170-532: The Vampire Chronicles is a series of gothic vampire novels and a media franchise , created by American writer Anne Rice , that revolves around the fictional character Lestat de Lioncourt , a French nobleman turned into a vampire in the 18th century. Rice said in a 2008 interview that her vampires were a "metaphor for lost souls". The homoerotic overtones of The Vampire Chronicles are also well-documented. As of November 2008, The Vampire Chronicles had sold 80 million copies worldwide. The first novel in
340-501: A 2008 interview that her vampires were a "metaphor for lost souls". The homoerotic overtones of The Vampire Chronicles are also well documented. As of November 2008, The Vampire Chronicles had sold 80 million copies worldwide. The first novel in the series, Interview with the Vampire (1976), was made into a 1994 film starring Tom Cruise , Brad Pitt , Antonio Banderas , Christian Slater and Kirsten Dunst . The Queen of
510-405: A bit of time talking to Aunt Queen about cameos and their history. When Lestat and Quinn are alone, Goblin returns to feed on Quinn but Lestat burns him as he does so. Quinn then tells Lestat the story of himself and Goblin (and his entire life). After the story is done they hear a noise and Quinn discovers Goblin has killed Aunt Queen. Lestat suggests Merrick can perhaps help get rid of Goblin. At
680-598: A counter to the naive and persecuted heroines usually featured in female Gothic of the time, and instead feature more sexually assertive heroines in their works. When the female Gothic coincides with the explained supernatural , the natural cause of terror is not the supernatural, but female disability and societal horrors: rape , incest , and the threatening control of a male antagonist. Female Gothic novels also address women's discontent with patriarchal society, their difficult and unsatisfying maternal position, and their role within that society. Women's fears of entrapment in
850-461: A creature made against the rules. Claudia is portrayed by Kirsten Dunst in the 1994 film adaptation, by Bailey Bass in season one of the 2022 television series Interview with the Vampire and by Delainey Hayles in season two of the series. Daniel Molloy is a young reporter introduced in Interview with the Vampire (1976) to whom Louis de Pointe du Lac recounts his life history. The character
1020-509: A definite Christian framework and it will concern the vampire Lestat; and it will be a story I think I need to tell. But it will have to be in a redemptive framework. It will have to be where Lestat is really wrestling with the existence of God in a very personal way." That same year she produced a YouTube video in which she told her readers that she had dismissed any intentions of writing any more books in The Vampire Chronicles , calling
1190-466: A dying Akasha's body, making her the first vampire. She in turn makes Enkil a vampire by drawing out nearly all of his blood and then allowing him to drink nearly all of hers. After millennia, they become living statues and sleep upright in their thrones. What befalls Akasha and Enkil also befalls all vampires; if they are injured, so are their children, if they die, so do all vampires. Called Those Who Must Be Kept, Akasha and Enkil are hidden and cared for by
1360-545: A female named Catherine, conceives herself as a heroine of a Radcliffean romance and imagines murder and villainy on every side. However, the truth turns out to be much more prosaic. This novel is also noted for including a list of early Gothic works known as the Northanger Horrid Novels . The poetry, romantic adventures, and character of Lord Byron —characterized by his spurned lover Lady Caroline Lamb as "mad, bad and dangerous to know"—were another inspiration for
1530-529: A female vampire, is notable for its treatment of vampirism as both racial and medicalized. The vampire, Harriet Brandt, is also a psychic vampire , killing unintentionally. In the United States, notable late 19th-century writers in the Gothic tradition were Ambrose Bierce , Robert W. Chambers , and Edith Wharton . Bierce's short stories were in the horrific and pessimistic tradition of Poe. Chambers indulged in
1700-484: A ghostly nun, and its view of Roman Catholicism as exotic and heathenistic. Nathaniel Hawthorne 's novel The House of the Seven Gables , about a family's ancestral home, is colored with suggestions of the supernatural and witchcraft ; and in true Gothic fashion, it features the house itself as one of the main characters, The genre also heavily influenced writers such as Charles Dickens , who read Gothic novels as
1870-575: A kind of grief for a lost faith." Her 1998 return to the Catholic Church after 38 years of atheism had prompted a change in the direction of her writing that resulted in her 2005 novel Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt and its 2008 sequel Christ the Lord: The Road to Cana . However, in the same interview, Rice said: "I have one more book that I would really like to write; and the book will have
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#17328619867572040-476: A metaphor for the homosexual experience." In 1996, Rice commented: On the homoerotic content of my novels: I can only say what I have said many times—that no form of love between consenting individuals appears wrong to me. I see bisexuality as power. When I write I have no gender. It is difficult for me to see the characters in terms of gender. I have written individuals who can fall in love with men and women. All this feels extremely natural to me. Undoubtedly, there
2210-630: A noticeable heartbeat – albeit considerably slower than that of a living heart. This ensures normal blood circulation and also synchronizes with that of their fledglings while turning them. When vampires enter a state of hibernation, their hearts cease to beat and they enter into a desiccated state in which their bodies become skeletal and dry from lack of blood flow. Blood starvation may also trigger this. Removing their heart from their bodies will also kill them. Despite these differences, Rice's undead do share some similarities with mainstream vampire fiction. They are supernaturally strong and can move faster than
2380-462: A number of stories that fall within the Gothic genre or contain Gothic elements. They include " Saint John's Eve " and " A Terrible Vengeance " from Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka (1831–1832), " The Portrait " from Arabesques (1835), and " Viy " from Mirgorod (1835). While all are well known, the latter is probably the most famous, having inspired at least eight film adaptations (two now considered lost), one animated film, two documentaries, and
2550-465: A persecuted heroine fleeing from a villainous father and searching for an absent mother. At the same time, male writers tend towards the masculine transgression of social taboos . The emergence of the ghost story gave women writers something to write about besides the common marriage plot, allowing them to present a more radical critique of male power, violence, and predatory sexuality. Authors such as Mary Robinson and Charlotte Dacre however, present
2720-486: A prosperous Italian family. She was educated and had traveled to and lived in many cities in Europe. Then she was married at a young age to Lestat's father, Marquis d'Auvergne. Gabrielle gave birth to eight children, but only 3 survived. Out of these sons, the youngest (Lestat), was to become her favorite. She and Lestat shared a special bond: they both were trapped in a place they hated and struggling endlessly to escape. Gabrielle
2890-532: A pyre that he had made for himself. He left Lestat to struggle and learn for himself of his new vampiric nature and its powers. Lestat would later lament that he learned "absolutely nothing" from the one who made him. Introduced in The Vampire Lestat , Antoine is a French musician, exiled to Louisiana and made a vampire by Lestat. He returns in Prince Lestat (2014). Antoinette, a gender swapped version of
3060-499: A rational age. Initiating a literary genre, Walpole's Gothic tale inspired many contemporary imitators, including Clara Reeve 's The Old English Baron (1778), with Reeve writing in the preface: "This Story is the literary offspring of The Castle of Otranto ". Like Reeve, the 1780s saw more writers attempting his combination of supernatural plots with emotionally realistic characters. Examples include Sophia Lee 's The Recess (1783–5) and William Beckford 's Vathek (1786). At
3230-449: A ride on the postal carriage. Lestat became an actor there and was far happier than he ever was back home. He was grateful and loved his mother for all that she had done for him over the years so he sent letters to her telling her about his life in Paris. She encouraged his acting career, which gave him a lot of strength. She carefully hid her rapidly declining health to keep him strong. Lestat
3400-454: A screenplay for The Tale of the Body Thief (1992) adapted by Christopher Rice , Anne Rice's son. In May 2016, writer–director Josh Boone posted a photo on Instagram of the cover a script written by him and Jill Killington. Titled Interview with the Vampire , it is based on the novel of the same name and its sequel, The Vampire Lestat . In November 2016, Rice announced on Facebook that
3570-601: A series of ancient vampires in locations around the world. In the late 1800s, Lestat discovers them and drinks from Akasha, acquiring her supreme powers. Over a century later, Lestat's music awakens Akasha in The Queen of the Damned . Akasha is portrayed by Aaliyah in the 2002 film Queen of the Damned . Nicolas "Nicki" de Lenfent is Lestat's closest friend and lover in Paris, introduced in The Vampire Lestat (1985). Lestat
