Erik Butler. Metamorphoses of the in Literature and Film: Cultural Transformations in Europe, 1732-1933. Rochester: Camden House, 2010. ix + 225 pp. $75.00, cloth, ISBN 978-1-57113-432-5.

Reviewed by Svitlana Krys

Published on H-Russia (June, 2017)

Commissioned by Hanna Chuchvaha (University of Calgary)

Erik Butler’s monograph traces the develop‐ The monograph traces the vampire’s move ment of the vampire fgure in western European from the folklore of eastern and central Europe to intellectual thought, from its eighteenth-century the literature and flm of western Europe and the emergence in the so-called vampire epidemic in Americas in three chronological parts. The frst Austria-controlled Serbia to its frst appearance part considers the vampire epidemic among the on the screen in post-World War I Germany. He peasants in central Europe and its frst, often sees the vampire frst and foremost as a modern satiric and highly metaphorical, portrayal in the fgure brought in by the Enlightenment in Europe literature of the Enlightenment and Romantic pe‐ that serves to explain, on a symbolic level, various riods. The second part analyzes the vampire’s two issues raised by the age of modernity. The period iconic presentations in British Gothic literature included a changing social and political order (the that brought angst to intellectual readers in west‐ Industrial and French Revolutions, the rise of the ern Europe because they depicted the vampire’s middle class, etc.), shifting borderlands, the suf‐ threat as being real and close to home: Lord frage movement, and changing gender and family Ruthven of John Polidori’s short story “The roles, as well as questions of sexuality, venereal Vampyre” (1819) and of Bram Stoker’s disease, and madness that came to the fore at the eponymous novel from 1897. The third part fol‐ turn of the century following the development of lows the vampire’s appearance in German expres‐ psychoanalysis. His monograph succeeds in ren‐ sionist flms of the Weimar period and in works of dering a thorough, multifaceted portrayal of the a psychoanalytic nature. The book has an intro‐ vampire and explains its persistence as a potent duction and a lengthy conclusion that ofers a cultural symbol that came to address a number of brief overview of the development of vampire fears and anxieties in a society going through narrative in the United States from Bela Lugosi’s changes. The vampire still functions in that re‐ famous portrayal of in the 1931 gard today, as Butler’s conclusion shows. Overall, Hollywood flm to today’s teenage vampire sagas. Metamorphoses of the Vampire in Literature and Part 1 argues that the vampire entered the Film employs various critical lenses (postcolonial, Western intellectual discourse at a time of disrup‐ Marxist, gender, cultural studies, and psychoanal‐ tive political events in central Europe that ysis) to uncover “the logic underlying the vam‐ brought about an increasing mixture of cultures pire’s many and conficting forms” (p. vii). and religions due to unstable borders and shifting H-Net Reviews control of the territories. It is ftting that Serbia, a Butler argues that the various low-brow imita‐ borderland fought over by the Ottoman and Aus‐ tions of Polidori’s vampire in French and English trian Empires, gave rise to this phenomenon. Ac‐ popular theaters signifed the need of the masses cording to Butler, the vampire shows a disturbed for catharsis because societal tensions associated social balance, oscillating between peace (life) with a changing and modernizing society had and war (death) and marked by constant struggle, brought about a diferent work order and had im‐ and competing religious systems added to the in‐ pacted the family structure, which resulted in creased tension in the region. Christianity was at confusion and the need for a scapegoat. It is inter‐ war with Islam and there were inner tensions esting that the book does not include a chapter on within Christianity itself—Orthodoxy was fol‐ Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla (1871–72)—even lowed by the peasants, Catholicism was supported though it mentions the book feetingly throughout by the imperial Austrian government, and a com‐ the text—inasmuch as it is a telling tale of the Vic‐ peting Protestantism encroached from the Ger‐ torian fear of the “New Woman” and her thirst for man north. This united the village community power (as seen through her sufragist demands) against the aggressive foreigner, be it the Austrian and served as a major inspiration for Dracula. or the Ottoman, whom the villagers symbolically While the Napoleonic era was followed by peace‐ tried to get rid of through a scapegoating exercise ful times in Europe, the British Empire’s expan‐ (here, a sacrifce of the alleged vampire, an equal‐ sionist tendencies generated another anxiety— ly foreign and hostile entity). At the time when the that of the “Other” and reverse colonization, as vampire entered the written record, the intellec‐ exhibited by Stoker’s Dracula. Stoker’s novel also tuals of western Europe saw it as a backward su‐ refects societal tensions that arose out of “con‐ perstition of illiterate peasants, but later on, it be‐ sumerist mass culture … [and] the … electrically came a handy metaphorical term to be applied driven forms of communication” (p. 109) brought satirically in the age of rationalism to express about by industrial progress, and fear of homo‐ scorn for the “unclear pedigree of newly ascen‐ sexuality, which threatened the heterosexual dant parties in political and economic afairs” (p. Christian norms of the English bourgeoisie. Butler 54) or to attack politicians for their greedy and contends that, as a result, Dracula became the em‐ ruthless practices (e.g., raising taxes). The age of bodiment of England’s “domestic worries” and a Romanticism, however, added depth and humani‐ mirror through which the empire saw its “evil” ty to this still faceless and strictly symbolic fgure, (colonial) deeds abroad (p. 117). imbuing it with self-doubt, alienation, and tor‐ Part 3 turns to Daniel Paul Schreber’s Mem‐ ture, which the vampire now paradoxically oirs of My Nervous Illness (1903), a German work placed not only on his victims, but also on him‐ of memoirs that was written around the same self, becoming a tormented Byronic fgure. time as Stoker’s Dracula. The memoirs present a Part 2 addresses the long nineteenth century real-life case of vampirism, with the author, a pa‐ with its ideas of imperial expansion, increased so‐ tient in a mental institution, functioning as a Stok‐ cial mobility associated with the rise of the middle erian Renfeld (a madman in Dracula). Schreber’s class and the nouveau riche, and new socialist alleged attack by a vampiric entity is one of the and radical political philosophies that changed most complex chapters in Butler’s monograph, the traditional societal structure and order. In deeply steeped in psychoanalytic theory. The Butler’s insightful analysis, Polidori’s lead vam‐ chapter analyzes Schreber’s claim that the vam‐ pire, Lord Ruthven, is an impostor, a pedigreeless pire who attacked him was none other than God individual whose barbarism corrupts the English himself (referred to as “a soul murderer”), a dec‐ social body and brings lawlessness and terror. laration that Butler interprets as standing for

