The Open Graves, Open Minds Project began by unearthing depictions of the vampire and the undead in literature, art, and other media, then embraced werewolves (and representations of wolves and wild children), fairies, and other supernatural beings and their worlds. The Project extends to all narratives of the fantastic, the folkloric, and the magical, emphasising that sense of Gothic as enchantment rather than simply horror. Through this, OGOM is articulating an ethical Gothic, cultivating moral agency and creating empathy for the marginalised, monstrous or othered, including the disenchanted natural world.
Academic and cultural life is still persisting, thankfully. The Gothic creative spirit is resisting Gothic times! So, some announcements here on events, conferences, and edited collections.
The first two decades of the twenty-first century have seen a surge in interest in the strange and disturbing worlds created by Shirley Jackson. [. . .] What, then, has happened to invite new interest in Jackson’s work? Alice Vincent has referred to our current ‘strange and fractured’ times as possessing a certain ‘Shirley Jackson energy’. There is also a growing body of academic criticism of Jackson’s work.
The objective of “Theorizing Zombiism 2: Undead again” is to promote interdisciplinary scholarship on one of the most prevalent, yet critically understudied cultural metaphors in contemporary popular culture, namely zombies and zombiism.
The Victorian Popular Fiction Association is dedicated to fostering interest in understudied popular writers, literary genres and other cultural forms, and to facilitating the production of publishable research and academic collaborations amongst scholars of the popular.
We invite a broad, imaginative and interdisciplinary interpretation on the topic of ‘Victorian Inclusion and Exclusion’ and its relation to any aspect of Victorian popular literature and culture that addresses literal or metaphorical representations of the theme. Inter- and multidisciplinary approaches are welcome, as are papers that address poetry, drama, global literature, non-fiction, visual arts, journalism, historical and social contexts. Papers addressing works from the ‘long Victorian period’ (i.e. before 1837 and after 1901) and on neo-Victorian texts/media are also welcome.
Angela Carter, one of the twentieth-century’s most acclaimed novelists, came of age as a writer in 1960s Clifton, where she experienced life in post-war Bristol, looking at a horizon bombed-out and derelict, but also booming with reconstruction schemes. On this tour through Clifton and Hotwells, we will revisit the places and counterculture that inspired her writing, in a society undergoing transformation and renewal so profound, that she declared: “Truly, it felt like Year One.”
‘The Death of Marie Emily ‘Netta’ Fornario in 1929′
Marie Emily ‘Netta’ Fornario was born in 1897 in Cairo to an Italian doctor and English mother. Her mother died while she was still an infant so her maternal grandparents raised her in England. In 1922, despite spending her youth in Italy, she struggled to put down roots and eventually returned to Britain. She lived in the town of Bishop Stortford in Hertfordshire, which was a known occultist hangout at the time. Bishop Stortford was home of ‘The Grange’, an institute run by the prominent occultist and freemason, Theodore Moriarty. Netta was also said to have been initiated into the secretive order, ‘Alpha et Omega Temple’, which was a branch of the Order of the Golden Dawn. Members of the order were devoted to Hermetic magical study and traditions and even boasted famous members such as W.B. Yeats and Aleister Crowley.
In 1929 Netta planned a trip to the Scottish Island of Iona as she was drawn by its mystical past and she believed she had lived there in a past life. Her aim was to contact the island’s fairies/ancient spirits. Once she arrived in Iona, she stayed with Mrs Macrae in the village of Traymore. During her stay they would have long talks about mystical phenomenon and Netta would share her knowledge of the occult in exchange for tales of Hebridean folklore. Netta was known to fall into trances that would last a week at a time and became increasingly obsessed with contacting the spirits. Netta was believed to have an ability to connect with supernatural energies and had an advanced knowledge of Greey Ray Elementals (a type of fairy) and she was also told to be sensitive to other dimensions using her third eye. She would often go missing for long periods while walking the beaches and moors in her attempts to channel the island’s energy and reach out to the other side. Soon, she began to speak of visions and messages from the beyond and her host and fellow travellers became concerned about her.
On the fateful morning of the 17th of November 1929 Netta seemed out of sorts and frantic. She urgently wanted to return to London, muttering that she was being disturbed telepathically. She talked of a boat sailing across the sky and messages from another dimension. Unfortunately, she was unable to leave the island that day as there were no ferries returning to the mainland, so she was forced to stay the night. She was mysteriously missing the next morning, however, on the 18th of November 1929.
