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INFORMATION TO USERS This manuscript has been reproduced from the microfilm master. UMI films the text directly from the original or copy submitted. Thus, some thesis and dissertation copies are in typewriter tace, while others may be from any type of computer printer. The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. Broken or indistinct print, colored or poor quality illustrations and photographs, print bleedthrough, substarxtard margins, and improper alignment can adversely affect reproduction. In the unlikely event that the author did not send UMI a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will t>e noted. Also, if unauthorized copyright material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. Oversize materials (e.g., maps, drawings, charts) are reproduced by sectioning the original, t)eginning at the upper left-hand corner and continuing from left to right in equal sections with small overlaps. Photographs included in the original manuscript have been reproduced xerographically in this copy. Higher quality 6" x 9” t>lack and white photographic prints are available for any photographs or illustrations appearing in this copy for an additional charge. Contact UMI directly to order. Bell & Howell Information and Learning 300 North Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346 USA 800-521-0600 UMI UNIVERSITY OF OKLAHOMA GRADUATE COLLEGE HOLY TERROR: THE VAMPIRE AS NUMINOUS EXPERIENCE IN BRITISH AND AMERICAN LITERATURE A Dissertation SUBMITTED TO THE GRADUATE FACULTY in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy By Beth E. McDonald Norman, Oklahoma 2000 UMI Number 9985577 Copyright 2000 by McDonald, Beth E. All rights reserved. UMI UMI Microform9985577 Copyright 2000 by Bell & Howell Information and Learning Company. All rights reserved. This microform edition is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code. Bell & Howell Information and Leaming Company 300 North Zeeb Road P.O. Box 1346 Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346 ©Copyright by Beth E. McDonald 2000 All Rights Reserved. HOLY TERROR: THE VAMPIRE AS NUMINOUS EXPERIENCE IN BRITISH AND AMERICAN LITERATURE A Dissertation APPROVED FOR THE DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH BY ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I wish to thank my committee for their help in making this dissertation happen: Dr. Stephen Tabachnick for his tireless woik as the chair o f my committee and for his advice and encouragement; Dr. George Economou, Dr. Lawrence Frank, Dr. Michael Morrison, and Dr. James Madison Davis for being part of the committee and giving me such valuable feedback in the revision process. A special note of appreciation goes to my husband Michael for putting up with all the years of doctoral study, research, and writing. IV CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS .............................................................................................iv ABSTRACT vi CHAPTER ONE. DREADFUL REVELATIONS: THE NUMINOUS AND THE VAMPIRE...................................................1 TWO. SURRENDERING THE SELF: THE NUMINOUS AND THE VAMPIRE IN COLERIDGE’S “THE RIME OF THE ANCYENT MARINERE” ............... 56 THREE. RECREATING THE WORLD: THE SACRED AND PROFANE IN DRACULA......................................... 112 FOUR. EROS AND THE THANATOTIC HERO: ANNE RICE’S VAMPIRE CHRONICLES.......................... 170 FIVE. TRANSFORMATIONS OF THE VAMPIRE 224 WORKS CITED .....................................................................................................249 ABSTRACT This dissertation investigates the experience of the numinous in a specific category of Gothic literature, which employs a vampire as the primary focus of its action, regardless of whether that figure is literal or metaphoric. The texts examined in the following chapters include both poetry and fiction by both British and American authors. This study explores how the use of the vampire in literature has served to convey a human sense of alienation fix>m the divine and a desire to overcome that alienation. While expressing the physical, isolated state of the individual human being, as a numinous figure, the vampire also represents the transcendent agent through which individuals and societies may confiant questions about their innate goodness or evilness and the condition of their belief in the divine and in the possibility of an afterlife. This dissertation defines the idea of the numinous as it was developed by Rudolf Otto in The Idea of the Holv and expands upon that concept with the use of several later examinations of the experience of the numinous. This study argues that a textual experience of the numinous in the form of the vampire propels the subject of the experience on a spiritual journey involving both psychological and religious qualities, and that through that journey the reader, and possibly the main character, begins to understand the value of his or her existence in the world and to negotiate a new relationship with the divine. VI CHAPTER ONE DREADFUL REVELATIONS: THE NUMINOUS AND