The Vampyre & Dracula

The Vampyre was written by John William Polidori in 1819. Polidori was born in 1795 and died in 1821.

He was invited to be the travelling companion of Lord Byron, who was leaving England for a continental tour of Europe in the spring of 1816. In Geneva they were joined by Claire Clairmont, Mary Godwin and Percy Bysshe Shelley.

“Lord Byron abhorred the

vampire yet ironically has

ever since bee its literary

counterpart.” — Seán

Manchester (First edition

of The Highgate Vampire)

Several days later, during stormy weather which limited their movements, Byron suggested that each person begin a ghost story, and read tales from Fantasmagoriana to inspire the group. Mary Godwin was the only person who took Byron's proposal really seriously. Her tale eventually developed into the novel Frankenstein.

Polidori kept a journal of his experiences in Europe, plus a synopsis of Byron's story. He took the plot of Byron's summer tale and developed it into a short story of his own, ie The Vampyre, which was published in the April 1819 issue of New Monthly magazine.

The choice of the name of his vampire, Lord Ruthven, was, of course, the appellation chosen by Byron's former lover, Lady Caroline Lamb, to lampoon the celebrated poet in her novel Glenarvon.

The Vampyre was published under Lord Byron's name, which caused its initial success and probably much more attention than it would otherwise have received or rightly deserve. The May issue of the New Monthly magazine carried Polidori's explanation of the circumstances surrounding the writing of The Vampyre.

Bram (Abraham) Stoker was born on 8 November 1847 in Dublin, Ireland. His father was a civil servant and his mother was a charity worker and writer. Stoker was a sickly child and spent a lot of time confined to his bed. Growing up his mother told him many gothic horror stories. Stoker studied Mathematics at Trinity College Dublin and graduated in 1867. After graduation he became a civil servant. During this time he also worked as a freelance journalist, a drama critic and was editor of the Evening Mail. In 1876 he met Sir Henry Irving, a famous actor. Stoker accepted the job of personal secretary to Irving and went to England in 1878. Before he left Ireland he published his first book: The Duties of Clerks of Petty Sessions in Ireland in 1878. While working for Irving he met an aspiring actress named Florence Balcombe. They were married 1878 and had one son, Noel, born 1879. In England Stoker also began writing a series of novels and short stories the first of which was The Snake's Pass. Although best known for Dracula, Stoker wrote eighteen books before he died in 1912. Dracula was thoroughly researched using works of non-fiction about folklore and vampirism. He also visited Highgate Cemetery on innumerable occasions where he took tea in the afternoon. He would have been aware of tales of the hobbs, ghosts and demons that abounded in previous years. Not surprisingly, perhaps, he fortuitously set the Westenra Tomb in the Western Cemetery at Highgate ~ the very section that was later identified as having a vampire contagion. However, the truth is invariably stranger than fiction, as Stoker undoubtedly knew. Hence his greatest novel has become one of the most read books in the world. Bram Stoker died at the age of 64 of exhaustion.

Seán Manchester dedicated his novel ~ Carmel ~ to Bram Stoker. It is the completion and, of course, sequel to Dracula. Stoker left many loose ends in his gothic masterpiece that are resolved within the pages of Carmel, a book which also draws on fact ~ especially regarding the Highgate Vampire case. There might even be a further work, which goes beyond Dracula and even Carmel. Set in the 21st century, this final book witnesses the advent of the Antichrist.