As more time passed, a search party was sent out to look for any sign of Netta on the island. After two days and no luck, they searched Sithean Mor, or Fairy Hill, near The Machair. This was an area of interest to Netta, and she had spent time there trying to contact the spirits. She was found strewn across the top of the grassy mound wearing only a large black cloak and completely lifeless. Her only belongings at the time of her death was a blackened silver cross worn around her neck and a small silver dagger. Carved into the grass turf under her body was a large cross shape which seemed to have been made in a desperate hurry. Her body was also covered with scratches; the soles of her feet were damaged and bloody as though she had been running barefoot for her life. These mysterious elements about her death are coupled with the location of The Fairy Hill where she lay, which was thought to be a gateway linking the magic dimension to the human realm. It is thought that Netta believed her life was in danger and she was frantically trying to defend herself from this imaginary assailant in her final moments. Her face was distorted with terror and she was, in fact, scared to death. Her cause of death was documented as ‘exposure to the elements’ and she was later buried on the island at St Oran’s Chapel Cemetery.
Was Netta a victim of her own paranoid delusions? Did her obsession with black magic and the occult prove fatal? Or did she succeed in reaching out and travelling to another dimension?
Here, in all their beauty and glory are my pick of the greatest vintage vampire shorts; seductive and predatory, terrifying and comic, vital and metaphoric, doomed and daring!
THE VAMPIRE Marusia is courted by a young man who she later sees eating a corpse laid out in the church. Falling victim to the vampire, she’s carried out via a hole under the door & buried at a crossroad, appearing again as a flower. Afanasev, Russian Folk & Fairy Tales (1855-67)
THE BLACK VAMPYRE (1819). The first black vampire, the first vampire story by an American writer and the first vampire anti-slavery narrative. You can read about this remarkable text in OGOM’s forthcoming book on Polidori: the Romantic Vampire and its Progeny
LUELLA MILLER A psychic vampire story written by Mary E. Wilkins Freeman, c.1902. Luella drains everyone she comes into contact with, whilst retaining a youthful vitality herself. Pyschic vampires steal souls rather than blood, & energy, ideas & creativity ooh!
WAKE NOT THE DEAD (1823) Brunhilde is restored from beyond the grave at the instruction of her grieving husband; turning vampire/serpent, she preys on her own children in imitation of female demon Lilith. The work of Ernst Raupach, the tale was misattributed to Tieck
THE VAMPIRE MAID is written by Hume Nisbet. It was published in Stories Weird and Wonderful 1900. A tenant succumbs to the charms of his landlady’s raven haired daughter Ariadne. He awakes one night to find her sucking blood through the vein in his arm
VAMPIRISMO or ‘The Vampire’ by E.T. A. Hoffman, 1821; predates Carmilla & is indebted to vampirish Lord Byron. Aurelia, turns vampire & shifts from sexually alluring girl to used up old crone, enacting every husband’s worst nightmare. Image: Rounseville & Tchérina in Tales of Hoffman
A TRUE STORY OF A VAMPIRE by Eric Count Stenbock, (1894). A vampire desolates the home of young Carmela, when she is 13 years old in Styria. As an adult she falls under the spell of the vampire and has no ill will towards him. Indebted to Carmilla, the story predates Dracula.
THE DEATHLY LOVER or ‘La morte amoureuse’ French vampire by celebrated writer & critic Théophile Gautier (1843).The story of Lord Romualdo and his undead lover Clarimonda. Baudelaire dedicated Les Fleurs du mal which contains ‘Le Vampire’ to Gautier
THE FAMILY OF VOURDALAK Russian vampire story written by Aleksei Tolstoy, published in 1894; successfully fuses the sexual allegory of vampirism with the folklore of peasants; cites Calmet’s Hungarian vourdalaks who return from their graves to prey upon their own families
COUNT MAGNUS M.R. James story about an undead count in a mausoleum who has acquired a knowledge of the Black Mass (1904). James was influenced by De Nugis Curialium a twelfth-century work on ghosts, vampires and wood nymphs. He was also a huge fan of Le Fanu’s Carmilla, 1872.
THE GOOD LADY DUCAYNE uses transfusion, the very medical procedure by which Van Helsing desperately tries to save Lucy Westenra in Dracula, as the mechanism for her own vampirism. Mary Elizabeth Braddon’s vampire story was published in same year as Stoker’s novel in 1897
LET LOOSE Mary Cholmondeley,1890. Stylish vampire story by set in the fictional village of Wet Waste-in-the-Wolds; takes as its starting point lines from a Victorian sonnet: ‘The dead abide with us though stark and cold Earth seems to grip them they are with us still’
THE PARASITE An 1894 novella by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle about a psychic vampire Miss Penelosa, a small pale creature who requires a crutch to walk, practices mesmerism and the evil eye & transforms into a ‘monstrous parasite’ who creeps into her victim’s form.