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#17328619867573740-633: A similar message of her fate. She used magic to bring David and Louis to her. When Louis later is dying after his attempt to burn himself in the sun to join Claudia, Lestat fully awakes from his sleep. He saves Louis by letting him drink from his powerful blood. Merrick is also allowed to drink and joins the little coven. Later a young vampire named Quinn calls upon Lestat and asks for help in Blackwood Farm (2002). The spirit of his dead twin brother (named Goblin) had been haunting him all his life, and now, when he
3910-461: A stake through the heart, or holy water. Ancient immortals are almost completely unaffected by the sun. The key trait of Rice's vampires is that they are unusually emotional and sensual, prone to aesthetic thinking. This lends well to artistic pursuits such as painting, writing, and singing; all of which are refined by their eidetic memory and heightened beauty. Beyond their refined physical features, Rice's vampires are unique in that their appearance
4080-421: A story in a Gothic building serves several purposes. It inspires feelings of awe, implies that the story is set in the past, gives an impression of isolation or dissociation from the rest of the world, and conveys religious associations. Setting the novel in a Gothic castle was meant to imply a story set in the past and shrouded in darkness. The architecture often served as a mirror for the characters and events of
4250-467: A teenager and incorporated their gloomy atmosphere and melodrama into his works, shifting them to a more modern period and an urban setting; for example, in Oliver Twist (1837–1838), Bleak House (1854) and Great Expectations (1860–1861). These works juxtapose wealthy, ordered, and affluent civilization with the disorder and barbarity of the poor in the same metropolis. Bleak House, in particular,
4420-613: A thousand or more years old, are known colloquially as "Children of the Millennia". In his life as a vampire, Lestat spends decades trying to find any vampire who is more than a few hundred years old, as a way to learn where they all came from and what their vampiric status means, a quest that eventually leads him to the 2000-year-old Marius. In 2008 Rice called her vampires a "metaphor for lost souls", adding that "they were metaphors for us ... these were wonderful ways of writing about all our dilemmas in life... for me, supernatural characters were
4590-681: A vampire. On returning to Petronia and Manfred they explain "the rules" to him: that the Talamasca is now his enemy and also that hunting in New Orleans is forbidden because Lestat de Lioncourt won't allow it. Quinn decides to return to Blackwood Farm. Even though Petronia and Arion ask him not to, he makes preparations to leave straight away. When Quinn arrives at Blackwood Farm, Goblin attacks him and feeds on him, drinking his blood. Goblin attacks Quinn every time Quinn feeds on someone, and his attacks are becoming stronger each time. Petronia visits Quinn at
4760-496: A video game. Gogol's work differs from Western European Gothic fiction, as his cultural influences drew on Ukrainian folklore , the Cossack lifestyle, and, as a religious man, Orthodox Christianity . Other relevant authors of this era include Vladimir Fyodorovich Odoevsky ( The Living Corpse , written 1838, published 1844, The Ghost , The Sylphide , as well as short stories), Count Aleksey Konstantinovich Tolstoy ( The Family of
4930-412: A young reporter the story of how he had been made a vampire in 18th-century New Orleans by Lestat de Lioncourt . In creating and sheltering the child vampire Claudia , Lestat and Louis had unknowingly set tragedy in motion. This book chronicles Lestat's own origins, as he resurfaces in the modern world and attempts to find meaning by exposing himself to humanity in the guise of a rock star. This attracts
5100-581: Is possessed by James. At the end of the book, Lestat forces the blood upon David, making him his fledgling. David becomes somewhat of a confidant to Armand, and eventually records the story of his life in The Vampire Armand (1998). He is also described as having sexual preferences for young women and men, preferring men in The Tale of the Body Thief . David also appears in Merrick (2000), where he contacts
5270-496: Is a deep protest in me against the Roman Catholic attitude toward sexuality. She said later in 2008: My characters have always been transcending gender ... I think the main issue with me is love, not gender. I have never understood the great prejudice against gay people in our society ... I don't know why I see the world that way, but I know that it's very much a point with me, that we should not be bound by prejudices where gender
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5440-553: Is a loose literary aesthetic of fear and haunting . The name refers to Gothic architecture of the European Middle Ages , which was characteristic of the settings of early Gothic novels. The first work to call itself Gothic was Horace Walpole 's 1764 novel The Castle of Otranto , later subtitled "A Gothic Story". Subsequent 18th-century contributors included Clara Reeve , Ann Radcliffe , William Thomas Beckford , and Matthew Lewis . The Gothic influence continued into
5610-610: Is a member of the Talamasca who possesses a particular interest in the Mayfair Witches. Introduced in The Queen of the Damned (1988), the character appears in the entire Lives of the Mayfair Witches trilogy (1990–1994) as well as the 2000 crossover novel Merrick . Pandora is an ancient Roman woman, previously named Lydia, whom Marius de Romanus is forced to make a vampire, and who helps him care for Those Who Must Be Kept for centuries. Maharet and Mekare are six-thousand-year-old twins from ancient Kemet who inadvertently began
5780-458: Is a vampire, Quinn is the victim of several attacks. Lestat can not help Quinn on his own and asks Merrick for help, and she agrees. She explains the nature of spirits and says that Goblin refuses "to go into The Light". She performs a kind of exorcism, but to make the spirit "go into the Light" she ends her own life and they both "go into the Light" together. It was earlier revealed by Lestat that Merrick
5950-431: Is abducted from their bed and made a vampire by Magnus. Lestat later makes Nicki a vampire as well, which only amplifies Nicki's depression. Nicki was portrayed by Roderick Hill in the 2006 musical Lestat and was also portrayed by Joseph Potter in season 2 of Interview with the Vampire. Magnus is the vampire who turned Lestat into a vampire in The Vampire Lestat (1985). Magnus is characterized by black hair and eyes of
6120-615: Is an Italian vampire born in Florence , Italy in the late 1470s. She has sharp grey eyes and wavy golden hair, which she often interweaves with pearls, and is often described as a woman painted by Botticelli . Bianca lives a happy mortal life with her brothers until they die and she is forced to depend financially on her evil kinsmen, who are bankers. They provide amply for her as long as she kills those who they instruct her to kill. She does this by opening her house to virtually all as an amicable and graceful hostess and secretly placing poison in
6290-568: Is at peace after her death. Merrick can do this since she is a powerful witch, as are many of the Mayfairs. When her godmother, Great Nannane, died there was no one who could take care of her because her sister (Honey in the Sunshine) and her mother (Cold Sandra) were deceased. There is also a matter of her raising. The Mayfair Family is Louisiana Creole and are of African and European extraction, but all are distanced from Merrick's immediate family. Orphaned,
6460-475: Is characterized by an environment of fear, the threat of supernatural events, and the intrusion of the past upon the present. The setting typically includes physical reminders of the past, especially through ruined buildings which stand as proof of a previously thriving world which is decaying in the present. Characteristic settings in the 18th and 19th centuries include castles, religious buildings such as monasteries and convents , and crypts . The atmosphere
6630-410: Is concerned. In his book Anne Rice and Sexual Politics: The Early Novels , James R. Keller asserts that the publication and success of Rice's Vampire Chronicles reinforced the "widely recognized parallel between the queer and the vampire." He notes that in particular "gay and lesbian readers have been quick to identify with the representation of the vampire, suggesting its experiences parallel those of
6800-510: Is credited with introducing urban fog to the novel, which would become a frequent characteristic of urban Gothic literature and film. Miss Havisham from Great Expectations , is one of Dickens' most Gothic characters. The bitter recluse shuts herself away in her gloomy mansion ever since being jilted at the altar on her wedding day. His most explicitly Gothic work is his last novel, The Mystery of Edwin Drood , which he did not live to complete and
6970-514: Is described as unusually long. There is no organized society beyond covens, religious bodies, and small groups from time to time. While a few vampires seem to find a way to cope with immortality, most capitulate to self-destructive anger or depression and do not survive beyond some decades or a few centuries. This is described in the series by the saying that vampires "go into the fire or go into history"—the few that survive far longer become legendary or semi-mythical characters. The most ancient vampires,
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7140-420: Is dying. Quinn and Lestat leave the Talamasca to hunt. They arrive back at Blackwood Farm where they find Mona waiting for Quinn, dying. Quinn tells her what he is and Lestat makes her into a vampire for Quinn. Santiago is a vampire and the leading thespian of Theatre des Vampires, introduced in Interview with the Vampire (1976). He is portrayed by Stephen Rea in the 1994 film adaptation and Ben Daniels in
