The Vampire: A Literary History

Since Goethe’s romantic ballad “The Bride of Corinth,” the vampire has occupied one of the most prominent places in the gallery of aesthetic horror. Even before Goethe, the vampire was closely tied to the German-speaking world through numerous medical and philosophical treatises of the early Enlightenment. This is why Bram Stoker’s landmark novel “Dracula” starts with Jonathan Harker quoting a German ghost ballad and the Count speaking his first words in German. The vampire seems to reflect certain features of German thought and literature, as well as international perceptions of German culture. The seminar aims to explore these connections through texts by Johann Flückinger (“Official Report on the Vampires,” 1732), Michael Ranft (“Treatise on the Chewing and Smacking of the Dead in Graves,” 1734), Goethe (“The Bride of Corinth,” 1797), Novalis (“Hymns to the Night,” 1799/1800), Lord Byron (“Fragment of a Novel,” 1816), E. T. A. Hoffmann (“Vampyrism,” 1821), Le Fanu (“Carmilla,” 1872), and Stoker (“Dracula,” 1897). Films to be examined include F. W. Murnau’s “Nosferatu” (1922), Roman Polanski’s “Dance of the Vampires” (1967) and Werner Herzog’s “Nosferatu the Vampyre.”