CLARIMONDE Vampire courtesan, Gautier, Paris, 1836. A version of La Morte Amoureuse.(above). ‘If thou wilt be mine the angels themselves will be jealous of thee. Tear off that funeral shroud. I am beauty. I am youth. I am life. Come to me. Our lives will flow on like a dream in one eternal kiss’ (trans 1908).
THE ROOM IN THE TOWER E. F. Benson. 1912 vampire short in which a man is trapped in the same nightmare for 15 years after being given the room in the tower which contains the portrait of Julia Stone, a suicide. Benson went on to publish Spook Stories in 1928
FOR THE BLOOD IS THE LIFE one of the most memorable vampire tales ever written, appearing in Wandering Ghosts by F. Marion Crawford, 1911 “I have seen an evil thing this night. I have seen how the dead drink the blood of the living. And the blood is the life”
SCHOOL FOR THE UNSPEAKABLE A vampire story by Manly Wade Wellman published in Weird Tales (1937). Three demonic school boys torture a new boy. They turn out to have been murdered 50 years earlier by the master of the school and have been reborn as vampires. The story plays on the idea that murder victims or suicides (traditionally buried at crossroads) are particularly susceptible to becoming undead and may rise again as vampires!
In April of 1819, a London periodical, the New Monthly Magazine, published The Vampyre: A Tale by Lord Byron. Notice of its publication quickly appeared in papers in the United States.
Byron was at the time enjoying remarkable popularity and this new tale, supposedly by the famous poet, caused a sensation as did its reprintings in Boston’s Atheneum (15 June) and Baltimore’s Robinson’s Magazine (26 June).
The Vampyre did away with the East European peasant vampire of old. It took this monster out of the forests, gave him an aristocratic lineage and placed him into the drawing rooms of Romantic-era England. It was the first sustained fictional treatment of the vampire and completely recast the folklore and mythology on which it drew.
By July, Byron’s denial of authorship was being reported and by August the true author was discovered, John Polidori.
In the meantime, an American response, The Black Vampyre: A Legend of St. Domingo, by one Uriah Derick D’Arcy, appeared. D’Arcy explicitly parodies The Vampyre and even suggests that Lord Ruthven, Polidori’s British vampire aristocrat, had his origins in the Carribean. A later reprinting in 1845 attributed The Black Vampyre to a Robert C Sands; however, many believe the author was more likely a Richard Varick Dey (1801–1837), a near anagram of the named author.
Front page of The Black Vampyre.Author provided
What is so remarkable about this story is that it is an anti-slavery narrative from the early 1800s which also contains America’s first vampire who is Black. It is also perhaps the first short story to advocate the emancipation of slaves, released 14 years before Lydia Child published An Appeal in Favor of That Class of Americans Called Africans, which is widely considered the first anti-slavery book.
Surprisingly, this ground-breaking text is relatively unknown, even in Gothic circles. It appears in none of the seminal histories of the vampire, for example, and is not included in any of the classic and recent collections of vampire short fiction. There is one online edition, a labour of love, excellently prepared, to enable the teaching of the text by the Americans, Ed White and Duncan Faherty.
A mixed union
The Black Vampyre also explores the idea of mixed marriage at a time when interracial love was deemed taboo.
Darcy’s narrative begins with a slave-owner Mr Personne, in what is now Haiti repeatedly trying to kill a 10-year-old slave. As much as he tries though the corpse keeps reviving. Personne orders the child to be burned but the boy moves with supernatural speed and miraculously causes the slave-owner to be flung into the fire instead. Before Mr Personne dies, his wife informs him that the cradle of their unbaptised son is empty apart from his skin, bones, and nails.
Some years later we return to Personne’s widow, Euphemia, who is in mourning for her third husband. She is visited by two strangers, an extremely handsome Black man, dressed as a Moorish prince, accompanied by a pale European boy. He charms her with his elegance and beauty and rapidly wins her hand in marriage, which takes place that evening. That same night he reveals that he is a vampire and converts Euphemia to his bloodthirsty set.
Monsters aside, Published in 1819, an interracial marriage would have made for shocking reading – not to mention between a former slave and his one-time mistress.
Vampirish children
Married to a monster and now a monster herself (in the eyes of society too), Euphemia learns that the prince’s pale young companion is her vanished son – now also a vampire. The prince gives the boy named Zemba back to Euphemia along with her first husband’s money so they can escape to Europe.
