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'''''The Vampyre''''' is a short work of prose fiction written in 1819 by [[John William Polidori]]. The work is often viewed as the progenitor of the [[romanticism|romantic]] [[vampire literature|vampire genre]] of [[fantasy]] [[fiction]].<ref name=":0" /> The work is described by [[Christopher Frayling]] as "the first story successfully to fuse the disparate elements of [[vampirism]] into a coherent literary genre."<ref name=Frayling_1992>
{{Citation
|author-link=Christopher Frayling
|last=Frayling
|first=Christopher
|title=Vampyres: Lord Byron to Count Dracula
|publisher=Faber & Faber
|place=London
|year=1992
|isbn=0-571-16792-6
}}</ref>{{rp|page=108}}

==Characters==
* [[Lord Ruthven (vampire)|Lord Ruthven]]: a suave [[British people|British]] nobleman; the vampire
* Aubrey: a wealthy young gentleman; an orphan
* Ianthe: a beautiful Greek woman Aubrey meets on his journeys with Ruthven
* Aubrey's sister: becomes engaged to the Earl of Marsden
* Earl of Marsden: also known as Lord Ruthven

==Plot==
Aubrey, a young Englishman, meets [[Lord Ruthven (vampire)|Lord Ruthven]], a man of mysterious origins who has entered [[London]] society. Aubrey accompanies Ruthven to [[Rome]], but leaves him after Ruthven seduces the daughter of a mutual acquaintance. Aubrey travels to [[Greece]], where he becomes attracted to Ianthe, an innkeeper's daughter. Ianthe tells Aubrey about the legends of the vampire. Ruthven arrives at the scene and shortly thereafter Ianthe is killed by a vampire. Aubrey does not connect Ruthven with the murder and rejoins him in his travels. The pair is attacked by bandits and Ruthven is mortally wounded. Before he dies, Ruthven makes Aubrey swear an oath that he will not mention his death or anything else he knows about Ruthven for a year and a day. Looking back, Aubrey realizes that everyone whom Ruthven met ended up suffering.

Aubrey returns to London and is amazed when Ruthven appears shortly thereafter, alive and well. Ruthven reminds Aubrey of his oath to keep his death a secret. Ruthven then begins to seduce Aubrey's sister while Aubrey, helpless to protect his sister, has a [[nervous breakdown]]. Ruthven and Aubrey's sister are engaged to marry on the day the oath ends. Just before he dies, Aubrey writes a letter to his sister revealing Ruthven's history, but it does not arrive in time. Ruthven marries Aubrey's sister. On the wedding night, she is discovered dead, drained of her blood—and Ruthven has vanished.

==Publication==
[[File:The Vampyre New Monthly Magazine 1819.jpg|left|thumb|''The New Monthly Magazine'', 1 April 1819.]]"The Vampyre" was first published on 1 April 1819 by [[Henry Colburn]] in the ''[[New Monthly Magazine]]'' with the false attribution "A Tale by [[Lord Byron]]". The name of the work's protagonist, "[[Lord Ruthven (vampire)|Lord Ruthven]]", added to this assumption, for that name was originally used in [[Lady Caroline Lamb]]'s novel ''Glenarvon'' (from the same publisher), in which a thinly-disguised Byron figure was also named Lord Ruthven. Despite repeated denials by Byron and Polidori, the authorship often went unclarified.

The tale was first published in book form by Sherwood, Neely, and Jones in London, Paternoster-Row, in 1819 in octavo as ''The Vampyre; A Tale'' in 84 pages. The notation on the cover noted that it was: "Entered at Stationers' Hall, March 27, 1819". Initially, the author was given as Lord Byron. Later printings removed Byron's name and added Polidori's name to the title page.

The story was an immediate popular success, partly because of the Byron attribution and partly because it exploited the [[gothic fiction|gothic]] horror predilections of the public. Polidori transformed the vampire from a character in [[folklore]] into the form that is recognized today—an aristocratic fiend who preys among high society.<ref name=Frayling_1992 />

