. "Christabel"
Le Fanu, Sheridan. "Carmilla".
Melton, J. Gordon. The Vampire Book.

Sexuality and the female vampire

The fool was stripped to his foolish hide, ...
Which she might have seen when she threw him aside--...
So some of him lived but the most of him died--
"The Vampire" by Rudyard Kipling



Vamp, "a term coined in the 1910s to refer to a woman who uses her sex appeal to seduce and exploit men", "is derived directly from vampire. The image of a wily woman "sucking the blood...out of her unknowing, naive victim is an enduring misogynist trope of twentieth-century popular culture" (Winokur 345). But, we know that the idea far predates the development of this term.

A majority of the traditional vampires were female. Lilith, Lamia, the Langsuyar, and others make up the legions of female vampires in traditional tales. The Aztec ciuateteo and Greek empusa stand as other examples of how the female vampire victimizes males. These creatures would wait by the roadside to prey on the male travelers who might pass. They may also seduce young men into their beds by promising sex and delivering death. The "female vampire illustrates...cultural anxieties about women and hunger, in which hunger is symbolically related to women's predatory sexuality and aggression" (Silver 117).

"Some post-Freudian theorists have suggested that the vampire signals an end to gender distinctions" (Willimason 157). "The gender of the vampire is ambiguous, he is male and female at once" (Lorey 264). However, the issue of gender and the vampire is more complex than the simple abandonment of gender roles. The vampire "represents what lies beyond the norms and strictures imposed by conventional society and culture" (West-Settle 19). The female vampire contradicts motherhood and the passive female role in sex and relationships. "In addition to their anti-maternal proclivity for feeding upon children, female vampires are overtly and aggressively sexual, using their beauty and seductiveness to prey on both men and other women; in each case, the female vampire's hunger is inseparable from her sexual desire" (Silver 117). In folklore, the female vampire is a tool that can be used to reinforce traditional roles through the fear of disgrace and rejection.

Just as the vampire can be used as a scapegoat for social ills, it also provides an image of the taboo or socially rejected. "Strong, independent vampire women do not suffer dominant males gladly" (Hamilton 9). When applied to society, the "vampire is a subversive borderline figure", who "problematises representation and destabilises the boundaries of gender" (Williamson 157). To encourage socially appropriate behavior, the strong female is aligned with evil, thereby encouraging women to repress their own desires to break free from their gender. Even in the Victorian era literature, vampires "can be male or female, but, except for the figure of Dracula himself, the female vampire, not the male, dominated the late nineteenth-century literary imagination, thereby placing female hunger at the center of literature of horror" (Silver 117).

In the age after the sexual-revolution (socio-political movement in the 1960s and 70s), the Western world has embraced the vampire. Humans are allured by the sexually aggressive vamp; they idolize the vampire for the ability to reject social norms and to live outside the constraints of tradition. What was once feared for being different is now admired and romanticized.

Ta-ta,
Ana

Sources:
Alternate Film Guide. http://www.altfg.com/blog/film-reviews/a-fool-there-was-theda-bara-frank-powell/ [PHOTO]

Hamilton, Richard Paul; Margaret Sönser Bree. This thing of darkness...

Lorey, Christoph; John L. Plews. Queering the canon: defying sights in German literature and culture.

Silver, Anna Krugovoy. Victorian literature and the anorexic body.

Williamson, Milly. The lure of the vampire: gender, fiction and fandom from Bram Stoker to Buffy

Winokur, Mark, & Bruce Holsinger. The complete idiot's guide to movies, flicks...

Vampire reproduction

According to L.A. Banks in The Awakening, "Vampires can't breed...their seed is dead...They make more [vampires] through the bite" (P163). As previously mentioned, this argument is fallacious. The world is not overpopulated by vampires; therefore, they must not reproduce through a bite (Read more: turning a human into a vampire).

So, how do the 'undead' reproduce?
If you've seen the movie Van Helsing, your mind probably conjures up the image of giant cocoons and exploding monster-bats. This is Hollywood at its best. I guarantee you that vampires do not create cocoons or have bat-children.