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“vast conspiracies of internal and external agita‐ vampire’s ability to refect anxieties and fears as‐ tors intent on taking over Germany and … [Schre‐ sociated with a changing society (i.e., the same ber’s] own person—the Fatherland and its citizen- reasons that inaugurated its appearance in the son” (p. 141). Butler weaves the cultural and social fne arts of the eighteenth and nineteenth cen‐ disintegration of the German Empire into the turies). background that brought on Schreber’s nervous While the structure of Butler’s book is tradi‐ breakdown and led to hallucinations and the need tional, judging by the works included in a recent to symbolically castrate himself (he starts to see anthology on the critical literature dealing with himself as a woman). Butler then looks at the Ger‐ the vampire[1] and other monographs on the top‐ man and Austrian horror literature of the time, ic,[2] the book’s novelty lies in Butler’s use of vari‐ which featured sexual and psychological perver‐ ous theoretical approaches to uncover the latent, sions, and sees in it a refection of “anxieties sur‐ unifying meaning of the vampire’s symbolism for rounding struggles for dominance by competing various cultures and epochs. Another strength of [ethnic and social] groups” (p. 143). World War I the monograph is its use of little-known texts, gave an outlet to these struggles, but instead of such as Schreber’s Memoirs or minor popular catharsis it brought on further troubles. Extreme texts inspired by the vampire classics. Butler’s violence, mass murders caused by modern war point of departure for the vampire discourse is technologies, and an increase in ethnic tensions the 1720s vampire epidemic in Serbia, when the were refected in interwar German expressionist vampire enters the written record of western Eu‐ flms in the persona of the soulless, corpse-like, rope. Although this is understandable, Butler’s parasitic, foreign entity of the vampire. Butler’s erudite knowledge of literary theory would have analysis shows that flms such as Robert Wiene’s been benefcial if applied to east European folk‐ The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920) and Friedrich lore on the vampire, given that there is a written Wilhelm Murnau’s (1922, based on record of this word in its Stoker) introduced themes of antisemitism, racial variation as early as the eleventh century.[3] separation, and a “reintroduction of social stabili‐ Butler’s conclusion promises the reader a fu‐ ty [that] led to the persecution of persons and ture look at the in the Americas and be‐ groups deemed responsible for the community’s yond. However, he stops with the Americas and afiction” (p. 160). These themes refect tensions does not consider the vampire’s move back to in the German society of the time and represent eastern Europe, or to Europe in general (the locale evils to come in World War II—the end of Butler’s that occasioned this discourse), and the contem‐ chosen framework for the book. porary depiction of the vampire in European (es‐ In his conclusion, which functions as a full- pecially east European) literatures. Despite these fedged chapter on its own, Butler ofers a brief observations, the book shows the author’s ability but informative overview of the transformation to synthesize a great number of primary and sec‐ of the vampire from an ancient corpse to an eter‐ ondary (critical and theoretical) works relevant to nal youth. He brings other genres of speculative the vampire and horror literature and ofers an fction to his analysis, drawing an insightful paral‐ informative, theoretical analysis of the cultural lel between the vampire fgure and other “mon‐ transformations of the vampire fgure in litera‐ sters” of contemporary pop culture, such as cy‐ ture and flm. It will serve as a great auxiliary borgs, superhuman characters, and zombies. His read for courses in folklore, English, or compara‐ main hypothesis is that the persistence and vitali‐ tive literature dealing with this enigmatic fgment ty of the vampire fgure, despite diferences in of the human imagination. outward behavior or appearance, stem from the

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Notes [1]. See J. Gordon Melton and Alysa Hornick, eds., The Vampire in Folklore, History, Literature, Film and Television: A Comprehensive Bibliogra‐ phy (Jeferson, NC: McFarland, 2015). [2]. See Jan Louis Perkowski, Vampire Lore: From the Writings of Jan Louis Perkowski (Slavica Publishers, 2006); and Bruce A. McClelland, Slay‐ ers and Their Vampires: A Cultural History of Killing the Dead (Ann Arbor: University of Michi‐ gan Press, 2006). [3]. McClelland, Slayers and Their Vampires, 187-191.

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Citation: Svitlana Krys. Review of Butler, Erik. Metamorphoses of the Vampire in Literature and Film: Cultural Transformations in Europe, 1732-1933. H-Russia, H-Net Reviews. June, 2017.

URL: https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=47253

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