7310-462: Is going to happen next. A fire is built and Quinn and Lestat watch as Merrick performs a ritual that involves the remains of Goblin/Gawain. The ritual ends with Merrick jumping into the fire with Goblin and even though Lestat pulls her out and tries to save her, she is dead. Quinn and Lestat visit Oak Haven and speak to Stirling Oliver telling him about Merrick so that the Talamasca know what happened to her. Stirling Oliver tells Quinn that Mona Mayfair
7480-495: Is herself destroyed by the vampire witch Mekare , who has awakened and returned after 6,000 years to fulfill a promise to destroy Akasha at the moment she poses the greatest threat. The novel finds Lestat haunted by his past and tiring of immortality. A thief switches bodies with him and runs off, and Lestat enlists David Talbot , leader of the Talamasca and one of his only remaining friends, to help him retrieve it. Lestat meets
7650-453: Is immediately in front of us." The mysterious imagination necessary for Gothic literature to have gained any traction had been growing for some time before the advent of the Gothic. The need for this came as the known world was becoming more explored, reducing the geographical mysteries of the world. The edges of the map were filling in, and no dragons were to be found. The human mind required a replacement. Clive Bloom theorizes that this void in
7820-586: Is inducing Terror – or else "a great deal of the apprehension vanishes"; Obscurity is necessary to experience the Terror of the unknown. Bloom asserts that Burke's descriptive vocabulary was essential to the Romantic works that eventually informed the Gothic. The birth of Gothic literature was thought to have been influenced by political upheaval. Researchers linked its birth with the English Civil War , culminating in
7990-513: Is made a vampire by Lestat de Lioncourt in Blood Canticle . Tarquin is initially featured in the novel Blackwood Farm (2002) and later in Blood Canticle (2003). An oval face, with features that are almost too delicate. Sharp, intelligent blue eyes and jet black hair, cut short that is slightly curly. He stands at an impressive height of six feet four inches (1.93 m), and
8160-563: Is more statue-like than human. Their pupils are luminous while in the dark and their nails appear more like glass. Being undead, their skin is likewise pallid as well as unusually smooth. Additionally, upon being sired, the vampire's body is essentially frozen in the state in which it died. Their hair and nails cease to grow; if they are cut, they will quickly grow back. The undead also possess no bodily fluids other than blood, as they are purged following death. While virtually all other internal bodily functions expire, Rice's vampires still possess
8330-482: Is now and although Quinn tries to fight against it, he feeds on Stirling Oliver until he is pulled away from him. The person who pulled him away was Lestat who quickly deals with Stirling Oliver by warning him not to try it again and also not to make any mention of Quinn in any report he might make to the Talamasca. Lestat takes Quinn's letter and then takes him to feed and afterward Quinn is attacked by Goblin. Lestat goes with Quinn back to Blackwood Farm where they spend
8500-460: Is of a slight, handsome build. Tarquin Anthony Blackwood was born in 1980 to Patsy Blackwood who was only 16 at the time. Quinn is looked after by his grandfather Pops, grandmother "Sweetheart" and Jasmine, a servant, who helps run the house, Blackwood Farm just outside New Orleans. Quinn has spent his entire life accompanied by a spirit named Goblin. The first clear memory Quinn has of Goblin
8670-475: Is often described with words such as "wonder" and "terror." This sense of wonder and terror that provides the suspension of disbelief so important to the Gothic—which, except for when it is parodied, even for all its occasional melodrama , is typically played straight, in a self-serious manner—requires the imagination of the reader to be willing to accept the idea that there might be something "beyond that which
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#17328619867578840-426: Is particularly important, as his 1833 short story The Queen of Spades was so popular that it was adapted into operas and later films by Russian and foreign artists. Some parts of Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov's A Hero of Our Time (1840) are also considered to belong to the Gothic genre, but they lack the supernatural elements of other Russian Gothic stories. The following poems are also now considered to belong to
9010-452: Is portrayed by Brad Pitt in the 1994 film adaptation and by Jacob Anderson in the 2022 television series Interview with the Vampire . Armand is a 500-year-old vampire with the outer appearance of a cherubic adolescent boy, introduced in Interview with the Vampire (1976), When first encountered he is the leader of a coven of vampires living in a cemetery in Paris, with rituals that reflect their belief that they are damned creatures; when
9180-469: Is portrayed by Christian Slater in the 1994 film adaptation, and portrayed by Eric Bogosian and Luke Brandon Field in the 2022 television series. Marius is an ancient vampire, originally from Rome in the 1st century BC and introduced in The Vampire Lestat (1985). He is portrayed by Vincent Pérez in the 2002 film Queen of the Damned . David is the Superior General of the secret organization
9350-552: Is set in the twenty-second century and speculates on fantastic scientific developments that might have occurred three hundred years in the future, making it and Frankenstein among the earliest examples of the science fiction genre developing from Gothic traditions. During two decades, the most famous author of Gothic literature in Germany was the polymath E. T. A. Hoffmann . Lewis's The Monk influenced and even mentioned it in his novel The Devil's Elixirs (1815). The novel explores
9520-575: Is strongly associated with the Gothic Revival architecture of the same era. English Gothic writers often associated medieval buildings with what they saw as a dark and terrifying period, marked by harsh laws enforced by torture and with mysterious, fantastic, and superstitious rituals . Similar to the Gothic Revivalists' rejection of the clarity and rationalism of the Neoclassical style of
9690-468: Is taken to hunt with Arion, Petronia, and Manfred and here discovers that he can fly. The four of them arrive at a wedding full of "evil-doers" but Quinn mistakenly kills the bride who was not evil at all. Petronia, obviously enraged by this, begins beating Quinn until Arion stops it. The sun rises and Quinn sleeps during the day, dreaming of killing his mother Patsy. The next night Arion teaches Quinn how to hunt properly and teaches him about what he now is,
9860-475: Is then told by Petronia to pick someone from the 3 servants in the house to feed upon. These are the same servants Quinn met when still alive so Quinn is reluctant to feed on any of them even though he can now see they have all committed some very bad deed. Quinn eventually kills one female servant and afterward, Manfred also lets Quinn drink from him. Quinn then sees the ghost of Rebecca but ignores her now as he believes that to be finished now that he has died. Quinn
10030-501: Is typically claustrophobic , and common plot elements include vengeful persecution, imprisonment, and murder. The depiction of horrible events in Gothic fiction often serves as a metaphorical expression of psychological or social conflicts. The form of a Gothic story is usually discontinuous and convoluted, often incorporating tales within tales, changing narrators, and framing devices such as discovered manuscripts or interpolated histories. Other characteristics, regardless of relevance to
10200-520: The Enlightened Establishment, the literary Gothic embodies an appreciation of the joys of extreme emotion, the thrills of fearfulness and awe inherent in the sublime , and a quest for atmosphere. Gothic ruins invoke multiple linked emotions by representing inevitable decay and the collapse of human creations – hence the urge to add fake ruins as eyecatchers in English landscape parks. Placing
10370-561: The Graveyard poets . They were also present in novels such as Daniel Defoe 's A Journal of the Plague Year , which contains comical scenes of plague carts and piles of corpses. Even earlier, poets like Edmund Spenser evoked a dreary and sorrowful mood in such poems as Epithalamion . All aspects of pre-Gothic literature occur to some degree in the Gothic, but even taken together, they still fall short of true Gothic. What needed to be added
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#173286198675710540-517: The Jacobite rising of 1745 which was more recent to the first Gothic novel (1764). The collective political memory and any deep cultural fears associated with it likely contributed to early Gothic villains as literary representatives of defeated Tory barons or Royalists "rising" from their political graves in the pages of early Gothic novels to terrorize the bourgeois reader of late eighteenth-century England. The first work to call itself "Gothic"
10710-579: The Satanic cult headed by Armand , founded a theatre, and made Nicolas into a vampire. After this, Lestat and Gabrielle went traveling around the world. Gabrielle became increasingly distant and cold to her son. They finally parted in Egypt just after the French Revolution . Gabrielle went into the deep jungles of Africa and Lestat went underground to sleep. Gabrielle was off exploring the world on her own for
10880-567: The trope of vampires having sharpened teeth. Another notable English author of penny dreadfuls is George W. M. Reynolds , known for The Mysteries of London (1844), Faust (1846), Wagner the Wehr-wolf (1847), and The Necromancer (1857). Elizabeth Gaskell 's tales "The Doom of the Griffiths" (1858), "Lois the Witch", and "The Grey Woman" all employ one of the most common themes of Gothic fiction:
11050-416: The 1790s." The popularity and influence of The Mysteries of Udolpho and The Monk saw the rise of shorter and cheaper versions of Gothic literature in the forms of Gothic bluebooks and chapbooks , which in many cases were plagiarized and abridgments of well known Gothic novels. The Monk in particular, with its immoral and sensational content, saw many plagiarized copies, and was notably drawn from in