The story has its genesis in the summer of 1816, the [[Year Without a Summer]], when Europe and parts of [[North America]] underwent a severe [[climate]] abnormality. [[Lord Byron]] and his young physician John Polidori were staying at the [[Villa Diodati]] by [[Lake Geneva]] and were visited by [[Percy Bysshe Shelley]], [[Mary Shelley]] and [[Claire Clairmont]]. Kept indoors by the "incessant rain" of that "wet, ungenial summer",<ref>
{{Citation
|last=Shelley
|first=Mary
|author-link=Mary Shelley
|title=''Frankenstein''
|edition=introduction to Third
|year=1831
}}</ref> over three days in June the five turned to telling fantastical tales, and then writing their own. Fueled by ghost stories such as the ''[[Fantasmagoriana]]'', [[William Thomas Beckford|William Beckford]]'s ''[[Vathek]]'' and quantities of [[laudanum]], Mary Shelley, in collaboration with Percy Bysshe Shelley,<ref>
{{Citation
|last=Owchar
|first=Nick
|title=The Siren's Call: An epic poet as Mary Shelley's co-author. A new edition of ''Frankenstein'' shows the contributions of her husband, Percy
|publisher=Los Angeles Times
|date=October 11, 2009
}}
*{{Citation
|last=Rhodes
|first=Jerry
|title=New paperback by UD professor offers two versions of Frankenstein tale
|work=UDaily
|publisher=University of Delaware
|date=September 30, 2009
|quote=Charles E. Robinson: "These italics used for Percy Shelley's words make even more visible the half-dozen or so places where, in his own voice, he made substantial additions to the 'draft' of ''Frankenstein''."
}}
*{{Citation
|last=Pratt
|first=Lynda
|title=Who wrote the original Frankenstein? Mary Shelley created a monster out of her 'waking dream' – but was it her husband Percy who 'embodied its ideas and sentiments'?
|publisher=The Sunday Times
|date=October 29, 2008
}}
*{{Citation
|last=Adams
|first=Stephen
|title=Percy Bysshe Shelley helped wife Mary write Frankenstein, claims professor: Mary Shelley received extensive help in writing Frankenstein from her husband, Percy Bysshe Shelley, a leading academic has claimed
|publisher=Telegraph
|date=August 24, 2008
|quote=Charles E. Robinson: "He made very significant changes in words, themes and style. The book should now be credited as 'by Mary Shelley with Percy Shelley'.
}}
*{{Citation
|last=Shelley
|first=Mary
|last2=Shelley
|first2=Percy
|author-link=Mary Shelley
|author2-link=Percy Bysshe Shelley
|title=The Original Frankenstein
|editor-last=Robinson
|editor-first=Charles E.
|location=New York
|publisher=Random House Vintage Classics
|year=2008
|isbn=978-0-307-47442-1
}}
*{{Citation
|last=Rosner
|first=Victoria
|title=Co-Creating a Monster.
|publisher=The Huffington Post
|date=September 29, 2009
|url=http://www.huffingtonpost.com/victoria-rosner/co-creating-a-monster_b_301089.html
|quote=Random House recently published a new edition of the novel ''Frankenstein'' with a surprising change: Mary Shelley is no longer identified as the novel's sole author. Instead, the cover reads 'Mary Shelley (with Percy Shelley).'
}}</ref> produced what would become ''[[Frankenstein|Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus]]''. Polidori was inspired by a fragmentary story of Byron's, ''[[Fragment of a Novel]]'' (1816), also known as "A Fragment" and "The Burial: A Fragment", and in "two or three idle mornings" produced "The Vampyre".<ref>
{{Citation
|last=Byron
|first=George Gordon
|author-link=Lord Byron
|title=The Vampyre and Other Tales of the Macabre
|editor-first=Robert
|editor-last=Morrison
|editor2-first=Chris
|editor2-last=Baldick
|location=Oxford
|publisher=Oxford University Press
|year=1997
|isbn=0-19-955241-X
}}</ref>

