The appearance of Gothic in the architecture of the Middle Ages was the starting point and muse of Gothic literature. The lack of simplicity, symmetry, regularity and non-conformity to nature inspired the characteristics of Gothic literature: horror/terror, dark environment, paranormal, evil creatures, supernatural entities (vampires, ghosts, werewolves), haunted castles and mansions, settings isolation, violence, death and the sublime. The purpose of this article is to follow and compare the evolution of the vampire from the Gothic classics Carmilla (Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu, 1872) and Dracula (Bram Stoker, 1897) to their film adaptations. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay Influenced by Polidori's The Vampire (1819), Carmilla is one of the first works of vampire fiction. Initially serialized in the magazine The Dark Blue (1871-1872)[1] and then reprinted by Le Fanu in the short story collection In a Glass Darkly (1872), Carmilla is the story of a woman whose gender is important "in the construction of his monstrosity” (Creed 1993, p.3) vampire named Carmilla (anagram of Mircalla) who preys on females. Because of its preference for female victims, the tale is often seen as a lesbian vampire story that challenges Victorian ideologies of sexuality, "as with all other stereotypes of the feminine [the female monster] is defined in terms of his sexuality" (Creed 1993, p.3). The story was published in one issue of 1871 (December, pp. 434–448) and in three issues of 1872 (January, pp. 592–606; February, pp. 701–714; and March, pp. 59–78) . The story's plot is easy to follow and makes for fun reading: Laura dreams of being visited by a mysterious figure when she was six and remembers being bitten "as if two needles had penetrated my breast deeply at the same time." (Le Fanu, 7). Twelve years later, Laura and her English father were supposed to receive a visit from General Spielsdorf and his niece Bertha Rheinfeldt, but Bertha dies under mysterious circumstances that will be clarified later in the story. While Laura longs for a new partner, a carriage accident brings Carmilla into the care of Laura and her father. The friendship that develops between them is viewed by scholars from two perspectives: a lesbian tryst that came from Carmilla or a mother-daughter friendship that Laura never had (both motifs are valorized in film adaptations). Meanwhile, young women and girls die of an unknown disease, and Carmilla behaves bizarrely (refuses to attend prayers, sleeps during the day, sleepwalks outside at night, claims that hymns hurt her ears). In chapter 7, Laura finds a portrait of her ancestor, Mircalla Countess Karnstein, dated 1698 and observes that Carmilla looks strikingly like her. During Carmilla's stay, Laura continues to have nightmares of a large cat-like beast that takes the form of a female. In another nightmare, he sees Carmilla standing at the foot of his bed and hears her say "Your mother warns you to watch out for the murderer", and then wakes up with her nightgown all soaked in blood. His health is deteriorating, so his father calls the doctor. After the visit, the doctor speaks privately with her father and asks only to never leave her alone. On the way to Karnstein, Laura and her father meet General Spielsdorf and start talking about the strange thing that happened to Laura. Then, the general tells Laura's father that Bertha had the same symptoms, when a mysterious Millarca moved in with them for a short time, before dying and explains why Millarca is a vampire and how they can kill her. Whilethey located his tomb, the General and Laura were alone in an old chapel and Millarca suddenly appeared. The General and Millarca fly into a rage when they see each other. Laura now understands that Millarca and Carmilla are the same person with the General's help. In the last chapter, Laura explains to her the grotesque techniques of Carmilla's murder which she did not witness and her father sends her to Italy to regain her health, which she never quite does. So the characteristics of Le Fanu's vampire are: she is female, intelligent, charm, beauty, shape-shifting, vulnerability to sunlight and church-related rituals, sleeps in a coffin and strength, feeds on human blood. The first film adaptation, Byzantium (2012) focuses on the mother-daughter side of the story. In the film, Clara is a prostitute who turned into a vampire by stealing the map indicating the location of a cave that had the power to do such a thing. Enjoying the life of darkness, he turns his daughter (whom he abandoned into an orphanage/Catholic school to protect her from such a life, but still got her money) and makes her promise she won't tell anyone. This is also a similarity with the novella: during the ball in the general's residence, Carmilla's mother also forces her to silence. Eleanor respects her mother's wish for 200 years, until she feels she can no longer keep the secret. When she meets Frank, a teenager with whom she falls in love, she tells him her secret. At first, Frank tells the high school principal about it, who calls Clara and ends up being killed by her for finding out the truth. But in the end, he begs her to turn him into a vampire too. She does so and her mother frees her. Clara and Eleanor have similar characteristics to Carmilla: they are both beautiful, charming, intelligent (Eleanor more so than her mother) and feed on human blood. However, Eleanor chooses not to pray on ordinary humans, like her mother, but