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6 min read

Bled dry: some red flags for those who hope to date a vampire

A philosopher's guide to undying love.

Ryan is the author of A Guidebook to Monsters: Philosophy, Religion, and the Paranormal.

A modern vampire stairs at the face of his girlfried.
Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson in Twilight.
Lionsgate.

Writing from his new book, A Guidebook to Monsters, Ryan Stark delves into humanity’s undying passion for all things gothic.  In the first of a two-part series, he asks what is so irresistible about vampires, what do we want from them, and what’s the deal with the armadillos? 

 

Historians point to John Polidori’s The Vampyre as that vital moment in Western vampire lore when the grisly undead creature becomes instead a Casanova. London, 1819. Lord Ruthven, the suave vampire in question, seduces young women and orchestrates chaos in the lives of others—all for his own carnal pleasure. Importantly, he does this by way of persuasion, not rote coercion, which illustrates a key aspect of the modern vampires’ modus operandi. They prefer romance to compulsion, seduction to force. They prefer thrall, almost to the end, at which point the monster fully emerges and the victims fully grasp that their good senses have been compromised. But by then it is too late. 

“None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free,” Goethe once observed. Similarly, none are more hopelessly enslaved than those who believe themselves to be dating vampires. 

To resist, however, is easier said than done. Even Buffy the vampire slayer succumbs to thrall, so much so that she invites Dracula to bite her. And he happily obliges, if “happily” is possible in the mind of a vampire. Later, having sobered up from the ordeal, Buffy stakes the villain, but we are nonetheless left with an uneasy feeling. Despite all her experience, despite all her kung-fu knowhow, Buffy still crumbles in the wake of thrall, at least temporarily, putting herself in grave danger and eliciting from us a pressing set of questions. How could this have happened so easily? Will this happen again? Are women attracted to men in capes? 

Much like kryptonite, vampire magic also affects Superman. Two vampires have so far succeeded in hypnotizing him. Crucifer, not fortunate in name, enthralls our protagonist and sends him on several errands, until the Man of Steel has a moment of clarity, as the alcoholics call it, at which point he punches the ancient vampire through the heart. Dracula, too, disguised as an aristocrat named Rominoff, charms our superhero rather easily and then bites him on the neck, only to explode—hilariously—on the premise that Superman’s blood is tinged with sunlight. A moment of dream logic used to subvert the expectation that superblood might somehow benefit the Count. 

Lord Ruthven of Polidori fame also wanders into the DC Comic Book Universe and, per usual, charms his way through problems, until he inadvertently skewers himself on a war memorial. Before this happens, however, we get the strong impression that Ruthven could beguile Superman with ease, if given the chance: that pens are mightier than swords and always have been. 

On the contrary, vampires have a long history of not pointing to Heaven. Instead, they gild the lily. In their attempt to out-gothic the gothic, they turn their style inwardly upon themselves.

Psychoanalysts observe that to empathize with sociopaths is to negate the self most dangerously. They are right, I think, and right—too—that self-erasure proves difficult to recognize at times, because it feels like love. Such is the predicament of those who hope to rendezvous with vampires. Perhaps they have a death wish, some will say, or maybe a savior syndrome, as if they are to save the brooding scoundrels. As if they can. Regardless, the monsters have another plan entirely. As an early church father once explained, those who dine with the devils should bring long spoons. 

Not that vampires are particularly good at banquets. They inevitably exaggerate, like the Macbeths as they welcome King Duncan to the castle: “All our service,” the lady says, “in every point twice done and then done double.”  

Or recall the embroidered hospitality of Bela Lugosi’s 1931 Dracula, caught between silent film and sound: “I bid you welcome,” he says, acting out the part as if the audience must see the motive on his face. A perfect moment when the silent cinema and talking pictures conspire to produce the quintessential vampire ethos, an overstated affectation framed for the modern age. The bow of pretended humility, the elongated gesture, the monumental gravity. The outfit.   

Some speculate that if vampires were able to see themselves in mirrors, they would reconsider their wardrobes. We have reason to think otherwise. Of course, the true gothic is not the vampire aesthetic, because the true gothic always points to Heaven, as in Notre Dame Cathedral, for instance, or Westminster Abbey. On the contrary, vampires have a long history of not pointing to Heaven. Instead, they gild the lily. In their attempt to out-gothic the gothic, they turn their style inwardly upon themselves, incurvatus in se, which signals not grandeur but rather self-apotheosis. In essence, vampires are their own cathedrals, and with this premise proceed accordingly, candelabras in tow. 