11220-494: The 1976 novel Interview with the Vampire . The series primarily follows the antihero Lestat de Lioncourt , a French nobleman turned into a vampire in the 18th century, and by extension the many humans and vampires whose lives he has touched in his own long existence. Some characters from Rice's Lives of the Mayfair Witches trilogy cross over to The Vampire Chronicles , specifically in Merrick (2000), Blackwood Farm (2002), and Blood Canticle (2003). Rice said in
11390-588: The Common Era, the elder who was entrusted to keep the Parents abandoned Akasha and Enkil in the desert to wait for the sun to rise and consume them. While they remained unharmed, young vampires everywhere were destroyed by fire and even mighty elders were badly burned. Following this, the fledgling Marius – a gifted Roman scholar – went to Egypt and retrieved the Divine Parents, making them his sacred responsibility as
11560-440: The Damned (1988) was adapted into a 2002 film of the same name , starring Stuart Townsend and Aaliyah and using some material from 1985's The Vampire Lestat . A television adaptation, Interview with the Vampire , premiered on AMC on October 2, 2022, starring Sam Reid and Jacob Anderson . Lestat is a French nobleman born and made a vampire in the 1700s, and the primary antihero of Rice's Vampire Chronicles . He
11730-439: The Damned , which combined plot elements of The Vampire Lestat and The Queen of the Damned , was released in 2002 starring Stuart Townsend as Lestat and Aaliyah as Akasha. In August 2014, Universal Pictures and Imagine Entertainment acquired the motion picture rights to the entire Vampire Chronicles series, with producers Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci signed to helm the potential film franchise. The deal also included
11900-519: The Devil, Memnoch, and he brought back Veronica's Veil , causing chaos among mortals and bringing out many of the ancients. Mael tells David Talbot and Lestat that he is going to burn himself in the sun for God. Mael is ancient and thereby too strong for the sunlight to kill him ordinarily, but he believes that the presence of the Veil negates his supernatural powers (but not his vulnerabilities). The final implication
12070-412: The Devil, who calls himself Memnoch. He takes Lestat on a whirlwind tour of Heaven and Hell, and retells the entirety of history from his own point of view in an effort to convince Lestat to join him as God's adversary. In his journey, Memnoch claims he is not evil, but merely working for God by ushering lost souls into Heaven. Lestat is left in confusion, unable to decide whether or not to cast his lot with
12240-810: The Devil. Rice's New Tales of the Vampires — Pandora (1998) and Vittorio the Vampire (1999)—do not feature Lestat at all, instead telling the stories of the eponymous peripheral vampires, the Patrician Pandora from Rome in the 1st century B.C. and the 15th-century Italian nobleman Vittorio . Armand tells his own life story in 1998's The Vampire Armand , and Rice's Mayfair Witches series crosses over with The Vampire Chronicles in Merrick (2000) as Louis and David seek Merrick Mayfair 's help in resurrecting Claudia's spirit. The origins of Marius are explored in 2001's Blood and Gold , and Blackwood Farm (2002) tells
12410-571: The First Brood and stood against the Divine Parents and their followers, the Queen's Blood. Overwhelmed and captured, the twins were separated and sent into exile; Maharet to familiar lands in the Red Sea , and Mekare to uncharted waters out towards the west. After two millennia, the Queen and King went mute and catatonic. They were maintained like statues by elders and priests under the impression that if Akasha –
12580-581: The German Schauerroman and the French R oman noir . Eighteenth-century Gothic novels were typically set in a distant past and (for English novels) a distant European country, but without specific dates or historical figures that characterized the later development of historical fiction. The saturation of Gothic-inspired literature during the 1790s was referred to in a letter by Samuel Taylor Coleridge , writing on 16 March 1797, "indeed I am almost weary of
12750-435: The Gothic and influenced Bram Stoker 's vampire novel Dracula (1897). Stoker's book created the most famous Gothic villain ever, Count Dracula , and established Transylvania and Eastern Europe as the locus classicus of the Gothic. Published in the same year as Dracula , Florence Marryat 's The Blood of the Vampire is another piece of vampire fiction. The Blood of the Vampire , which, like Carmilla, features
12920-444: The Gothic genre made it rich territory for satire. Historian Rictor Norton notes that satire of Gothic literature was common from 1796 until the 1820s, including early satirical works such as The New Monk (1798), More Ghosts ! (1798) and Rosella, or Modern Occurrences (1799). Gothic novels themselves, according to Norton, also possess elements of self-satire, "By having profane comic characters as well as sacred serious characters,
13090-426: The Gothic genre: Meshchevskiy's "Lila", Katenin's "Olga", Pushkin 's "The Bridegroom", Pletnev 's "The Gravedigger" and Lermontov 's Demon (1829–1839). The key author of the transition from Romanticism to Realism, Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol , who was also one of the most important authors of Romanticism, produced a number of works that qualify as Gothic fiction. Each of his three short story collections features
13260-564: The Gothic novel, providing the archetype of the Byronic hero . For example, Byron is the title character in Lady Caroline's Gothic novel Glenarvon (1816). Byron was also the host of the celebrated ghost-story competition involving himself, Percy Bysshe Shelley , Mary Shelley , and John William Polidori at the Villa Diodati on the banks of Lake Geneva in the summer of 1816. This occasion
13430-407: The Gothic novelist could puncture the balloon of the supernatural while at the same time affirming the power of the imagination." After 1800 there was a period in which Gothic parodies outnumbered forthcoming Gothic novels. In The Heroine by Eaton Stannard Barrett (1813), Gothic tropes are exaggerated for comic effect. In Jane Austen 's novel Northanger Abbey (1818), the naive protagonist,
13600-459: The Gothic tradition, Mary Shelley's novel is often considered the first science fiction novel, despite the novel's lack of any scientific explanation for the animation of Frankenstein's monster and the focus instead on the moral dilemmas and consequences of such a creation. John Keats ' La Belle Dame sans Merci (1819) and Isabella, or the Pot of Basil (1820) feature mysteriously fey ladies. In
13770-403: The Gothic. Emily Brontë 's Wuthering Heights (1847) transports the Gothic to the forbidding Yorkshire Moors and features ghostly apparitions and a Byronic hero in the person of the demonic Heathcliff. The Brontës' fictions were cited by feminist critic Ellen Moers as prime examples of Female Gothic, exploring woman's entrapment within domestic space and subjection to patriarchal authority and
13940-506: The Grove". Marius escaped. Mael later returns in The Queen of the Damned (1988). He is a companion to Maharet and also seeks to protect her mortal descendant Jesse Reeves. Mael is present when Maharet tells Jesse her story when they later try to reason with Akasha, and when Mekare kills her. The third appearance by Mael is at the end of Memnoch the Devil . Lestat goes to Heaven and Hell with
14110-484: The Mayfair Witches for developing film and television projects. A television series, Interview with the Vampire , premiered on AMC on October 2, 2022, starring Jacob Anderson and Sam Reid . Rice considered Blood Canticle a conclusion to the series and thought she would never write about Lestat again. In a 2008 interview with Time , she called her vampires a "metaphor for lost souls", and noted that writing about them had been, to her, "a sort of search for God and
14280-641: The Screw (1898), and the stories of Arthur Machen . In Ireland, Gothic fiction tended to be purveyed by the Anglo-Irish Protestant Ascendancy . According to literary critic Terry Eagleton , Charles Maturin , Sheridan Le Fanu , and Bram Stoker form the core of the Irish Gothic subgenre with stories featuring castles set in a barren landscape and a cast of remote aristocrats dominating an atavistic peasantry, which represent an allegorical form
14450-508: The Sublime and Beautiful , which "finally codif[ied] the gothic emotional experience." Specifically, Burke's thoughts on the Sublime, Terror, and Obscurity were most applicable. These sections can be summarized thus: the Sublime is that which is or produces the "strongest emotion which the mind is capable of feeling"; Terror most often evoked the Sublime; and to cause Terror, we need some amount of Obscurity – we can't know everything about that which
14620-436: The Talamasca , which researches and investigates the supernatural . David is introduced in The Queen of the Damned (1988). He meets both Lestat and Louis at the end of the novel. Lestat taunts David, offering to turn him with his powerful vampire blood, which David soundly refuses. In The Tale of the Body Thief (1992), it seems he and Lestat have become friends. After Lestat tries to end his immortal life by flying into
14790-732: The Terrible, having been a hireling in the Critical Review for the last six or eight months – I have been reviewing the Monk , the Italian , Hubert de Sevrac &c &c &c – in all of which dungeons, and old castles, & solitary Houses by the Sea Side & Caverns & Woods & extraordinary characters & all the tribe of Horror & Mystery, have crowded on me – even to surfeiting." The excesses, stereotypes, and frequent absurdities of
