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Overview
Vampyres is a comprehensive illustrated history of vampires in literature, from the folklore of Eastern Europe to the Romantics and beyond. Frayling recounts the most significant moments in Gothic history, while extracts from a huge range of sources – including Bram Stoker’s detailed research notes for Dracula, penny-dreadfuls and Angela Carter’s The Lady of the House of Love, are contextualized and analysed.
This revised and expanded edition brings Vampyres up to date with 21st-century vampire literature, including new text extracts, commentary and a revised introduction. Christopher Frayling also explores the development of the vampire in the visual arts, with illustrations ranging from 17th-century prints to 21st-century film stills, demonstrating the enduring appeal of the vampire from popular press to fine art and, finally, to film.
Reviews
'An admirable selection of 19th-century vampire stories in an anthology that shows how blood-soaked and fertile was the soil from which Bram Stoker’s marvellous Dracula sprang in 1897'
Independent
'A very Baedeker of vampirism'
Observer
'A capacious book dripping with suspense and replete with horror'
Financial Times
'A thorough scholarly survey of the vampiric literature of the 19th-century Gothic Revival … enthralling'
Evening Standard
'Excellent … the great joy of this book is discovering the darker past of [Dracula’s] antecedents, real monsters, who can still induce that tingle in the flesh with, in Jonathan Harker's words, "powers of their own which mere 'modernity' cannot kill"'
Sunday Telegraph
Product Information
Book Details
Format: Hardback
Size: 23.4 x 15.3 cm
Extent: 464 pp
Publication date: 22 September 2016
ISBN: 9780500252215
About the Author
Sir Christopher Frayling is a Fellow of Churchill College, Cambridge, and was Rector of the Royal College of Art, London, from 1996 to 2009, where he remains Professor Emeritus of Cultural History. His many public appointments have included Chairman of Arts Council England; Chairman of the Design Council; and the longest-serving Trustee of the Victoria and Albert Museum. He is the author of many books, including The Yellow Peril, Cinema: The Whole Story and Sergio Leone, all published by Thames & Hudson.