THE VAMPIRE This dissertation investigates the experience of the numinous in a specific category of Gothic literature, which employs a vampire as the primary focus of its action, regardless of whether that figure is literal or metaphoric. The texts examined in the following chapters include both poetry and fiction, and all were written at or near the ends of their respective centuries by both British and American authors. This study explores how at the ends of the last three centuries these authors have used the numinousness of the vampire to convey a human sense of alienation from the divine and a desire to overcome that alienation. While expressing the physical, non transcendent, and isolated state of the individual human being, as a numinous figure, the vampire also represents the transcendent agent through which individuals and societies may confront questions about their innate goodness or evilness and the condition of their belief in the divine and in the possibility o f an afterlife. This dissertation defines the idea of the numinous as it was developed by Rudolf Otto in The Idea of the Holv and expands upon that concept with the use of several later examinations of the experience of the numinous as based on Otto’s primary work. This study argues that a textual experience of the numinous in the form of the vampire propels the subject of the experience on a spiritual journey involving both psychological and religious qualities, and that through that journey the reader, and possibly the main character, begins to understand the value of his or her existence in the world and to negotiate a new relationship with the divine. Method of Inquirv The purpose of this dissertation is to discuss the use of the vampire figure as a representation of the numinous over several literary periods in a kind of super religious context that goes beyond the realm of traditional religious systems. Although some mention of other vampire texts and other vampires might be made in the discussion, I have chosen to divide the body of the dissertation into three chapters, dealing with the Romantic, Victorian, and late twentieth century periods, respectively. The first two analytical chapters of the dissertation each examine one work by one writer from that particular period. The third chapter, however, explores the numinous in relation to a particular character through a series of texts by one writer. For the Romantic period I have chosen to analyze Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s “The Rime of the Ancyent Marinere” (1798), basing my use of this poem as a vampire text on James B. Twitchell’s arguments for that perspective in The Living Dead. No analysis of the vampire in literature would be complete without the now classic vampire Dracula, so as a representative of vampire fiction in the Victorian period, I have examined Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1897); and for the late twentieth century, I have selected the first five books of Anne Rice’s popular Vampire Chronicles (1976-1995) for analysis. Despite the fact that I am considering the vampire figure as a negative representative of the numinous in all the chapters, rather than using one text dealing with the numinous concept as a foundation and following that particular thread through the texts of all three centuries, I have chosen a different perspective on the numinous for each chapter. With this method, I hope to show how an experience of the vampire as a numinous figure can be analyzed on both psychological and religious levels. However, before any attempt can be made to examine the vampire in terms of an experience of the numinous, several issues must be addressed. These issues include: the problem of how to reconcile the textual construction o f an experience of the numinous through language with the idea that the numinous, by definition, is indescribable; the philosophical question of whether the divine in any form truly exists and where belief in the divine enters into an encounter with the numinous; and whether a discussion of the experience of the numinous in literature should be approached from a purely psychological point of view, a purely religious one, or a combination of the two perspectives. The problem of textual construction and the ineffableness of the numinous can be resolved, or at least clarified, in a discussion of the conventions of realism and the fantastic or Gothic text. Questions of the existence of the divine, of whether a belief in that existence is required in an experience of the numinous, and of the psychological versus the religious approach can be examined in a discussion of the definition of the numinous and the connection of an experience of the numinous to both the psychological and religious realms of knowledge. Realism, the Fantastic, and the Numinous In The Rise of the Novel; Studies in Defoe. Richardson and Fielding (1957), Ian Watt attributes the development of the novel in the early eighteenth century to the advent of realism as a philosophic viewpoint, to the rise of the middle class as an important contingent of the reading public, and to the influence of the courts of law.