On their way, they find themselves in a cavern with a group of noble-looking vampires and a crowd of slaves. The prince addresses the crowd in the language of revolutionary Enlightenment:
Our fetters discarded, and our chains dissolved, we shall stand liberated, – redeemed, – emancipated, – and disenthralled by the irresistible genius of UNIVERSAL EMANCIPATION!!
This draws on the then recent Haitian Revolution (1791–1804), which ended slavery and French control of the colony. The vampires, like the slaves, are forced to exist on the fringes of society and so are rebelling against their lot in life. However, unlike Haiti’s, the rebellion is thwarted by a group of soldiers and the vampires are staked to death.
Illustration depicting combat between French and Haitian troops during the Haitian Revolution.Wikimedia
Luckily Euphemia and Zemba escape, sipping a potion that can restore a vampire to the human state. They go on to lead a happy family life, Zemba is finally baptised as Barabbas and life goes on. That is until Euphemia gives birth to a mixed-race son (presumably the prince’s) with “vampirish propensities”. This is the first instance of a mixed-race vampire ever recorded in literature.
Important for being the first American vampire text and for depicting the first Black vampire in literature, The Black Vampyre has a contemporary resonance. The racism cultivated by slavery lives on; the struggle against it and the dreams of universal humanity expressed in the Haitian Revolution continues. The links The Black Vampyre makes between racial oppression and a vampiric society, though ambivalent, make its resurrection worthwhile. The crude goriness and spookiness of Gothic vampire narratives can still have an ethical force.
We’re excited to invite you to our forthcoming event to explore Gothic dreams of new worlds and the creatures that inhabit them, notably Mary Shelley’s plague world, John Polidori’s vampyre, the Black Vampyre, and the ghosts of World War 1.
Visit Polidori’s uncanny resting place in a virtual tour of St Pancras Old Church, in the same graveyard where Mary and Percy Shelley’s courtship found life, and contemplate Gothic new worlds via presentations and performances:
‘The Stories Are Begun’ with Marcus Sedgwick (novelist) ‘Gothic Afterworlds’ with Dr Karl Bell (historian) ‘The Romantic vampire and its Progeny’ with Dr Sam George (vampire expert) ‘Enlightenment and its Shadows’ with Dr Bill Hughes (Gothic scholar)
Discover the first black vampire in literature, inspired by Polidori, and pay homage to the famous story-writing contest at the Villa Diodati, writing Gothic flash-fiction in a workshop led by Dr Kaja Franck (literary werewolves) and Daisy Butcher (botanical gothic).
The event is free and online but you need to register and places are selling out fast. To book, please visit our Gothic Dreams of New Worlds page where you will also find resources as background to the event and an inspiration to the stories and flash fiction writing!!
call for proposals for papers on how forms of the Gothic deal with the critical issues arising from racism, social injustice, populism, mass infection, and the relation of each of these to contagion in at least one of its many forms – the most pressing issues of our current moment — now and throughout world history.
In the world of High Fantasy, authors create fictional worlds that often reflect human religiosity and theological themes in new and creative ways. Through theological and religious analyses of high fantasy and fantasy series, the editors invite paper proposals for a volume on the intersection of fantasy and theology.
This major interdisciplinary international conference aims to examine and expand debates around vampires in all their many aspects. We therefore invite researchers from a range of academic backgrounds to re/consider vampires as a phenomenon that reaches across multiple sites of production and consumption, from literature and film to theatre and games to music and fashion and beyond. What accounts for this Gothic character’s undying popular appeal, even in today’s postmodern, digital, commercialized world? How does vampirism circulate within and comment upon mass culture?
Supernatural Studies invites submissions for a special issue, inspired by the current crisis, on supernatural engagements with disease, broadly conceived. We welcome essays that explore this theme through explicitly monstrous tropes, e.g. zombies, vampires, parasitism, haunting, and other uncanny embodiments of sickness and contagion. We also invite investigations of narratives that deploy the supernatural to engage existing cultural “maladies” that infectious diseases routinely expose and exacerbate: e.g., economic precarity, healthcare inequities, media mis/disinformation, science skepticism and denial, environmental challenges, and experiences of alienation
5. Finally, we’d like to welcome and congratulate the new Centre for Fantasy and the Fantastic at the University of Glasgow. To launch the Centre, there will be ‘a lecture by acclaimed fantasy author Ellen Kushner, and a discussion panel on fantasy with Terri Windling, Professor Brian Attebery, and Dr Robert Maslen.’ This is an online event on 16 September 2020–use the link above to book.
