Vampires Evolution

In today’s society, vampires have completely inundated literature and media. Movies, television shows, books, magazines, music, and fashion are just some aspects of culture that have been influenced by vampires. Some wonder why this trend has been brought about, and the answer is quite simple; the humanization of the vampire. What was once a character completely determined on torturing and destroying humans in order for sustenance and entertainment, the vampire has now been revolutionized and given more human qualities such as the abilities to feel guilty and to feel love. The process of the vampire turning from a solely evil creature to a demon trying to escape his or her fate did not just occur over night. This study proposes to explain the evolution of vampires in literature and media for the purpose of examining how the characterization of vampires has changed throughout history.
Depictions of the Evil Vampire
In order to truly understand the evolution of the characteristics of vampires over time, one must start at the beginning. For many centuries, vampires were the stars of various legends that were passed down from generation to generation. In his book, Russian Fairy Tales,W.R.S. Ralston shares and analyzes the old folklore “The Soldier and the Vampire.” In this story the warlock (the term used for vampires at this time) wreaks havoc amongst the villages of Russia and shares his gruesome secrets with a soldier, intending to kill him in the end in order to protect himself. Yet, the soldier ends up killing the warlock properly and restoring peace to the town. (Ralston, 2007) This story, like many others that were passed down in Eastern Europe, portrays the warlock/vampire as an evil creature of the dead intent on preying on innocent villagers. Ralston notes that although each tale may differ in its grisly description of the warlock/vampire, all of them have one thing in common: the importance of the warlock/ vampire drinking the blood of its victim. (Ralston, 2007) Through the various descriptions of vampires described in these folktales, it is clear that vampires were originally thought of as foul and ghastly creatures with no positive human characteristics.
Russian fairytales were not the only literary sources that described vampires as evil creatures. In J.P. Telotte’s analysis of John Polidori’s The Vampyre and how it relates to the Romantic Era of literature, Telotte goes into detail about the attributes and traits of Lord Ruthven, Polidori’s main vampire. He states that Lord Ruthven is bound to earth and a constant round of repetitions of its gruesome life…(and that by) feeding upon the living, to sustain its unnatural existence, it suggests a fundamental perversion of normal human participation in the world. (Telotte, 1999) From Telotte’s assertion it is quite apparent that vampires during the Romantic Period of literature remained as wicked, unnatural creatures that terrorized human societies.
One of the most iconic vampires of history is Bram Stoker’s Dracula. While Dracula is an immortal and immoral being with no regard for human emotions, he is not as physically offensive as his vampire brethren of the past were. As Elisabeth Johansson discusses in “A Domesticated Vampire: How the Vampire Myth has Changed since Bram Stoker’s Dracula to Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight,” Stoker created a vampire that was a pleasant gentleman, dressed in a cape, but his appearance still infuse(d) respect and fear.  (Johansson, 2010) Though humans in Dracula’s world were not able to outright detect he was vampire from his physical appearance, they knew through internal instincts that they were dealing with a powerful being when they were in his presence. While vampires’ physical attributes were evolving slowly over time through different modes of literature, their personality traits were still remaining the same, and would do so until the twentieth century.
Not only did vampires remain evil in literature for a long period of time, but they were also portrayed that way in their early film debuts. The journal article “Vampires in Film and Television” states how early vampire films stayed true to the original vampire characters found in novels such as Dracula. Pictures from the article, one depicting a vampire with a defined stance in a long, black cape, and another with a vampire staring lustfully at another person, clearly show that early vampire stars based their appearances and acting skills off of older vampires in literature. (Heldreth, 1999) Vampires in film during the early 1900’s to 1970’s were living incarnations of the early vampires in literature. These films proved that the vampire did not evolve in just a few short years, but changed slightly over years of time.
From the earliest vampire myths to the short stories, novels, and films created nineteenth  and early to mid twentieth centuries, vampires had changed very little. While they may have physically become a little less gruesome, they still exhibited certain traits that defined them as otherworldly. Yet, their personality traits never seemed to evolve much over this time. They were still terribly evil and were incapable of feeling human emotions. Yet, as time progressed, so did the vampire.
The Humanization of the Vampire
The twentieth and twenty-first centuries were the time periods where the real evolution of vampires occurred. Not only did vampires’ physical appearances alter to make them even more human-like and more attractive, but also their mind and psyche also changed and they developed human feelings and emotions. One of the greatest forerunners of the humanization of vampires was, and still is, author Anne Rice. The article “New Life for an Old Tradition: Anne Rice and Vampire Literature,” written by Martin J. Wood explains how Rice took a new approach to telling a classic legend. Rice’s vampires question where they come from and why they were placed into existence. They seek out to make new vampires only from those who have higher thinking capacities and are physically attractive. Not only do they get angry, but they can be happy or upset as well. What Rice successfully does is integrate aspects of the old vampires, i.e. the needing to drain humans of their blood in order to survive, with human emotions, and creates vampires that people can identify and sympathize with. (Wood, 1999) Thus, Rice created a brand new trend in vampire literature and media, opening the door for many new writers in both literature and film to create their own creation with the newly humanized vampires.   
The most recent and notable contribution to vampire literature is Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight Saga series. Meyer’s series has taken the evolution of the vampire to a whole new level. Marika Sjöqvist explores the humanization of Edward Cullen, the lead vampire of the story, in her report “The Vampire as both a Segregated and an Integrated Other Discussing Humanisation of the Vampire in Twilight contrasting Dracula.” Sjöqvist affirms that Edward Cullen and his family are humanlike because they act as a family unit. The characters in the family are able to take on human identities, with the “father” becoming a doctor and the “children” posing as students. (Sjöqvist, 2010) Vampires being portrayed as genuine family units and integrating themselves amongst human society differs from the original vampire folklores where vampires were tearing families apart all by themselves.
Sjöqvist further asserts her point by quoting from Joan and Veronica Hollinger’s book Blood Read: The VAMPIRE as Metaphor in Contemporary Culture. They stated, “Dracula was confined to a narrow range of activities; to kill and to plan to kill. The new vampires can be art lovers or rock stars or even police detectives, and this communal condition permits them to love, to regret, to doubt, to question themselves, to experience interior conflicts and cross- impulses.” (Sjöqvist, 2010) It is clearly stated and supported in this article that the completely wicked vampires of the past are fading away, and the humanlike vampires of the present, with their questions, dreams, and emotions are taking over the literature scene.
Not only have vampires been humanized through literature in the twenty and twenty-first centuries, but television shows and movies have also played a major role in this trend. In his article “Vampires better looking, thanks to Hollywood,” Steve Wood asserts that Hollywood has helped to remake the gruesome vampires of legends into the good-looking, healthy vampires of today. (Wood, 2008) By making vampires even more human-like or even god-like in appearance, and making sure they have some human personality traits as well, movie directors are aiding to the hysteria over vampires.
Wood also conducted an interview with a young woman who explained how the change of vampires has made them even more appealing to the masses. This young woman stated, “They (vampires) were people to begin with. They just let their human side out, which is kind of scary. All of their emotions are heightened. It's just making a human 10 times stronger in their emotions and feelings.” (Wood 2008) Although vampires have always been undead creatures with human origins, they never let those old human qualities that were buried deep inside themselves out until literature, film, and television allowed them to evolve.
In the report “The Modern Vampire Phenomenon Paradox: Simultaneous Contradictions and Unlimited Limits,” Jessica Landers identifies the clear alterations of the characteristics of vampires over history in literature, television, and film. She explains that nowadays, vampires are often conflicted about where their place in society lies. Many modern vampires do not fit in with the typical vampire crowd because they have decided to go “vegetarian,” meaning they forgo drinking human blood. Instead, some vampires decide to drink animal blood, as the vampires in the popular book and television series The Vampire Diaries do, or drink synthetic blood, as some of the vampires in the television series True Blood do. Yet, the vampires do not completely fit in with human society because of their supernatural abilities. Not being able to fit into a specific group leads the modern vampires to question whether or not they are more human and inherently good or more demonic and inherently evil. (Landers, 2011) The clear portrayal of vampires as otherworldly beings with human tendencies in books, television series, and films emphasizes how vampires have developed gradually over time. Because of their progression into humanity, vampires have become more popular in today’s culture than they ever were before.
Conclusion
As the literature clearly shows, vampires have evolved from being portrayed as vicious, bloodsucking, and soulless demons into supernatural beings whose human characteristics are at war with their wicked demonic traits. In their early origins and myths, vampires started out as repugnant, undead beings that tormented villagers, and ravaged communities. As time went on, vampires started to be portrayed in literature as physically human creatures, who were inherently evil, and could not comprehend human emotion. In the twenty and twenty-first centuries however, vampires were humanized throughout various types of literature, movies, and televisions shows, allowing these creatures to display human emotions and feelings, and creating a new sense of confusion, guilt, and internal conflict for these characters. Through this analysis, it is undoubtedly clear that throughout the characterization of vampires has changed within various forms of literature and media throughout history.