But, they do reproduce. After all, vampires surface in all time periods and all parts of the world. Some manner of reproduction occurs. In humans, reproduction most commonly happens through sex. Vampires are also capable of sexual intercourse. The Empusa, generally believed to be among the oldest blood drinkers, seduced men into bed and drained their blood after weakening them with sex. Female vampires are still often depicted as "ravenous succubae that take more than just blood from their male victims" (Ramsland 225).

Male vampires are also physically capable of having sexual intercourse. If a male vampire is feeding, he should have adequate blood to achieve an erection in the same manner as humans. Circulation of blood should not be squabbled about, because "the discovery of corpses with erections" is "not [an] uncommon occurrence" (223).

Furthermore gypsies, the source of much vampire folklore, "believed that vampires left the grave at night to have sex with their spouses" (223). Vampire-Human copulation seems possible, right? After all, the anatomy does correspond. But, what about reproduction? "Poppy Z. Brite's vampires can have children with mortals, and dhampirs are the result of such a union" (224). "Usually a dhampir has a vampiric father and mortal mother" (Belanger 116). According to the supporters of the dhampir idea, a male vampire can copulate with a female human and may produce a viable offspring, which is "physically indistinguishable from ordinary humans" and is considered a sub-race of humanity (Morton). Reportedly, "dhampirs can recognize vampires" easily, and although their particular traits vary by legend, they do not usually possess supernatural powers (Handeland 131). Since dhampirs share the same traits as humans, it is logical to assume that they can live a normal existence without ever realizing their vampiric nature. However, if "they share the blood...then they become more vampire than human" (132).

What does this mean? Well, the idea of a dhampir indicates that vampires may reproduce and that the hybrid-offspring will become a vampire if it begins to consume blood. This falls in line with the modern vampire community's assertion that vampires gradually become aware of their vampiric nature as they reach maturity.

If you buy into the possibility of a dhampir, then you may question whether female vampires can produce children. Like all vampiric mysteries, the topic is debated. Among the mythological "lamie, styrges, empuse; children were the objects of their envy and thus their hatred" (Levi 90).

For a single case study, let's examine Lamia. "Lamias were creatures which made love to sleeping men and also killed and ate their children". To understand why, we should look to the "original Lamia" who "was said to have been a beautiful Libyan queen...Hera was bitterly jealous and murdered Lamia's children. Lamia went mad with grief...and in desperate revenge she stole and devoured other people's children" (Cavendish 100). Clearly, Lamia had children, but that was prior to the moment when "her beauty changed to bestial ugliness", or in other words, she become evil (100). This idea of a childless female snatching the children of women develops throughout the legends as "the adulteration of familial bliss by a vampire or monster presence" (Principe 99). Of course, if a female vampire stole a human child the child would still be human, which does not solve the problem of reproduction. Some sources assert that the spirit of the vampire enters child of a dead mother, whether killed by a vampire or deceased in childbirth (Poe 16). However, this idea "dictates the precept of monogenesis--that is,...the descent of an entire race from the vampiric Progenitor" (Principe 94).

Is there a single vampiric ancestor from whom all blood-drinkers descend? --I suppose that there must be, but I have never met a blood-drinker who has knowledge of vampiric origins. Do vampires reproduce? --Yes, but I will not say how. Some questions cannot be answered, and I refuse to answer others; however, you are welcome to voice any opinions and provide knowledgeable sources on the matter.

Sziasztok,
Ana


Sources:
Banks, L.A. The Awakening.
Belanger, Michelle. Sacred Hunger.
Cavendish, Richard. The powers of evil in Western religion, magic and folk belief.
Dundles, Alan. The vampire.
Handeland, Lori. Doomsday Can Wait.
Levi, Eliphas. Alphonse louis Constant. Arthur Edward Waite. The history of magic.
Morton, EW. Out for Blood.
Poe, Edgar Allen. Morella. 1836.
Principe, David Del. Rebellion, Death, and Aesthetics in Italy.
Ramsland, Katherine M. The Science of Vampires.