Sam George and Bill Hughes, eds., Open Graves, Open Minds: Representations of Vampires and the Undead from the Enlightenment to the Present Day (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2013)
The Open Graves, Open Minds Project began in 2010, in part as a response to Stephenie Meyer’s hugely successful Twilight series; a Young Adult vampire romance series, the first of which was Twilight (2005). We launched the Project with an exciting conference on the role of the vampire in culture, out of which came our first edited collection, Open Graves, Open Minds: Representations of Vampires and the Undead from the Enlightenment to the Present Day (2013). Since then we have explored a host of other supernatural creatures in all modes of fantastic and Gothic writing but centred upon the paranormal romance, frequently that for YA readers, and with the vampire always lurking in the background. Now, Meyer’s sparkling revenant Edward Cullen is back, with her new book, Midnight Sun, which tells the paranormal romance between the mortal Bella and Edward in the latter’s voice. The first chapters of this appeared on line in 2008 but Twilight fans have had to wait twelve years to get the full novel.
Stephenie Meyer, Midnight Sun (London: Atom, 2020)
The release of Midnight Sun has inspired some useful articles on vampire romance. On Goodreads, there are some very interesting interviews about YA vampire romances, with Meyer herself, and with Renée Ahdieh, author of The Damned; Caleb Roehrig, author of The Fell of Dark; Zoraida Córdova and Natalie C. Parker, editors of Vampires Never Get Old: Tales with Fresh Bite. They discuss why there has been a resurgence in the genre and what directions it might take.
Vampire romance is not confined to Young Adult readers; the Times of India has some suggestions for ‘Vampire Romances To Sink Your Teeth Into‘, both YA and adult. The Tor website (always an excellent resource on fantastic fiction) has an informative article on the persistence of vampire fiction by Zoraida Córdova, ‘Vampires Never Left: A History of Vampires in Young Adult Fiction‘. This mentions some novels that I’ve not come across before and which sound very interesting.
Of course, the vampire has a history from way before Twilight. In this BBC Radio 4 broadcast, ‘Vampires in Gothic Literature‘, Greg Jenner, Dr Corin Throsby, and Ed Gamble ‘look at the role of vampires in Gothic Literature of the 19th century and the effect on modern day pop culture.’
Hybridity is something that I have always found interesting to explore in relation to the gothic. I’ve blogged about fairy tale hybridity in relation to Beauty and the Beast and commented on the Wellcome’s ‘Making Nature’ exhibition on faux taxonomy and hybrid creatures as well as responding to a BBC article on fictional and folkloric representations of hybridity: Hybrid Creatures from the Owl Man to the Demon Dog In this post I approach hybridity via demonology for the first time.
One of the reasons why a negative view of hybridity has developed (apart from those taxonomies which outlawed anything that was not ‘pure’ stock labelling them ‘monstrous’) is because of the iconography surrounding demons. The process of cross-fertilisation can of course create something new, more than the sum of the original parts. It moves us away from notions of identity which are either/or, either one thing or another. Demons work against this positive idea of hybridity because they are shown to be flawed, malformed, and akin to the devil, and also because they are cast out and forever in a state of exile or unbelonging.
In Christianity demons have their origins in the Fallen Angels who follow Satan when he was cast out of heaven. As Christianity spread, Pagan gods, goddesses, and nature spirits were incorporated into the ranks of demons. Descriptions from antiquity portray demons as shapeshifters who can assume any form, animal or human or hybrid. Some theologians and witch hunters say that demons have no corporeal form, and only give the illusion that they are in animal or human form (they create voices out of air that mimic people, for example).
In Judaic lore, demons are invisible, but can see themselves and each other. They cast no shadows (linking them to Dracula). They only assume bodies to copulate. In Christian lore demons assume forms that are black, such as black dogs, and other animals. Because they are evil they are imperfect, shown in flaws such as malformed limbs and cloven feet. Demons are described as unclean, if they make their bodies out of air, or occupy a living body, they exude a stench. Throughout history the activities of demons has been thought to cause illness and disease. Demons can send bad weather, pests such as armies of rats and mice and swarms of locusts. Such belief holds that humankind is in constant danger of demonic attack in some form, and constant vigilance is required. The greatest danger occurs at night when sleeping humans are at their most vulnerable, births and deaths are perilous times, as are nights on which marriages are consummated. At these times demons are better able to wreak havoc!