References
Heldreth, L.G. (1999). Vampires in film and television. Journal of Popular Film & Television, 27(2), Retrieved from EBSCOhost.

Johansson, E. (2010). A domesticated vampire- How the vampire myth has changed since Bram Stoker’s Dracula to Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight. Lulea University of Technology, Department of Language and Culture.

Landers, J. (2011). The modern vampire phenomenon paradox: Simultaneous contradictions and unlimited limits. Rutgers the State University of New Jersey, Department of Women’s and Gender Studies.

Ralston, W.R.S. (2007). The soldier and the vampire. In W.R.S. Ralston (Ed.), Russian Fairy Tales (pp. 210-215).

Sjöqvist, M. (2010). The vampire as both a segregated and an integrated other: Discussing humanisation of the vampire in Twilight contrasting Dracula. Gothenberg University, Department of Languages and Literature/English.

Telotte, J.P. (1999). A parasitic perspective: Romantic participation and Polidori’s The Vampyre. In L.G. Heldreth (Ed.), The blood is the life: Vampires in literature (pp.9-18). Popular Press.

Wood, M.J. (1999). New life for an old tradition: Anne Rice and vampire literature. In L.G. Heldreth (Ed.), The blood is the life: Vampires in literature (pp.59-78). Popular Press.

Wood, S. (2008, October 31). Vampires better looking, thanks to Hollywood. Deseret News, p. W.8, Retrieved from ProQuest Newsstand. (Document ID: 1586608021).