Vampire Defanged, The: How the Embodiment of Evil Became a Romantic Hero

Vampires first entered the pop culture arena with Bram Stoker's 1897 novel, Dracula. Today, vampires are everywhere. From Buffy the Vampire Slayer to the Twilight Saga to HBO's True Blood series, pop culture can't get enough of the vampire phenomenon.

Bringing her literary expertise to this timely subject, Susannah Clements reveals the roots of the vampire myth and shows how it was originally immersed in Christian values and symbolism. Over time, however, vampires have been "defanged" as their spiritual significance has waned, and what was once the embodiment of evil has turned into a teen idol and the ultimate romantic hero. Clements offers a close reading of selected vampire texts, explaining how this transformation occurred and helping readers discern between the variety of vampire stories presented in movies, TV shows, and novels. Her probing engagement of the vampire metaphor enables readers to make Christian sense of this popular obsession.

Susannah Clements (PhD, University of South Carolina) is associate professor and chair of the Department of Language and Literature at Regent University, Virginia. She contributed to the Dictionary of Literary Biography and has presented papers and taught courses on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Jane Eyre, and J. R. R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings trilogy. She is a British literature specialist whose research interests include nineteenth-century literature, popular culture, and the genre of fantasy.