Vampires and Vampirism

About this book

What is a vampire before it becomes a familiar figure in cinema? Dudley Wright searches the reports, folklore and historical fears that gave the creature its enduring life.

Vampires and Vampirism surveys beliefs from different regions, touching on burial customs, supposed revenants and accounts of attacks attributed to the dead. The evidence is often anecdotal and shaped by the collecting practices of Wright's period. The book is a useful guide to the older legends from which later Gothic fiction drew so much of its force.