Demons were believed to aid witches during the inquisition, they acted as familiars, taking the form of animals, participating in sabbats. They can also assume beautiful and seductive forms, acting as sexual predators. By the C14th it was accepted that demons had sex with humans, in the form of Incubi and Succubi, or even as Satan himself. They are organised into hierarchies, according to GRIMOIRES or inquisition writings. Such magic books give the names, duties, seals, incantations and rituals around summoning and controlling demons.
The DICTIONNAIRE INFERNAL describes demons which are organised into hierarchies. It was written by Jacques Auguste Simon Collin de Plancy and first published in 1818. There are several editions of the book; perhaps the most famous is the 1863 edition, which included illustrations by Louis Le Breton depicting the appearances of several of the demons. I am excited to say that the Bibliothèque nationale de France has scanned this book and made it available for download here
This work together with James, George Frazer’s The Golden Bough (1890) and a used copy of Rosemary Ellen Guiley’s Encyclopedia of Demons and Demonology (2009), inspired my initial interest in demons. My research is not about poltergeists or demonic possession, it is instead focused on discovering wonderfully hybrid, magical creatures. You might like to browse some of my favourites below:
MARCHOSIAS. Fallen angel and 35th of 72 Spirits of Solomon. He is a marquis ruling 30 legions of demons. He appears as a she-wolf with griffin wings and a serpent’s tail. A shapeshifter he will take human form. Once a member of the angelic order of dominions, he is set to return after 1,200 years.
ADREMLECH. A Chieften of hell. Grand Chancellor of Demons, President of the Devil’s General Council. Governor of the Devil’s Wardrobe. Often portrayed as a mule with a peacock’s tail.
ANDRAS. Fallen angel and 6rd of the 72 Spirits of Soloman. Wonderfully hybrid, he appears in the form of an owl-headed demon who rides a black wolf! He creates discord and kills his enemies with a gleaming silver sword.
AMDUSCIAS. Fallen angel 67th of the 72 Spirits of Solomon. Appears first as a unicorn. He will take on human shape but this will cause musical instruments to be heard but not seen. Trees sway at the sound of his voice He gives humans the power to make trees fall and he gives excellent familiars!
HALPAS. Fallen angel and demon. He is an Earl who appears in the form of a giant female stork and speaks with a croaky voice. He burns whole towns and takes a sword to the wicked. He rules over 26 legions of Hell.
BAAL. Fertility deity now a fallen angel and demon. 1st of the 72 Spirits of Solomon. A King ruling 66 legions of demons. He is triple-headed with a cat, human and toad head. He can bestow the gift of invisibility and wisdom.
GAAP. Fallen angel and 33rd of the 72 Spirits of Solomon. Prince in Hell, ruling 66 legions of demons. Humanlike, with huge bat wings, he can make you insentient or move you from place to place. Takes familiars away from magicians!
The editors of The Swan’s Egg invite submissions for the journal’s first issue. Essays on Hans Christian Andersen by undergraduate, MA, and PhD students written in English or in Danish are welcome, and should be around 4,000 words in length.
The Chichester Centre for Fairy Tales, Fantasy and Speculative Fiction seeks articles, book reviews and creative writing relating to literary and historical approaches to fairy tales, fantasy, Gothic, magic realism, science fiction and speculative fiction for Gramarye, its peer-reviewed journal published by the University of Chichester.
This call for papers reaches out to scholars interested in working on interpretations of the CBS series The Vampire Diaries. This American supernatural teen drama features a diverse set of characters, both dead and undead, while touching on topics such as friendship, romance, adulthood, as well as depression, and aging. So far, no book length work has dealt with this complex series, and it is our aim to publish an in-depth analysis consisting of 10-11 chapters that offer critical and creative readings of this series
Prof. Sam George at the Polidori symposium, 6-7 April 2019, Keats House, Hampstead
It is with great pleasure that I announce the promotion of Sam George to Associate Professorship. I’ve known Sam for many years and for the last ten we have worked together founding and developing the Open Graves, Open Minds Project.
Sam’s current research is exploring Gothic fairies, with the prospect of a book on the topic (see, too, our forthcoming ‘Ill met by moonlight’ conference). She is also formulating ideas towards an ethical Gothic; this is included in an impact case study for REF entitled ‘Open Graves, Open Minds: Promoting empathy and interrogating difference through public engagement with Gothic narratives’ and there will be a symposium and publications. And she is conducting an investigation into the cultural significance of the shadow, which will bear fruit as her next monograph, In the Kingdom of Shadows; Optics, Dark Folklore and the Gothic.
I am very proud of what Sam has achieved with OGOM; it has been immensely rewarding to work with her and it is wonderful that her work has been recognised in this way.