14960-413: The Vampire (1976). She is created on a whim by Lestat, despite the prohibition against making vampires of the young, and grows up trapped in a child's body. Eventually, she seeks revenge against Lestat and poisons him with tainted blood to immobilize him, before killing him, but she is unsuccessful. Claudia travels with Louis, and when the two are captured by Armand's coven in Paris, she is killed by fire as
15130-653: The Vourdalak , 1839, and The Vampire , 1841), Mikhail Zagoskin ( Unexpected Guests ), Józef Sękowski / Osip Senkovsky ( Antar ), and Yevgeny Baratynsky ( The Ring ). By the Victorian era , Gothic had ceased to be the dominant genre for novels in England, partly replaced by more sedate historical fiction . However, Gothic short stories continued to be popular, published in magazines or as small chapbooks called penny dreadfuls . The most influential Gothic writer from this period
15300-444: The attention of the ancient vampire Marius de Romanus, and culminates in the accidental awakening of Akasha , the ancient Egyptian queen and first vampire, who has been immobile for millennia and safeguarded by Marius. Lestat has awakened Akasha, the first of all vampires, who has in her thousands of years of immobility, contrived an idealized way to achieve world peace, by killing almost all males and destroying all other vampires. She
15470-572: The burning, Marius, severely weakened, mentally calls Bianca to him. Marius makes Bianca a vampire so that she can bring him victims so that he can heal. The two stay together for nearly two hundred years, caring for Those Who Must Be Kept before Bianca leaves Marius in Dresden , when she overhears him telling Pandora that he would leave Bianca if it meant having Pandora with him once more. Marius also does not tell Bianca that rumors of Pandora in Dresden are
15640-463: The character, appears in the 2022 television series Interview with the Vampire , portrayed by Maura Grace Athari. In the story, she is a blues singer taken as a lover by Lestat. Eventually, Louis and Claudia insist that Lestat kill her as a condition of reuniting their family. Lestat pretends to, presenting her severed finger as proof, but instead makes her a vampire to spy on Louis and Claudia. They ultimately destroy her in their incinerator. Aaron
15810-506: The cheaper pamphlets. Other notable Gothic novels of the 1790s include William Godwin 's Caleb Williams (1794), Regina Maria Roche 's Clermont (1798), and Charles Brockden Brown 's Wieland (1798), as well as large numbers of anonymous works published by the Minerva Press established by William Lane at Leadenhall Street , London in 1790. In continental Europe, Romantic literary movements led to related Gothic genres such as
15980-429: The collective imagination was critical in developing the cultural possibility for the rise of the Gothic tradition. The setting of most early Gothic works was medieval, but this was a common theme long before Walpole. In Britain especially, there was a desire to reclaim a shared past. This obsession frequently led to extravagant architectural displays, such as Fonthill Abbey , and sometimes mock tournaments were held. It
16150-490: The coven breaks up, Armand is left with many existential questions. His previous life in Venice with Marius, and his capture and indoctrination by vampires there who despised Marius's optimistic manner of living, is disclosed in The Vampire Lestat (1985). The character is portrayed by Antonio Banderas in the 1994 film adaptation and by Assad Zaman in the television show. Claudia is a child vampire introduced in Interview with
16320-441: The coven master has the power of life and death over all of his flock'; and we learn that 'no vampire shall ever reveal his true nature to a mortal and allow that mortal to live'." Through The Tale of The Body Thief and Memnoch The Devil , the cosmology of the series expands into exploration of broader supernatural themes and realms, particularly of Heaven and Hell, and also into exploration of apex supernatural entities like angels,
16490-410: The cycle of vampirism in the world by summoning the demon spirit Amel, who possesses a dying Akasha and turns her into a vampire. Mael is mentioned briefly in The Vampire Lestat . Along with Marius de Romanus and Pandora, he is one of the legendary ancient vampires. When Marius tells the young Lestat the story of his life, he says that Mael was the druid priest who abducted him to become the new "God of
16660-506: The day Would quake to look on. — Lines from Shakespeare's Hamlet The components that would eventually combine into Gothic literature had a rich history by the time Walpole presented a fictitious medieval manuscript in The Castle of Otranto in 1764. The plays of William Shakespeare , in particular, were a crucial reference point for early Gothic writers, in both an effort to bring credibility to their works, and to legitimize
16830-611: The decadent style of Wilde and Machen, even including a character named Wilde in his The King in Yellow (1895). Wharton published some notable Gothic ghost stories. Some works of the Canadian writer Gilbert Parker also fall into the genre, including the stories in The Lane that had No Turning (1900). Akasha (The Vampire Chronicles) The following is a list of characters from Anne Rice 's The Vampire Chronicles , which began with
17000-565: The devil, and God Himself. Memnoch also acknowledges that many other types of earthbound supernatural creatures exist aside from the vampires, which leaves open connections to Rice's Taltos and werewolf stories. Rice chronicles the origins of her vampires in The Vampire Lestat and The Queen of the Damned . The first vampires appeared in Ancient Egypt , their origin connected to spirits which existed before Earth. Mekare and Maharet , twin witches living on Mount Carmel , were able to speak to
17170-577: The domestic, their bodies, marriage, childbirth, or domestic abuse commonly appear in the genre. After the characteristic Gothic Bildungsroman -like plot sequence, female Gothic allowed readers to grow from "adolescence to maturity" in the face of the realized impossibilities of the supernatural. As protagonists such as Adeline in The Romance of the Forest learn that their superstitious fantasies and terrors are replaced by natural cause and reasonable doubt,
17340-916: The early 19th century; works by the Romantic poets , like Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Lord Byron , and novelists such as Mary Shelley , Charles Maturin , Walter Scott and E. T. A. Hoffmann frequently drew upon gothic motifs in their works. The early Victorian period continued the use of gothic aesthetic in novels by Charles Dickens and the Brontë sisters , as well as works by the American writers Edgar Allan Poe and Nathaniel Hawthorne . Later well-known works were Dracula by Bram Stoker , Richard Marsh's The Beetle and Robert Louis Stevenson 's Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde . 20th-century contributors include Daphne du Maurier , Stephen King , Shirley Jackson , Anne Rice , and Toni Morrison . Gothic fiction
17510-470: The emerging genre as serious literature to the public. Tragedies such as Hamlet , Macbeth , King Lear , Romeo and Juliet , and Richard III , with plots revolving around the supernatural, revenge, murder, ghosts, witchcraft , and omens , written in dramatic pathos, and set in medieval castles, were a huge influence upon early Gothic authors, who frequently quote, and make allusions to Shakespeare's works. John Milton 's Paradise Lost (1667)
17680-491: The eye can see. Their senses are heightened and they will heal from any injury short of beheading and even reattach limbs. The act of feeding is highly sexualized in Rice's novels. Vampires both crave and need blood to sustain their unlife. While they can feed on animals, human blood is more nourishing. As they age, they're able to resist the urge more to the point where elders feed only for pleasure. As with most vampire fiction, all of
17850-567: The famous vampire Lestat de Lioncourt . Lestat's powerful vampire body has been stolen by a former member of the Talamasca, Raglan James. When they got Lestat's body back Raglan stole David's body instead and David ended up in the body of a young man. David's original body is destroyed when Raglan, in David's original body, tries to trick Lestat into giving him "the Dark Gift". When David contacts her, years later, Merrick knows all of this. She agrees to raise
18020-482: The female Gothic allowed women's societal and sexual desires to be introduced. In many respects, the novel's intended reader of the time was the woman who, even as she enjoyed such novels, felt she had to "[lay] down her book with affected indifference, or momentary shame," according to Jane Austen . The Gothic novel shaped its form for woman readers to "turn to Gothic romances to find support for their own mixed feelings." Female Gothic narratives focus on such topics as
18190-543: The first of a new series. Prince Lestat was released on October 28, 2014. A sequel, Prince Lestat and the Realms of Atlantis , was released on November 29, 2016, followed by Blood Communion: A Tale of Prince Lestat on October 2, 2018. The Vampire Chronicles series have a few crossover novels with this series, making Lives of the Mayfair Witches part of the Vampire Chronicles universe: Louis de Pointe du Lac tells
18360-401: The funeral, Merrick tells Quinn to go home with his family and to keep Patsy in particular at home. When Merrick and Lestat arrive at Blackwood Farm, Quinn is told that Goblin is in fact the ghost of his twin brother who died shortly after they were born. Quinn doesn't believe this until Patsy confirms it and says his name was Gawain and that it was Quinn's fault that his brother died. Quinn hears
18530-401: The height of the Gothic novel's popularity in the 1790s, the genre was almost synonymous with Ann Radcliffe , whose works were highly anticipated and widely imitated. The Romance of the Forest (1791) and The Mysteries of Udolpho (1794) were particularly popular. In an essay on Radcliffe, Walter Scott writes of the popularity of Udolpho at the time, "The very name was fascinating, and
