Carmilla by J. Sheridan Le Fanu: A Report by John Wallis
These small details are what seemingly set the differences in what geographic regions the tales are being told. These differences are also known as geographic folklore or vernacular folklore with details specific to that region.
So, I finished reading Carmilla, (1872), by J. Sheridan Le Fanu and found it really interesting. It’s not a very long book and spans a mere eighty-six pages. Since Le Fanu has written his story, Bram Stoker came out with his own masterful story of undead human predators in his novel, Dracula, which has become a canonized, literary classic.
But before Stoker’s version of these cursed beings, the folklore landscape had become aware of these creatures through Le Fanu and other writers like John William Polidori. It is through these stories and even earlier legends that we have today the likes of Interview with a Vampire, The Vampire Diaries, and the ever popular The Twilight Saga.
It would seem that almost all our current popular notion of vampires has been written about and documented by famous and semi-famous writers for generations and it is very interesting to be able to map the evolution of the stories over that same length of time.
What is also amazing in this evolution is the way vampires are killed, a stake through the heart, burning, decapitation, etc. and the signs and symptoms of their presence like fang marks (although the word “fangs” is never used) on the neck, a trance-like consciousness, (languor), knowing things that shouldn’t be known, and inappropriate sexual behavior.
These small details are what seemingly set the differences apart in geographic regions where the tales are being told. These differences are also known as geographic folklore or vernacular folklore with details specific to that region. For instance, some tales include the vampires transforming into other creatures like bats, Le Fanu used a “shadowy cat-like creature” that paced at the foot of the victim’s bed, while Stoker used the image of a “large black dog” that escaped the Demeter after running aground in the sand at Tate Hill Sands and the East Cliff by the Whitby Abbey ruins in England.
Stoker went a step further, however, as he had Dracula transform into a “mist” that was able to penetrate the doors and windows and easily access the heroine’s lofty abode. It is also in these details that the symptoms of vampirism are exuded as well, as we see in Carmilla’s story where the marks of the vampire bite manifest as a “small blue dot” at the base of the victim’s throat.
In Polidori’s account, it would seem that the Vampyre’s teeth “tore open” veins to gain access to the blood. In Stoker’s version Dracula left “two small white dots, with red centres,” like a snake bite.
The story of Carmilla as told by Le Fanu, takes place in a land called Styria, Austria, and involves a young girl left in the care of a prominent land-owner’s castle (schloss) after a staged carriage disaster in the forest. The young ward of a rather stately woman of obvious means is described as “beautiful and as fair as any creature could be.”
A child, by all means and observances, about the same age of the landowner’s daughter, Laura. Laura, who narrates the story, thought it would be great fun to have a friend to talk with and to indulge in trifle teenage conversations. However, Carmilla is the same person Laura had encountered in a “vision” some years before, but Carmilla explained that she too had the same dream or vision and found it enchanting that she was now meeting the girl in her vision in person.
It needs to be recognized here how the nightmare Laura experienced was treated so casually by Carmilla as a fate-inspired serendipitous encounter. She took to Laura immediately, and the bored daughter of a wealthy landowner, trapped in a mundane existence in the middle of nowhere, found excitement regarding the prospect of having a companion to talk to and returned the sentiment.
Carmilla is an 1872 Gothic novella by Irish author Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu and one of the early works of vampire fiction, predating Bram Stoker's Dracula (1897) by 26 years. (Ilustration by Michael Fitzgerald)
They soon become fast friends. Carmilla’s mother (actually, a caretaker or familiar) must make a trip and Carmilla, whose physical countenance is described as “pale and fragile,” is left with the landowner and Laura to recuperate from the carriage incident.
The woman states a return date of approximately three months’ time in which she will return to the schloss and collect her daughter after she has recovered. The landowner enthusiastically agrees to let Carmilla stay and recuperate with him and his daughter at their estate.
Over the next few months, Carmilla will intertwine her strange behavior with that of Laura and the staff of the schloss and cause so much despair that life and death hang in the balance.
In the meantime, strange deaths begin to occur amongst the villagers and others in the community surrounding the schloss. The people fear there is an epidemic of fever spreading through the population and even Laura becomes afflicted with the unknown disease.
She begins having strange dreams, imagining dark, cat-like creatures pacing at the foot of her bed. She becomes increasingly lethargic and cannot retain energy enough for simple ambulation.
The doctor is called and examines the young girl. During this examination he notices a “blue dot” at the base of her neck and calls another doctor – supposedly more experienced in these matters - for a second opinion. (Does this sound familiar?) The second doctor examines the girl and diagnoses her as a victim of a Vampire attack.
The original doctor is skeptical and resorts to basically calling the second doctor delusional because vapires don't exist, right? However, during all of this controversy, Carmilla is seen walking in the lane outside her window by gardeners and swineherds, yet she has been behind locked doors and monitored by castle staff.
It isn’t until the Landowner’s friend, General Spielsdorf, (whose niece, Mademoiselle Rheinfeldt, suffered a similar fate at the hands of the same creature) comes back from his journey that the truth about Carmilla is exposed.
In an encounter at the graveyard at Karnstein ruins, Carmilla shows her true self when she escapes the General’s attempt to strike her with an axe and, through a “brutalized change” (78), transforms into a type of wild animal, where she ducks the axe, and grabs the general up like he weighed nothing.
He subsequently dropped the axe, and Carmilla disappeared. The general is able to locate the original tomb of “Mircalla, Countess of Karnstein,” and open the coffin to find, after one hundred and fifty years, the countess’ body was “tinted with the warmth of life,” an “appreciable respiration,” and looked exactly like Carmilla!
The description also states that her coffin is half full of fresh blood. General Spielsdorf then takes a sharpened wooden stake and drives it through her heart, and what happened next nobody expected.
At the moment of penetration of the stake through the heart, the body of the countess “uttered a piercing shriek, (…) then the head was struck off, and a torrent of blood flowed from the severed neck (82). The body and head were then burned, reduced to ashes, and thrown into the river. Afterwards, Laura regained her health, and the entire experience is written down by her doctor as she relates it to him.
Overall, Le Fanu does an excellent job in recounting a tale of caution, loneliness, and the predication of others upon this loneliness. Furthermore, the narrative hints at a sexual relationship between Carmilla and Laura that the latter finds disturbing, but desires companionship so much that she is willing to accept and rationalize the untoward attention.
She also finds it unusual that her “guest” is never present for morning or evening prayer time with the family. These are good examples of the details that represent the cultural vernacular of that time and region, where good girls stayed close to family and dutifully said their prayers daily.
The details regarding the actions, habits, and predilections of the vampires show the details of the current folk tales and lore prevalent at that time. It is also important to consider Le Fanu’s claim that a “suicide” victim, a person who commits suicide, can become a vampire. It is this immersion into the folklore history of these accounts of the undead predators, how they are made and what can kill them, that brings more depth and believability to his story.
(Cover illustration of Carmilla is by D. H. Friston 1871-1872)