Marina Warner
Marina Warner is a writer of fiction, criticism and history; her works include novels and short stories as well as studies of art, myths, symbols and fairytales.
Centre for Myth Studies, University of Essex
The Centre It promotes the study of myth, from ancient to modern, and raises awareness of the importance of myth within the contemporary world.
Mythopoeic Society
The Mythopoeic Society is a non-profit organization devoted to the study of mythopoeic literature, particularly the works of members of the informal Oxford literary circle known as the “Inklings.”
Sheffield Gothic
Sheffield Gothic is a collective group of Postgraduate Students in the School of English at The University of Sheffield with a shared interest in all things Gothic.
American Gothic Studies
American Gothic Studies is the official journal of the Society for the Study of the American Gothic (SSAG), which promotes and advances the study of the American Gothic
Echinox Journal
Caietele Echinox is a biannual academic journal in world and comparative literature, dedicated to the study of the social, historical, cultural, religious, literary and arts imaginaries
Folklore
Journal of The Folklore Society. A fully peer-reviewed international journal of folklore and folkloristics, in printed and digital format
Gothic Nature
Gothic Nature: New Directions in Ecohorror and the Ecogothic
Gothic Studies
The official journal of the International Gothic Association considers the field of Gothic studies from the eighteenth century to the present day.
International Journal of Young Adult Literature
an academic peer-reviewed journal dedicated to publishing original and serious scholarship on young adult literature from all parts of the world.
Irish Journal of Gothic and Horror Studies
The Irish Journal of Gothic and Horror Studies (ISSN 2009-0374) is a peer-reviewed, interdisciplinary, electronic publication dedicated to the study of Gothic and horror literature, film, new media and television.
Journal of Popular Romance Studies
The Journal of Popular Romance Studies is a double-blind peer reviewed interdisciplinary journal exploring popular romance fiction and the logics, institutions, and social practices of romantic love in global popular culture.
Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts
An interdisciplinary journal devoted to the study of the fantastic in Literature, Art, Drama, Film, and Popular Media
Monsters and the Monstrous
Monsters and the Monstrous is a biannual peer reviewed global journal that serves to explore the broad concept of “The Monster” and “The Monstrous” from a multifaceted inter-disciplinary perspective.
Studies in the Fantastic
Studies in the Fantastic is a journal devoted to the Speculative, Fantastic, and Weird in literature and other arts
Supernatural Studies
Supernatural Studies is a peer-reviewed journal that promotes rigorous yet accessible scholarship in the growing field of representations of the supernatural, the speculative, the uncanny, and the weird.
The Lion and the Unicorn
The Lion and the Unicorn, an international theme- and genre-centered journal, is committed to a serious, ongoing discussion of literature for children.
Victorian Popular Fictions Journal
Victorian Popular Fictions is the journal of the Victorian Popular Fiction Association. The VPFA is a forum for the dissemination and discussion of new research into nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century popular narrativeo
Related Links
Aarne-Thompson-Uther Index
The Aarne-Thompson-Uther Index is a classification numeric system created to group similar folktales from different cultures
ACADEmy
LSAD centre for research into Art, Curatorial Studies, Applied Design and Art and Design Education
African Religions
With the Yoruba Religion Reader and similar resources
Angela Carter Society
Promoting the study and appreciation of the life and work of Angela Carter
Art Passions
Art Passions: Fairy Tales are the Myths We Live By
Asian Gothic
Asian Gothic appears as an attempt to make sense of the vast and diverse body of Asian literature, film, television, games, comics and other forms of cultural production by reading these texts from a Gothic perspective
British Association for Romantic Studies (BARS)
The UK’s leading national organisation for promoting the study of Romanticism and the history and culture of the period from which it emerged.
British Association for Victorian Studies (BAVS)
The British Association for Victorian Studies (BAVS) is a multidisciplinary organisation dedicated to the advancement and dissemination of knowledge about the Victorian period.
Byron Society
The Byron Society celebrates the life and works of Lord George Gordon Byron (1788-1824), a poet, traveller and revolutionary
Cambridge Research Network for Fairy-Tale Studies
The Cambridge Research Network for Fairy-Tale Studies is an open space at the University of Cambridge aimed at connecting researchers with an interest in fairy tales across different disciplines and scholarly perspectives.
Carterhaugh School
We give lectures and teach courses on fairy tales, folklore, witches, writing, and more. Basically, your ultimate fantasy college courses
Centre for Myth Studies, University of Essex
The Centre It promotes the study of myth, from ancient to modern, and raises awareness of the importance of myth within the contemporary world.