to only drink from elderly people who are about to die and always asks their permission. The second film adaptation, The Curse of Styria (2014) remains more faithful to the tale. Lara (and not Laura, like the character in the story) is the daughter of a former Cambridge professor. They both go to Styria and stay in a castle they rented for a week because his father had to complete a study. As in the story, they were waiting for the professor's colleague and Lara's friend, but they didn't make it because they couldn't cross the border. Lara suffers a lot because she can't be together with her friend and that's when Carmilla appears in her life, similar to the way Cramilla appeared in Laura's life: due to a car accident. In this film, the lesbian side of the novella is much more highlighted than the maternal side, Carmilla holds Lara's hand when she urges her to sneak out and see the view and initiates with her and even shares a few kisses with Lara in the second film. half of the film. As in the story, Carmilla finds funerals useless and annoying. She also feeds on human blood, is charming, beautiful, intelligent and somewhat evil due to her vampire nature. In the nearby village, girls and young women start behaving bizarrely, and Lara suspects it's because of Carmilla. It turns out he was right and Carmilla was killed in the same grotesque way as Carmilla from the story. Although the films were completely different from each other, I think they both beautifully represented Le Fanu's Carmilla, the type of vampire Carmilla was: intelligent, wonderful, mysterious entity and blood eater in both her maternal and lover. Bram Stoker's Dracula (1897) introduces the character of Count Dracula, the classic image of a vampire that everyone has today. The plot is more complex than that ofCarmilla because Dracula is one of the first gothic novels to appear in English literature. The Count is based on Vlad the Impaler (Dracul), voivode of Wallachia who later also inspired video game characters (such as the Castlevania series) "Who was he but one of my own race who as Voivode crossed the Danube and defeated the Turks his land? This was indeed a Dracula! Woe that his unworthy brother, fallen, sold his people to the Turk and brought their shameslavery upon him. them! Was it not this Dracula, indeed, who inspired that other of his race who in a later age repeatedly carried his forces across the great river into the land of Turkey, who, when repelled, returned again and again; even though he had to come alone from the bloody field where his troops were being massacred, for he knew that only he could triumph in the end (Chapter 3, pp. 19). Professor Van Helsing is also speculating on the count's identity: “It must, indeed, have been that voivode Dracula who won his name against the Turks, on the great river just on the border of Turkish land.” (Chapter 18, p. 145). The story is told in epistolary format, diary fragments, newspaper articles and short travelogue entries. Jonathan Harker travels “to the far east of the country, right on the border of three states, Transylvania, Moldavia and Bukovina, in the middle of the Carpathian mountains” (Chapter 1, p. 6) to help the Count purchase some properties in the Kingdom United. The path to the castle is filled with gothic elements such as wolves, dark forests, the strange blue fire circle and many more. Harker soon realizes that he is Dracula's prisoner and barely escapes alive. Meanwhile, Dracula is haunting Lucy Westerna, Mina Hurray's friend, and communicates with Renfield, a mad patient who uses insects, birds and rats to absorb their "life force". He is the only one who can detect Dracula when he arrives. Lucy begins to suspiciously waste away and Seward (Renfield's doctor) summons her old teacher, Van Helsing. Van Helsing is able to immediately detect Lucy's illness but refuses to recognize it and diagnoses her with blood loss. Doctor Seward, Helsing, Quincey, and Arthur (Lucy's boyfriend?) all contribute, but she still dies. After her death, many children begin to disappear and Helsing knows that this is Lucy's fault, so he tells the rest of them that she has actually turned into a vampire. They hunt her down, stake her, decapitate her and stuff her mouth with garlic. Around the same time, Jonathan Harker arrives from Budapest, where Mina marries him. Vampire hunters try to learn about vampires as much as possible through folklore legends and superstitions to understand their powers and weaknesses. Mina also plays an important role in this act, gathering relevant data about him from newspapers and magazines. They manage to discover all the properties he bought in London and destroy all his boxes with the earth he needs to be able to walk there (since Dracula can only walk and rest on the earth of his homeland), but they don't find all the properties which he bought in London. boxes because some of them are sent back to Transylvania. After supporting their plans, Dracula attacks Mina and feeds her his blood to control her, but not completely turn her into a vampire. Mina helps the group find Dracula's location using what she received from the Count, but urges the group not to reveal their plans for fear that Dracula might overhear. They discover that he is returning to Transylvania with the gypsies. They manage to ambush him, Harker slits his throat and Quincey, mortally wounded, stabs the Count in the heart. Dracula turns to dust, Mina recovers from vampirism, and Quincey dies. The last chapter is a note from