==Influence==
Polidori's work had an immense impact on contemporary sensibilities and ran through numerous editions and translations. That influence has extended into the current era as the text is "often even cited as [an] almost folkloric sources on vampirism".<ref name=":0">{{Cite journal|url = https://www.researchgate.net/publication/283318599_Vampire_Evolution|title = Vampire Evolution|last = Jøn|first = A. Asbjørn|date = 2003|journal = mETAphor|doi = |pmid = |access-date = 25 November 2015|pages = |page = 21|issue = 3}}</ref> An adaptation appeared in 1820 with [[Cyprien Bérard]]'s novel ''Lord Ruthwen ou les Vampires'', falsely attributed to [[Charles Nodier]], who himself then wrote his own version, ''Le Vampire'', a play which had enormous success and sparked a "vampire craze" across Europe. This includes [[opera]]tic adaptations by [[Heinrich Marschner]] (see ''[[Der Vampyr]]'') and [[Peter Josef von Lindpaintner]] (see ''[[Der Vampyr (Lindpaintner)|Der Vampyr]]''), both published in the same year and called "The Vampire". [[Nikolai Gogol]], [[Alexandre Dumas]] and [[Aleksey Konstantinovich Tolstoy|Aleksey Tolstoy]] all produced vampire tales, and themes in Polidori's tale would continue to influence [[Bram Stoker]]'s ''[[Dracula]]'' and eventually the whole vampire genre. Dumas makes explicit reference to Lord Ruthven in ''[[The Count of Monte Cristo]]'', going so far as to state that his character "The Comtesse G..." had been personally acquainted with Lord Ruthven.<ref>{{Citation |author-link=Alexandre Dumas |last=Dumas |first=Alexandre |title=The Count of Monte Cristo |chapter=Chapter XXXIX}}</ref>

In Kim Newman's Anno Dracula series, the character of Lord Ruthven is a prominent character. In the Anno Dracula universe he becomes a prominent figure in British politics following the ascent of Dracula to power. He is Conservative Prime Minister in the period of the first novel and continues to hold power throughout the 19th and 20th Centuries. Described as the "Great Political Survivor" as of 1991 he succeeds Margaret Thatcher as Prime Minister (opposed to John Major).

==Film adaptation==
In 2016 it was announced that the studio Britannia Pictures will be releasing a feature-length adaptation of ''The Vampyre''. Production for the film was slated to begin in spring 2018, with filming taking place in the UK, Italy and Greece.<ref name="imdbpro2016">{{cite web|url=http://pro.imdb.com/title/tt4452568/ | accessdate=27 February 2017 | title=PRO The Vampyre}}</ref> The film will be directed by Rowan M. Ashe and is scheduled for release in October 2018.<ref name="imdb2016">{{cite web|url=http://www.imdb.com/title/tt4452568/ | accessdate=27 February 2017 | title=IMDb The Vampyre}}</ref>

Earlier adaptations of Polidori's story include the 1945 film ''[[The Vampire's Ghost]]'' starring [[John Abbott]] as the Lord Ruthven character "Webb Fallon", with the setting changed from England and Greece to Africa. Also, ''[[The Vampyr: A Soap Opera]]'', based on the opera ''[[Der Vampyr]]'' by [[Heinrich Marschner]] and the Polidori story, was filmed and broadcast on [[BBC 2]] on December 2, 1992, with the Lord Ruthven character's name changed to "Ripley", who is frozen in the late eighteenth century but revives in modern times and becomes a successful businessman.

==Theatrical adaptations==
In England, [[James Planché]]'s play ''The Vampire, or The Bride of the Isles'' was first performed in London in 1820 at the [[Lyceum Theatre, London|Lyceum Theatre]]<ref>Roy, Donald (2004). "Planché, James Robinson (1796–1880)". ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography''. Oxford University Press</ref> based on [[Charles Nodier]]'s ''Le Vampire'', which in turn was based on Polidori.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.unicorngarden.com/vamp5.htm |title=The Vampire in Literature |accessdate=2007-04-29 |last= Summers| first= Montague|authorlink=Montague Summers |author2=Nigel Suckling  |work=Montague Summers' Guide to Vampires}}</ref> Such melodramas were satirised in ''[[Ruddigore]]'', by [[Gilbert and Sullivan]] (1887), a character called Sir Ruthven must abduct a maiden, or he will die.<ref>Bradley, p. 731; Polidori and Planché are precursors to and context for Gilbert.  See Williams, Carolyn. ''Gilbert and Sullivan: Gender, Genre, Parody'', p. 277, Columbia University Press (2010) {{ISBN|0231148046}}</ref>

In 1988, American playwright Tim Kelly created a drawing room adaptation of ''The Vampyre'' for the stage, popular among community theaters and high school drama clubs.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.samuelfrench.com/p/14828/the-vampyre-kelly |title=The Vampyre, Samuel French Inc. |accessdate=2014-11-24 |last= Kelly| first= Tim}}</ref>