Deborah Hyde
Deborah Hyde wants to know why people believe in weird stuff. She attributes her fascination with the supernatural to having spent her childhood with mad aunties. She approaches the subject using the perspectives of psychology and history.
Fairyist: The Fairy Investigation Society
A website that will gather together sources, links, bibliographical references and discussions on fairies and related supernatural creatures
Folklore Society
The Folklore Society (FLS) is a learned society, based in London, devoted to the study of all aspects of folklore and tradition, including: ballads, folktales, fairy tales, myths, legends, traditional song and dance, folk plays, games, seasonal events, ca
Ghoul Guides
Home to the Ghoul Guides – a digital multimedia project devoted to exploring, understanding, and enjoying the wonders and weirdness of the Gothic
Gothic Feminism
Gothic Feminism is a research project based at the University of Kent which seeks to re-engage with theories of the Gothic and reflect specifically upon the depiction of the Gothic heroine in film
Gothic Herts Reading Group
This site is our one-stop platform for discussing our latest Gothic texts, from journal articles and press pieces, to full length books both old and new
Gothic Women Project
2023: The Year of Gothic Women. An interdisciplinary project devoted to spotlighting undervalued and understudied women writers
Haunted Shores
Haunted Shores Research Network, dedicated to investigating coasts and littoral space in Gothic, horror, and fantastic multimedia
Hellebore magazine
HELLEBORE is a UK-based small press devoted to British folk horror and the occult. Maria J. Pérez Cuervo publishes the magazine twice a year, on Beltane and Samhain
MEARCSTAPA
monsters: the experimental association for the research of cryptozoology through scholarly theory and practical application
Mermaids of the British Isles
a history of mermaids in the arts and cultural imagination of our early islands, which will map the place of these beguiling, and often deadly, figures in the national maritime imaginary, and explore our ancestors’ persistent reimagining of the mermaid
Open Folklore
Open Folklore is devoted to increasing the number of useful resources, published and unpublished, available in open access form for folklore studies and the communities with which folklorists partner
PCA Vampire Studies
A site dedicated to the Vampire Studies Area of the Pop Culture Association
Pook Press
Publisher of Vintage Illustrated Fairy Tales, Folk Tales and Children’s Classics
Romance Scholarship DB
This Romance Scholarship Database is therefore intended as a tool to assist popular romance scholars in their research into modern popular romance novels
RomanceWiki
A wiki resource for romance fiction authors, texts, and publishers
Science Fiction and Fantasy Research Database
The Science Fiction and Fantasy Research Database is a freely available online resource designed to help students and researchers locate secondary sources for the study of the science fiction and fantasy and associated genres.
Sophie Lancaster Foundation
The charity, known as The Sophie Lancaster Foundation, will focus on creating respect for and understanding of subcultures in our communities.
Supernatural Cities
Supernatural Cities is an interdisciplinary network of humanities and social science scholars of urban environments and the supernatural.
Supernatural Studies Association
The Supernatural Studies Association is an organization dedicated to the academic study of representations of the supernatural, the speculative, the uncanny, and the weird across periods and disciplines.
The Association for the Study of Buffy+
The mission of the Association is to promote the scholarship of Buffy+ Studies, focusing on inclusivity, intersectionality, and excellence. We define Buffy+ Studies as the scholarly exploration of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and its related texts.
The Society for the Study of the American Gothic (SSAG)
The Society for the Study of the American Gothic (SSAG) was established in 2023 to promote and advance the study of the American Gothic through research, teaching, and publication
The Thinker's Garden
we also love Plotinus and the Renaissance Platonists, as well as the Transcendentalists and Romantics. We are also drawn to the peculiarities of the Theosophists and hermeticists of the nineteenth century
Vamped
Vamped is a general interest non-fiction vampire site. We publish interviews, investigations, lists, opinions, reviews and articles on various topics.
Vampire Studies Association
TThe Vampire Studies Association (VSA) was founded by Anthony Hogg . . .“to establish vampire studies as a multidisciplinary field by promoting, disseminating and publishing contributions to vampire scholarship
Victorian Popular Fiction Association
The Association is committed to the revival of interest in understudied popular writers, literary genres and other cultural forms.
Wells at the World's End
I am reading through the complete works of H G Wells, in chronological order. This blog is for my jottings, as I go along.
YA Literature, Media, and Culture
YALMC is a resource for those of us researching, writing, writing about, interested in Young Adult Literature, Media, and Culture.
YA Studies Association (YASA)
The YA Studies Association (YASA) is an international organisation existing to increase the knowledge of, and research on, YA literature, media, and related fields