If the vampire could only find pleasure in chocolate, if he could laugh with children, if he could be loved like Bella loves Edward in The Twilight Saga, then maybe there is hope enough in the world for all of us.

Longinus, in On the Sublime, uses the term “frigidity” to describe the emotional effect produced by such false grandeur. He means to convey both rhetorical and metaphysical coldness, as does Dante, who places the Devil in a block of ice at the Inferno’s gaudy center. As does Stanley Kubrick, too, who freezes the possessed Jack in the maze at the end of The Shining. And somewhere near the frozen middle of Hell we find the vampires, those who betrayed the strangers in their midst and preyed upon the lonely and the desperate. But now they only devour themselves. We are punished by our sins, not for them. 

On a side note, and concerning the vampire’s many choristers, the opening scene of Lugosi’s Dracula features three armadillos. They wander about the castle and mind their own business, it seems, as wolves howl and spiders weave their webs. On how they got there we do not know, but the armadillos further confirm Longinus’s additional point that the ridiculous and the sublime bear a family resemblance. 

What, then, are we to make of the vampires who sparkle and the vampires with souls? Or, if not in the direction of the dreamy, then in the theater of the absurd: Count Chocula, the mascot for a popular breakfast cereal, or the puppet Count von Count from the children’s program Sesame Street, who teaches viewers how to add and subtract—hitting all the numbers with his heavy Transylvanian accent. We might deem these manifestations too unserious to be taken seriously, but in fairness to the spirit of Count Chocula, perhaps something else happens here. Namely, we find more variations upon the culture-making effort to rehabilitate the demonic, and the almost demonic, as the case might be.  

If the vampire could only find pleasure in chocolate, if he could laugh with children, if he could be loved like Bella loves Edward in The Twilight Saga, then maybe there is hope enough in the world for all of us. Indeed, maybe some vampires have grown tired of being vampires. That said, we do well to heed the old Transylvanian proverb, lest we over-empathize with the villains: the sane would do no good if they made themselves monsters to help the monsters. 

A recent meme depicts the real Dracula in the company of Count Chocula, Count von Count, The Twilight Saga’s Edward, and several other less-than-scary princes of darkness, at which point Dracula laments that the vampires have lost their edge. 

And, true, I have yet to comment on psychic vampires and flaming extroverts, which is an oversight to be sure. As a corrective, and by way of conclusion, I observe the following: for twenty-seven dollars, one can buy a beaker of psychic vampire repellent from Gwyneth Paltrow’s Goop Store in Beverly Hills, California. The Paper Crane Apothecary makes the product, which—with an essential blend of rosemary, lavender, and juniper—protects against the fiends who corner people at parties. At present, however, shipping will be difficult: the website tells me “This item is sold out.” 

  

From A Guidebook to Monsters, Ryan J. Stark.  Used by permission of Wipf and Stock Publishers. 

Review
Belief
Culture
Music
5 min read

Mumford & Sons search for meaning

Wonder about which love they sing of - earthly or divine.

Steve is news director of Article 18, a human rights organisation documenting Christian persecution in Iran.

A band lounge around.
Pondering the reviews.
Mumford & Sons

My old RE teacher always liked to make the point that meaning can be found in anything, if you want to find it.  

“Do you find meaning in a sunset?” he’d ask. “Or only beauty?” 

From the outset of Mumford & Sons’ new record, ‘Rushmere’, the deeper things, as ever, are front and centre - at least for those of us who wish to find them. 

The folk band’s records have always been replete with religious undertones - lead man Marcus Mumford is the son of a preacher, don’t you know? - and they are apparent from the very start of the band’s fifth studio album and first since 2018. 

‘Rushmere’ kicks off with ‘Malibu’, which speaks of finding “peace beneath the shadow of your wings”, and an unnamed “you” being “all I want” and “all I need”. 

There’s even talk, right at the beginning of the song, of feeling “the spirit move in me again - the same spirit that moves in you”.  

Precisely which spirit is meant is never defined - these are song lyrics, after all, not a sermon - but for this listener at least, the reference to the third member of the Trinity appears clear. 

