This page I dedicate to vampires and their unwilling role in Western culture.
About vampires, there are dozains of stories, dozains of theories. Here on the Internet there are people alive and undead who say to be vampires. Maybe. I'd welcome it. Though I must say it also depends on the "current" they're in. Ricean, or plain bloodsuckers without (vampiric) morals or even more real. At this site used to be a vampire dating list. There are also vampire newsgroups, such as alt.culture.vampires and alt.vampyres
"The essence of vampires, who normally do their definitive work on wedding nights, is the
pollution of natural kinds. They, like me, are praeternatural, counternatural. The existence of
vampires tropes the purity of lineage, boundary of community, order of sex, closure of race, and
clarity of gender.
From the point of view of the sources of my WASP culture, vampires are ambiguous (and therefore
dangerous)- like capital, genes, viruses, transsexuals, Jews, gypsies, prostitutes, or anybody else
who can figure corporate mixing in a rapidly changing culture that remains obsessed with purity. No
wonder queer theorists and novelists alike find the vampire to be familiar kin." [Long quote from
Donna Haraway, Modest_Witness@Second_Millennium; why rephrase the best characterization to something less eloquent after all]
Since this is my site, this is the opportunity to tell what I hold of vampires. And I want to
make clear the link between vampires and vreers. Maybe werewolves would do also. I like stories about
them also. Pam Keesey has collected some nice stories on "Women who run with the werewolves". I
actually like all stories about transformation.
With vampires it is just for a small part the
transformation stuff. It is more the outsider; I associate with the one who sees things many others
don't. I might fall in love with Lestat, might I meet him, seductive creature he is told to be.
One day when I was dancing with a beautiful girl, I experienced the urge to nibble at her
jugular. I resisted because of several practical arguments: my teeth aren't sharp, nor did I carry a
pen knife, I would upset her and if I'd really try, I probably would be in for some serious trouble.
Nevertheless from time to time the urge falls on me. A few years after my love and I had our vampire
marriage... Maybe at gothic parties I might stand some chance.
In
"Captain, Oh my Captain" Katherine V. Forrest tells of captain Harper, vampire of the future
cruising the galaxies like the Flying Dutchman, seducing her female colleagues. Maybe that is a
perspective?
Vampires are a protected species with civil rights and someone is killing them off. Anita Blake, private eye and raiser of the dead, is hired to look in to this
Contains two brilliant stories: "Anita, Polish Vampire, Holds forth at the Cafe of the Dead" (Judith Katz) and the spooky "The last train" (Linda K. Wright). The first about a woman who comes to see Anita L:ipsky at the Jewish Cafe of the Dead full of Draculan sphere.
With classical stories like "Carmilla" (Sheridan LeFanu), "The Vampire" (Pat Califia) or "O Captain my Captain" (Katherine V. Forrest). Featuring also a tongue in cheek story "Ms. Dracula", visiting The Harkers.
New collected stories, some very nice like "Wanting" and "Presence".
A black slave girl survives throught he times with a gentle though vampiric gift trying to make human life good also for those she meets
Several stories about women, werewolves, changing, their desires turn them literally into animals. Tales of transformation, delicious stuff for transformers like me.