18700-521: The host of Amel, the Sacred Core – died, all vampires would die with her. As the Common Era arrived, most undead forgot. As years passed, the story of the Divine Parents were maintained by a few elders who barely believed it themselves. Despite this, many of the self-made blood gods – vampires from Akasha's earlier progeny – remained entombed in hollowed-out trees or brick cells where they starved. Early in
18870-465: The island in the swamp and leaves him The Vampire Chronicles so he can understand things a bit better. On reading the books, he decides to find Lestat to ask for his help in dealing with Goblin. Quinn writes a letter to Lestat explaining a little about him and Goblin and asking for his help. He also encloses a cameo of himself for Lestat. Quinn takes this letter to Lestat's flat in New Orleans where he finds Stirling Oliver. Stirling can clearly see what Quinn
19040-446: The latter poem, the names of the characters, the dream visions, and the macabre physical details are influenced by the novels of premiere Gothicist Ann Radcliffe. Although ushering in the historical novel, and turning popularity away from Gothic fiction, Walter Scott frequently employed Gothic elements in his novels and poetry. Scott drew upon oral folklore , fireside tales, and ancient superstitions, often juxtaposing rationality and
19210-493: The main plot, can include sleeplike and deathlike states, live burials , doubles , unnatural echoes or silences, the discovery of obscured family ties, unintelligible writings, nocturnal landscapes, remote locations, and dreams. Especially in the late 19th century, Gothic fiction often involved demons and demonic possession , ghosts , and other kinds of evil spirits . Gothic fiction often moves between " high culture " and " low " or " popular culture ". Gothic literature
19380-520: The mischievous and bloodthirsty shade Amel. Amel grew to love Mekare, becoming her familiar . In time, soldiers sent by Akasha, Queen of Egypt, burned their village and captured the two witches. Coveting their knowledge and power, the Queen imprisoned and tortured the witches for some time; this infuriated the spirit of Amel, who began to haunt Akasha's villages and her nobles. In time, as Akasha's own treacherous noblemen conspired against her and instigated both her murder and that of her husband, King Enkil,
19550-630: The most celebrated Realists, wrote Faust (1856), Phantoms (1864), Song of the Triumphant Love (1881), and Clara Milich (1883). Another classic Russian Realist, Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoyevsky , incorporated Gothic elements into many of his works, although none can be seen as purely Gothic. Grigory Petrovich Danilevsky , who wrote historical and early science fiction novels and stories, wrote Mertvec-ubiytsa ( Dead Murderer ) in 1879. Also, Grigori Alexandrovich Machtet wrote "Zaklyatiy kazak", which may now also be considered Gothic. The 1880s saw
19720-704: The motive of Doppelgänger , a term coined by another German author and supporter of Hoffmann, Jean-Paul , in his humorous novel Siebenkäs (1796–1797). He also wrote an opera based on Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué 's Gothic story Undine (1816), for which de la Motte Fouqué wrote the libretto. Aside from Hoffmann and de la Motte Fouqué, three other important authors from the era were Joseph Freiherr von Eichendorff ( The Marble Statue , 1818), Ludwig Achim von Arnim ( Die Majoratsherren , 1819), and Adelbert von Chamisso ( Peter Schlemihls wundersame Geschichte , 1814). After them, Wilhelm Meinhold wrote The Amber Witch (1838) and Sidonia von Bork (1847). In Spain,
19890-601: The new keeper. Over the course of nearly two millennia, they came to be known in legends as Marius and Those Who Must Be Kept. At some point in time, Maharet returned to her village on Mount Carmel in the guise of a distant family member. She returned periodically over the course of many centuries to keep a record of her descendants, all the way down to Jesse Reeves – one of the last of the Great Family. Rice's vampires differ in many ways from their traditional counterparts such as Dracula . They are unaffected by crucifixes, garlic,
20060-412: The next 200 years. She did not reappear until 1985 (during 1988's The Queen of the Damned .) She was there to help her son fight against Akasha and help save the world. During this time, she developed a slight bond with Marius, but nothing became of it and she drifted away from everyone again. Gabrielle resurfaced for the last time after Memnoch the Devil , in The Vampire Armand (1998) while Lestat
20230-561: The novels. On July 17, 2018, it was announced that the series was in development at streaming service Hulu and that Fuller had departed the production. As of December 2019, Hulu's rights had expired and Rice was shopping a package including all film and TV rights to the series. In May 2020, it was announced that AMC had acquired the rights to The Vampire Chronicles and Lives of the Mayfair Witches for developing film and television projects. Anne and Christopher Rice would serve as executive producers on any projects developed. In June 2021, it
20400-548: The old cemetery with Goblin, Quinn sees a group of ghosts huddled together. Quinn is quite interested in these spirits which fade only to come back again, but as they don't move or talk he simply leaves them, much to the relief of Goblin. Quinn becomes a vampire and fledgling of Petronia. Soon after he is made, Arion (maker of Petronia) gives Quinn his blood so that Quinn is stronger. Arion tells Quinn that they must only feed upon people who have committed evil deeds (the "evil-doer" as they are commonly referred to). Quinn accepts this and
20570-415: The only reason they moved there. Armand later sees her in Paris in the early 19th century. Introduced as the title character of Merrick (2001), Merrick is a member of the Talamasca and is acquainted with David Talbot . Merrick is suddenly contacted by David Talbot, now a vampire , after his "death". He asks her to raise the spirit of Claudia for Louis de Pointe du Lac . Louis wants to know if Claudia
20740-466: The open where he would be burned to death when the sun rose. He nearly succeeds, but he is too old for the sun to end his life. David, Merrick, and Lestat find him and give him their blood to heal his burned form. Their combined blood makes Louis stronger than he had been before. The four then form a coven in New Orleans , but the Talamasca, enraged that three of their members had taken the blood, threaten
20910-551: The political plight of Catholic Ireland subjected to the Protestant Ascendancy. Le Fanu's use of the gloomy villain, forbidding mansion, and persecuted heroine in Uncle Silas (1864) shows direct influence from Walpole's Otranto and Radcliffe's Udolpho . Le Fanu's short story collection In a Glass Darkly (1872) includes the superlative vampire tale Carmilla , which provided fresh blood for that particular strand of
21080-495: The power of ancestral sins to curse future generations, or the fear that they will. M. R. James , an English medievalist whose stories are still popular today, is known as the originator of the "antiquarian ghost story." In Spain, Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer stood out with his romantic poems and short tales, some depicting supernatural events. Today some consider him the most-read Spanish writer after Miguel de Cervantes . In addition to these short Gothic fictions, some novels drew on
21250-667: The priest Pascual Pérez Rodríguez was the most diligent novelist in the Gothic way, closely aligned to the supernatural explained by Ann Radcliffe. At the same time, the poet José de Espronceda published The Student of Salamanca (1837–1840), a narrative poem that presents a horrid variation on the Don Juan legend. In Russia, authors of the Romantic era include Antony Pogorelsky (penname of Alexey Alexeyevich Perovsky), Orest Somov , Oleksa Storozhenko , Alexandr Pushkin , Nikolai Alekseevich Polevoy , Mikhail Lermontov (for his work Stuss ), and Alexander Bestuzhev-Marlinsky . Pushkin
21420-518: The public, who rushed upon it with all the eagerness of curiosity, rose from it with unsated appetite. When a family was numerous, the volumes flew, and were sometimes torn from hand to hand." Radcliffe's novels were often seen as the feminine and rational opposite of a more violently horrifying male Gothic associated with Matthew Lewis . Radcliffe's final novel, The Italian (1797), responded to Lewis's The Monk (1796). Radcliffe and Lewis have been called "the two most significant Gothic novelists of
21590-461: The reader may grasp the heroine's true position: "The heroine possesses the romantic temperament that perceives strangeness where others see none. Her sensibility, therefore, prevents her from knowing that her true plight is her condition, the disability of being female." 'Tis now the very witching time of night, When churchyards yawn, and hell itself breathes out Contagion to this world. Now could I drink hot blood, And do such bitter business as
21760-485: The revival of the Gothic as a powerful literary form allied to fin de siecle , which fictionalized contemporary fears like ethical degeneration and questioned the social structures of the time. Classic works of this Urban Gothic include Robert Louis Stevenson 's Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886), Oscar Wilde 's The Picture of Dorian Gray (1891), George du Maurier 's Trilby (1894), Richard Marsh 's The Beetle (1897), Henry James ' The Turn of
21930-429: The rights to her novels were reverted to her despite earlier plans for other adaptations. Rice said that she and her son Christopher would be developing and executive producing a potential television series based on the novels. In April 2017, they teamed up with Paramount Television and Anonymous Content to develop a series. As of early 2018, Bryan Fuller was involved with the creation of a potential TV series based on