Not every song on the album hits such obvious religious notes, but the opening track is far from unique. Indeed, one needs only to flick through the names of the other songs to get a hint of the deeper meanings on offer, with titles such as ‘Truth’, ‘Anchor’ and ‘Surrender’. 

Meanwhile, in ‘Monochrome’, we’re told that even within a hyacinth can “life”, “restoration” - even “Christ” - be found.  

Could the “out of sight” monochrome “beyond reason” that we are called to contemplate represent the Christ - in theological terms, the “Word” of God - whose fingerprints can be seen across Creation? 

And what is meant when Mumford sings that “the kind of love that I’m always chasing is the kind of love that won’t be chased?”  

As with many of the band’s lyrics, there appears space for both a romantic and religious reading, though perhaps romance is harder to read into metaphors such as a “cup running dry”, as Mumford sings elsewhere in ‘Monochrome’.  

Is it only me for whom this evokes memories of the old Sunday school refrain: “Fill up my cup and let it overflow”? 

‘Truth’, meanwhile, begins with the fairly blunt statement: “I was born to believe the truth is all there is.”  

“Oh my love, hold me fast,” the song ends, and again we are left to wonder about which love he is singing - earthly or divine. 

It isn’t made clear whether such belief remains intact today, nor even which truth is meant, given that we now live in times where such things seem occasionally grey. But ‘Surrender’ appears more black and white, speaking of being brought to one’s knees, “broken” then “put back together”, and “held in the promise of forever”.   

“I surrender, I surrender now,” Mumford cries - words Christian congregations have sung for centuries. 

And as ever with a Mumford & Sons record, ‘Rushmere’ doesn’t hold back from the trickier theological issues, touching upon the concepts of both hell and original sin. 

“Let your anger go to hell,” ‘Where It Belongs,’ Mumford sings in the track of the same name, which is sung like a lament, while in the final track, ‘Carry On’, those of us who believe in original sin are encouraged to consider that “there’s no evil in a child’s eye”. 

“It was made, and it was good,” Mumford sings in a nod to the Creation story, when the world was blemish-free. 

Meanwhile, in ‘Anchor’, Mumford sings that he “can’t say he’s sorry if he’s always on the run from the Anchor”. Which for some of us, at least, will conjure recollection of part of the Bible’s Book of Hebrews that speaks of our “hope” - Jesus - being “an anchor for the soul, firm and secure”. 

“Oh my love, hold me fast,” the song ends, and again we are left to wonder about which love he is singing - earthly or divine. 

Fans of Mumford & Sons - and yes, you’ve guess it, I count myself among them - will recognise that particular phrase from a previous hit, ‘Hopeless Wanderer’, which again seemed to speak to a life of faith; of pilgrims “called by name” trying “so hard to live in the truth”, but being “prone to wander”, as it says in the hymn ‘Come Thou Fount’, which Mumford has also been known to perform. 

So this is not the first Mumford & Sons album to have contained such imagery. Far from it. For those of us who’ve followed the band since their debut album, ‘Sigh No More’, in 2009, there have always been calls to ‘Awake My Soul’ or to find comfort in a future day in which there will be “no more tears.”  

In the years since, we have been encouraged to be ‘Lover[s] of the Light’, or to find hope in a ‘Guiding Light’ who won’t ‘Slip Away’ in the night. 

Perhaps, then, there’s nothing very different about ‘Rushmere’ - it represents just another chapter on a journey of faith - but this particular fan continues to appreciate, deeply, the depth that Mumford and his bandmates continue to bring to our ears.  

And as for the music, well I suppose by now that most readers will probably be familiar with what one can expect from a Mumford & Sons album, and ‘Rushmere’ certainly doesn’t disappoint those of us who like that kind of thing. 

It’s notably shorter than the previous album - nearly half the length - but is probably no worse for it. It’s hard to think of a weak song on the album, while there is something for everyone: from the country feel of ‘Caroline’ (think Counting Crows/Ryan Adams) and rock and roll of ‘Truth’, to the gentle fingerpicking and harmonies of ‘Monochrome’. Heck, the banjos even make a comeback on the self-titled ‘Rushmere’, so truly something for everyone - or at least for all of us fans.   

By the way, my old RE teacher never told us what he believed, but I later found out that he’d once been ordained, so I suppose that he, like me, might still find meaning in a sunset or even, perhaps, a Mumford & Sons record.

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