== References ==
<references/>
== Bibliography ==
*Bainbridge, S. "Lord Ruthven's Power: Polidori's 'The Vampyre', Doubles and the Byronic Imagination." ''The Byron Journal'', 2006.
*Barbour, Judith. “Dr. John William Polidori, Author of the Vampyre.” ''Imagining Romanticism: Essays on English and Australian Romanticisms''. Ed. Deirdre Coleman and Peter Otto. West Cornell, CN: Locust Hill, 1992. 85-110.
*Bleiler, E.F., ed. ''Three Gothic Novels: The Castle of Otranto, Vathek, The Vampyre, and "A Fragment of a Novel".'' Dover, 1966.
*Boone, Troy. “Mark of the Vampire: Arnod Paole, Sade, Polidori.” ''Nineteenth-Century Contexts'', 18 (1995): 349-366.
* {{cite book|last=Bradley|first=Ian|authorlink=Ian Bradley|year=1996|title=The Complete Annotated Gilbert and Sullivan|location=Oxford, England|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=0-19-816503-X}}
*Budge, G. "'The Vampyre': Romantic Metaphysics and the Aristocratic Other." ''The Gothic Other: Racial and Social Constructions in the Literary Imagination''. 2004.
*Byron, George Gordon. “Fragment.” ''The Vampyre and Other Tales of the Macabre''. Ed. Robert Morrison and Chris Baldick. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1997. 246-251.
*Dyer, Richard. “Children of the Night: Vampirism as Homosexuality and Homosexuality as Vampirism.” ''Sweet Dreams: Sexuality, Gender and Popular Fiction''. Ed. Susannah Radstone. London: Lawrence, 1988. 47-72.
*Gelder, Ken. ''Reading the Vampire''. London: Routledge, 1994.
*[https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=eYYH-BUSImIC&oi=fnd&pg=PA3&dq=vampyre+polidori&ots=qr8mw4Fmyp&sig=8moossnB18w9WtynUjTFeIDZ1zQ#v=onepage&q&f=false Kelly, Tim J., and John William Polidori. "The Vampyre: A 'Penny-Dreadful' Stage Thriller in Two Acts. New York: Dramatists Play Service, Inc., 1988.]
*Kristensen, A.C. "Evolution of the Vampire Genre: From Polidori's ''The Vampyre'' to ''Buffy the Vampire Slayer''." Aalborg University, 2003.
*Lovecraft, H. P. "Supernatural Horror in Literature." ''The Recluse'', No. 1 (1927), pp.&nbsp;23–59.
*Macdonald, D. L. ''Poor Polidori: A Critical Biography of the Author of the Vampyre''. Toronto: U of Toronto P, 1991.
*Marschner, H.A. "Der Vampyr: Romantic opera in two acts (1828), based on'The Vampyre' by John Polidori (1819), revised by Hans Pfitzner." MRF Records, 1971.
*Morrill, David. F. “‘Twilight is not good for Maidens’: Uncle Polidori and the Psychodynamics of Vampirism in Goblin Market.” ''Victorian Poetry'', 28.1 (Spring 1990): 1-16.
*Polidori, John.'' The Vampyre and Other Tales of the Macabre''. Ed. Robert Morrison and Chris Baldick. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1997.
*Polidori, John William. ''The Vampyre; And, Ernestus Berchtold, Or, The Modern Oedipus: Collected Fiction of John William Polidori''. University of Toronto Press, 1994.
*Rieger, James. “Dr. Polidori and the Genesis of ''Frankenstein''.” ''Studies in English Literature'', 3 (1963): 461-472. The origin of ''Frankenstein'' was in a conversation between John William Polidori and Percy Bysshe Shelley on June 15, 1816.
*Rigby, Mair. “Prey to some cureless disquiet”: Polidori’s Queer Vampyre at the Margins of Romanticism." ''Romanticism on the Net'', 36-37, November 2004, February 2005.
*Senf, C.A. "Polidori's ''The Vampyre'': Combining the Gothic with Realism." ''North Dakota Quarterly'', Winter, 1988.
*Skarda, Patricia. “Vampirism and Plagiarism: Byron’s Influence and Polidori’s Practice.” ''Studies in Romanticism'', 28 (Summer 1989): 249-69.
*Stiles, A., and S. Finger. "Somnambulism and Trance States in the Works of John William Polidori, Author of ''The Vampyre''." ''European Romantic Review'', 2010.
*Stiles, A., and S. Finger. "A New Look at Polidori. ''European Romantic Review'', 2010.
*Switzer, R. "Lord Ruthwen and the Vampires." ''The French Review'', 1955.
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