22100-514: The same color. As a mortal, he was an alchemist . He was an old man when he trapped the vampire Benedict in chains and stole the Dark Gift/Blood for himself. That happened at some point during the Middle Ages . According to the "Old Queen" (Allesandra) of Armand's coven in Paris, Magnus was 300 years old when he made Lestat, which would put his year of birth in the late 15th century. Over time, he
22270-407: The same story from Jasmine and her grandmother. Goblin leaves a message on the computer saying he wants Lestat and Merrick gone and that he hates Quinn. Quinn then gives Merrick all the information he can about Goblin so she can get rid of him. Quinn kills Patsy and the ghost of Rebecca appears and is satisfied because he killed her and leaves. Quinn drinks from Lestat so he has enough strength for what
22440-415: The season 2 of the 2022 television series Interview with the Vampire . Introduced in Interview with the Vampire , Madeleine is a human dollmaker whom Louis turns into a vampire at Claudia's request. She and Claudia become very close, and when Claudia is condemned to death by exposure, Madeleine is destroyed with her. She is portrayed by Domiziana Giordano in the 1994 film adaptation and Roxane Duran in
22610-429: The season two of the 2022 television series Interview with the Vampire . Gabrielle is Lestat's mother, introduced in The Vampire Lestat (1985). She is Lestat's first fledgling, and the second to leave him after Nicolas de Lenfent . She has yellow-blond hair like her son's and cobalt-blue eyes with "too small, too kittenish" features, as Lestat described them, that "made her look like a girl". Gabrielle comes from
22780-488: The second night she was in Paris and tried to hide the truth from her, but she found out upon closer inspection of Lestat's changed appearance that he had become a vampire. When Gabrielle began dying right in front of him, a desperate Lestat made her a vampire. Lestat was now the maker, parent, and teacher, while Gabrielle became the fledgling, the child, and the student. Lestat took her to his tower where they lived happily for months. Things changed, however, when Lestat destroyed
22950-502: The series "closed". Later, during a 2012 Q&A in Toronto, Canada, an audience member asked Rice if she would bring any of her old characters back, to which she replied: "I'm not ruling it out. I think it's very possible. I mean, I feel completely open with a new confidence in myself about it. I want to hear what Lestat has to say." On March 10, 2014, Rice announced a new installment of The Vampire Chronicles titled Prince Lestat , calling it
23120-405: The series was renewed for a third season. Interview with the Vampire has received critical acclaim, and is the first television series in Rice's Immortal Universe , based on the works of Anne Rice, with the second entry being the television adaptation of Lives of the Mayfair Witches . Gothic fiction Gothic fiction , sometimes called Gothic horror (primarily in the 20th century),
23290-446: The series, Interview with the Vampire (1976), was made into a 1994 film starring Tom Cruise , Brad Pitt , Antonio Banderas , Christian Slater and Kirsten Dunst . The Queen of the Damned (1988) was adapted into a 2002 film of the same name , starring Stuart Townsend and Aaliyah and using some material from 1985's The Vampire Lestat . In May 2020, AMC acquired the rights to both The Vampire Chronicles and Lives of
23460-634: The sexual outsider." Richard Dyer discusses the recurring homoerotic motifs of vampire fiction in his article "Children of the Night", primarily "the necessity of secrecy, the persistence of a forbidden passion, and the fear of discovery." As of November 2008, The Vampire Chronicles had sold 80 million copies worldwide. Interview with the Vampire was released in November 1994 starring Tom Cruise as Lestat, Brad Pitt as Louis, Kirsten Dunst as Claudia and Antonio Banderas as Armand . A second film, Queen of
23630-450: The spirit of Amel infused into her body as she lay dying. The shade's power and bloodlust roused her from death – reborn as the first immortal. After siring her spouse as well, Akasha and Enkil became known as the Divine Parents. To punish the twins for standing against her, the Queen had Maharet's eyes torn out and Mekare's tongue severed. Before they were to be executed, the steward Khayman sired them both out of pity. Together they formed
23800-444: The spirit of Claudia. When Merrick meets Louis, they fall in love, more or less. After the ceremony, Louis and Merrick express a desire to talk and David goes out. The next night he finds that Merrick has been made into a vampire by Louis. Merrick later confesses to David, Louis, and Lestat that it is what she's wanted ever since she found out about what happened to David. She also revealed that her ancestors had visited her dreams with
23970-902: The story of young Tarquin Blackwood as he enlists Lestat and Merrick to help him banish a spirit named Goblin. 2003's Blood Canticle intertwines the vampire, Blackwood and Mayfair storylines, and was intended by Rice to conclude the series. Prince Lestat (2014) rejoins the remaining vampires a decade later as Lestat faces pressure to lead them. Prince Lestat and the Realms of Atlantis (2016) and Blood Communion (2018) continued this new narrative thread. In her review of The Vampire Lestat (1985) The New York Times critic Michiko Kakutani noted, "We learn lots of 'facts' about vampires and vampire culture. We learn that they cry tears of blood, that they're capable of reading other people's minds, that they can be destroyed by fire and sunlight. We learn that 'no vampire may ever destroy another vampire, except that
24140-468: The story. The buildings in The Castle of Otranto , for example, are riddled with tunnels that characters use to move back and forth in secret. This movement mirrors the secrets surrounding Manfred's possession of the castle and how it came into his family. From the castles, dungeons , forests, and hidden passages of the Gothic novel genre emerged female Gothic. Guided by the works of authors such as Ann Radcliffe , Mary Shelley , and Charlotte Brontë ,
24310-492: The sun in the Gobi Desert , he visits David. He also seeks advice from David when Raglan James offers to switch bodies with him, though he doesn't listen to what David has to say. David helps Lestat regain his body. In the struggle with Raglan James, David switches into a much younger body, described as that of an Anglo-Indian with dark brown hair, while Lestat returns to his preternatural body. Lestat kills David's old body, which
24480-644: The supernatural. Novels such as The Bride of Lammermoor (1819), in which the characters' fates are decided by superstition and prophecy , or the poem Marmion (1808), in which a nun is walled alive inside a convent, illustrate Scott's influence and use of Gothic themes. A late example of a traditional Gothic novel is Melmoth the Wanderer (1820) by Charles Maturin , which combines themes of anti-Catholicism with an outcast Byronic hero. Jane C. Loudon 's The Mummy! (1827) features standard Gothic motifs, characters, and plot, but with one significant twist; it
24650-419: The title character, who also happens to be part of the Mayfairs. In this book, Merrick raises the spirit of Claudia for Louis. In the end, it is revealed that Merrick has been using Vodou to bring both David and Louis to her so she can attain eternal life. This plan works, as Louis gives her the blood and makes her immortal. After he makes Merrick his fledgling, he tries to commit suicide by placing his coffin in
24820-473: The transfer of vampirism to a human the "Dark Gift", and refer to the vampire bestowing it as the "maker" and the new vampire as a "fledgling". In ancient times vampires formed a religion-like cult , and in the Middle Ages, believing themselves cursed, dwelt in catacombs under cemeteries in covens which emphasized darkness and their own cursed state. Vampires are largely solitary; Lestat's "family" of 80 years
24990-459: The transgressive and dangerous attempts to subvert and escape such restriction. Emily Brontë's Cathy and Charlotte Brontë 's Jane Eyre are examples of female protagonists in such roles. Louisa May Alcott 's Gothic potboiler, A Long Fatal Love Chase (written in 1866 but published in 1995), is also an interesting specimen of this subgenre. Charlotte Brontë's Villette also shows the Gothic influence, with its supernatural subplot featuring
25160-1144: The undead were originally human. To sire a fledgling, a maker must feed upon a victim to the point of death. The attacker must then offer their own blood for the mortal to drink. After their body expires, they resurrect as a newborn immortal. Fledglings retain all the memories and mannerisms they had in life, however these usually fade or change over time as they acclimate to their new existence. Many young vampires experience existential crises or crippling depression as they learn to cope with their isolated nature. Within Rice's mythology, vampires possess certain paranormal abilities known as gifts. For younger undead, these gifts usually manifest in subtle ways. For older immortals – particularly ancient ones – these manifest as potent displays of both magic and their own inhuman natures. As vampires age, they become both stronger as well as more unnatural and statuesque in their appearance. Their demeanor usually becomes more tempered and calculating, even moreso as their more potent gifts manifest; which further distances them from their former human sentiments. The series creates its own terminology: vampires call
25330-463: The vampires and demand that Merrick, David, and Jesse return to them. Lestat wants to retaliate against the Talamasca, but David talks him out of doing anything rash, and the four leave their home in the Rue Royal. Jesse is a modern-day descendant of the ancient vampire Maharet , portrayed by Marguerite Moreau in the 2002 film Queen of the Damned . Introduced in The Vampire Armand (1998), Bianca
