The Vampyre - A Tale
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Lord Ruthven is a mysterious newcomer among England’s social elite. A young gentleman named Aubrey is fascinated by the suave stranger and is intrigued by his often curious behaviour. While travelling in Europe amid rumours of vampire killings, the pair are attacked, leaving Ruthven on his deathbed. As he draws his last breaths, he pleads with Aubrey to keep his death a secret for just over a year. When Ruthven reappears in London alive and well, Aubrey realises that his friend might be hiding dark and horrifying truths behind his seductive fabrication.
The Vampyre was written during the ‘Lost Summer of 1816’, when John William Polidori was among the group of friends who accompanied Lord Byron to the Villa Diodati on Lake Geneva. This short, stormy stay in the mansion led to a horror story writing competition in which famous tales such as Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein were first produced.
Decadent, sinister, and macabre, The Vampyre started the enduring fascination with bloodsucking monsters that produced stories such as Bram Stoker’s Dracula. This chilling tale is not to be missed by lovers of fantasy and horror fiction.
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John William Polidori (1795–1821) was an English writer and physician, known for his involvement in the Romantic literary movement. Credited by some as the creator of the vampire genre, his novella ‘The Vampyre’ (1819) was the first modern vampire story. The text was written in the summer of 1816, as a result of a horror writing competition between himself and his literary friends. The same competition produced Mary Shelley’s ‘Frankenstein’ (1818).