25500-518: The wake of Aunt Queen, Quinn is alone as Lestat has gone to find Merrick Mayfair . Quinn notices Petronia there who has left Aunt Queen a cameo. Quinn also witnesses the ghost of Julien Mayfair who warns him against turning Mona into a vampire. Quinn leaves after seeing Rowan and Stirling Oliver arrive. Quinn is accompanied by Lestat and Merrick to the funeral where he speaks about Aunt Queen, as do many people. Also, Quinn, out of habit, goes up to receive communion, and Lestat and Merrick follow him. After
25670-418: The way to talk about life; they were a way to talk about reality, actually." She also noted that writing about them had been, to her, "a sort of search for God and a kind of grief for a lost faith." The homoerotic overtones of The Vampire Chronicles are also well-documented. Susan Ferraro of The New York Times wrote that "Gay readers see in the vampires' lonely, secretive search for others of their kind
25840-551: The wine cups of those whom her kinsmen want dead. Bianca is a renowned Venetian courtesan when Marius comes to know her. Marius immediately falls in love with her and becomes obsessed with her, contemplating making her a vampire. A few years after the two meet, Armand arrives on the scene and also falls in love with Bianca. The three form an amiable sort of love triangle before the Children of Darkness, led by Santino , destroy Marius's palazzo , burn Marius, and take away Armand. After
26010-597: The young Merrick is taken in by David Talbot and Aaron Lightner and the Talamasca. As she grows her power increases and she studies to learn all that she can. She goes to high school and a university. Meantime she bonds with David and Aaron. When she is an adult she returns to become a full member of the Talamasca. When David suddenly dies, she knows something is not right and Aaron tells her nothing. When she says farewell to David's dead body her suspicions are confirmed. She decides to find papers where information about David has been filed. Merrick finds out that David has helped
26180-412: Was Horace Walpole 's The Castle of Otranto (1764). The first edition presented the story as a translation of a sixteenth-century manuscript and was widely popular. Walpole, in the second edition, revealed himself as the author which adding the subtitle "A Gothic Story." The revelation prompted a backlash from readers, who considered it inappropriate for a modern author to write a supernatural story in
26350-602: Was a notable Gothic writer, and converted from Catholicism to Anglicanism. In Switzerland, Jeremias Gotthelf wrote The Black Spider (1842), an allegorical work that uses Gothic themes. The last work from the German writer Theodor Storm , The Rider on the White Horse (1888), also uses Gothic motives and themes. After Gogol, Russian literature saw the rise of Realism, but many authors continued to write stories within Gothic fiction territory. Ivan Sergeyevich Turgenev , one of
26520-422: Was also very influential among Gothic writers, who were especially drawn to the tragic anti-hero character Satan , who became a model for many charismatic Gothic villains and Byronic heroes . Milton's "version of the myth of the fall and redemption, creation and decreation, is, as Frankenstein again reveals, an important model for Gothic plots." Alexander Pope , who had a considerable influence on Walpole,
26690-457: Was an aesthetic to tie the elements together. Bloom notes that this aesthetic must take the form of a theoretical or philosophical core, which is necessary to "sav[e] the best tales from becoming mere anecdote or incoherent sensationalism." In this case, the aesthetic needed to be emotional, and was finally provided by Edmund Burke 's 1757 work, A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of
26860-556: Was announced that AMC had given a series order for Interview with the Vampire , an eight-episode television adaptation of the novel. The project is executive produced by Rolin Jones and Mark Johnson . The series premiered on AMC on October 2, 2022, starring Sam Reid as Lestat, and Jacob Anderson as Louis. Interview with the Vampire was renewed for an eight-episode second season in September 2022, ahead of its premiere on AMC. In June 2024,
27030-611: Was cold and uncaring to everyone. She was the only person who was educated in her family and read her books every day, yet lacked the patience to teach her sons to read or write anything. Over the years she sold two of her heirloom jewels from an Italian grandmother to aid Lestat, the only person she loved and cared for. She lived life through him; he was the male part of her. She suffered a rapidly declining health due to bad winters and multiple childbirths. It eventually developed into tuberculosis . She funded Lestat's trip to Paris with Nicolas by giving him gold coins and advising him to hitch
27200-571: Was driven mad by his vampiric nature and his immortality. Before killing himself, he sought an heir to inherit the immense wealth that he had accumulated over the years. Magnus searched for years for an heir, with no success. In his dungeon, he had hundreds of decomposing bodies stored in a room, the discarded remains of his search for a suitable heir. Every one of these candidates had blond hair and blue eyes, just as Lestat does. After choosing Lestat as his heir and giving him explicit instructions to scatter his ashes after he had burned up, Magnus leaped into
27370-400: Was his birthday party when he was 3 years old which is also the first instance known of Goblin being able to physically touch Quinn by pushing his hand and forcing him to ruin a birthday cake. He is given a harmonica for his birthday by his grandfather, Pops which he loves to play although Goblin hates it because Quinn pays him no attention whilst playing it. At the age of 7, whilst playing in
27540-473: Was in his catatonic sleep. In the 2006 musical , Lestat , Gabrielle was portrayed by Carolee Carmello who was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Musical for her role. Introduced in The Vampire Lestat , Akasha is the progenitor of all vampires. The queen of Kemet (Egypt) circa 5000 BC, Akasha and her husband Enkil are plagued by the evil spirit Amel. During an assassination attempt on Akasha and Enkil, Amel enters
27710-455: Was introduced in Interview with the Vampire (1976), and has been portrayed by Tom Cruise in the 1994 film Interview with the Vampire ; Stuart Townsend in the 2002 film Queen of the Damned ; and by Sam Reid in the 2022 television series Interview with the Vampire . Louis is a Frenchman made a vampire in New Orleans by Lestat, introduced in Interview with the Vampire (1976). Louis
27880-472: Was made into a vampire by Magnus , and inherited near-inexhaustible wealth when Magnus killed himself in a bonfire. He repaid those who helped him with gold and indulged in his new-found wealth. To hide the truth from Gabrielle, Lestat told her tales of going to the Bahamas , marrying a rich woman, and coming into vast wealth. Intrigued, she went to Paris to see her son before she died. Lestat went to see his mother
28050-548: Was not merely in literature that a medieval revival made itself felt, and this, too, contributed to a culture ready to accept a perceived medieval work in 1764. The Gothic often uses scenery of decay, death, and morbidity to achieve its effects (especially in the Italian Horror school of Gothic). However, Gothic literature was not the origin of this tradition; it was far older. The corpses, skeletons, and churchyards so commonly associated with early Gothic works were popularized by
28220-518: Was productive of both Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, or, The Modern Prometheus (1818), and Polidori's short story " The Vampyre " (1819), featuring the Byronic Lord Ruthven . "The Vampyre" has been accounted by cultural critic Christopher Frayling as one of the most influential works of fiction ever written and spawned a craze for vampire fiction and theatre (and, latterly, film) that has not ceased to this day. Although clearly influenced by
28390-572: Was published unfinished upon his death in 1870. The mood and themes of the Gothic novel held a particular fascination for the Victorians, with their obsession with mourning rituals, mementos , and mortality in general. Irish Catholics also wrote Gothic fiction in the 19th century. Although some Anglo-Irish dominated and defined the subgenre decades later, they did not own it. Irish Catholic Gothic writers included Gerald Griffin , James Clarence Mangan , and John and Michael Banim . William Carleton
28560-424: Was suffering, which all new vampires do due to their new nature. Rowan is a Mayfair witch who appears in the novels The Witching Hour (1990), Lasher (1993), Taltos (1994), Blackwood Farm (2002) and Blood Canticle (2003). Mona is a Mayfair witch who appears in the novels The Witching Hour (1990), Lasher (1993), Taltos (1994), Blackwood Farm (2002) and Blood Canticle (2003). She
28730-603: Was the American Edgar Allan Poe , who wrote numerous short stories and poems reinterpreting Gothic tropes. His story " The Fall of the House of Usher " (1839) revisits classic Gothic tropes of aristocratic decay, death, and insanity . Poe is now considered the master of the American Gothic. In England, one of the most influential penny dreadfuls is the anonymously authored Varney the Vampire (1847), which introduced
28900-463: Was the first significant poet of the 18th century to write a poem in an authentic Gothic manner. Eloisa to Abelard (1717), a tale of star-crossed lovers, one doomed to a life of seclusion in a convent, and the other in a monastery, abounds in gloomy imagery, religious terror, and suppressed passion. The influence of Pope's poem is found throughout 18th-century Gothic literature, including the novels of Walpole, Radcliffe, and Lewis. Gothic literature
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