For everyone who grew up on a staple diet of Mills and Boon novels, the ideal man was tall, dark and handsome. But as any Twihard will tell you, all that has changed. Now, the ideal man has pale skin, a penchant for drinking blood and his average age is 100. And oh yeah, he's a vampire.
If you're recoiling in horror or contorting your face in disgust, you probably haven't read or seen the various forms of vampire fiction out there. But if you have, you would know that vampires are popular like never before. Whether it's the bestselling “Twilight series” and “The Vampire Diaries” or “True Blood” and “Underworld”, these blood-suckers are everywhere.
And fans, especially female ones, are devouring them. In an interview, actor Robert Pattinson (Edward Cullen to the uninitiated) revealed that female fans, ranging in age from seven to 70, often came up to him asking him to bite them on the neck. Of course, Pattinson doesn't oblige saying “Look, I can't do it, it might hurt you”. So why are vampires all the rage suddenly? It's not that vampires are a new entity.
No dearth in pop culture
According to speculation by literary historian Brian Frost, the “belief in vampires and bloodsucking demons is as old as man himself”. However, the term vampire was not popularised until the early 18th century, after an influx of vampire superstition into Western Europe from areas where vampire legends were frequent, such as the Balkans and Eastern Europe.
And there has certainly been no dearth of books, films and television series on vampires. From the definitive vampire novel, “Dracula”, by Bram Stoker in 1897 and “Interview with the Vampire: The Vampire Chronicles” in 1994 (remember the casting coup with Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt?) to “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” that aired from 1997 to 2003 and “Daybreakers” in 2010, vampires have been with us for a very long time.
Madhavi M., an M. Phil student, who is midway through the “Twilight” series says, “I like mythology and I'm fascinated by vampires because they can exist at any point of time. In this series, the author, Stephenie Meyer, has dismissed many myths about vampires. She's reinterpreted them and watered it down because it's a love story.” She adds, “I think fantasy fiction regained popularity after the ‘Lord of the Rings' films. And after the Harry Potter series made it acceptable for witches and wizards to be one of us, it's now the turn of vampires.”
Pravina Shetty, mother of two young adults, says, “My niece gave me the first book, ‘Twilight', at the airport. Once I read that, I felt I had to read the others. It's more of a love story and it is fast paced, which is why I enjoyed it.”
Interestingly, according to a study conducted by the University of Missouri, teenage girls are attracted to the theme of romance and the message of abstinence in the “Twilight” series However, Herosha Tanya Gopal, who has just finished II PU, says, “These messages are not the reason why I like the books. I like them more because of how the vampires are portrayed. Though, I think that they are portrayed accurately only in ‘Underworld'.” Herosha, who admits to being sort of obsessed by vampires from a young age, says, “I like how vampires live, it's different from how we live our lives. I even went to college for a theme day dressed as a vampire complete with black clothes, fangs and blood coming out of the side of my mouth.” She says that the college authorities didn't object considering that even her lecturer came as a vampire.
But is this new-found obsession with vampires a trend only to eventually die out?
Siddharth Selvaraj, who has just completed his M.A. in Film Production from Boston University says, “It's all about the money. If you're a Hollywood film producer and you see that these films and series of a particular genre are doing well, you'll want to churn out more films of that genre. It's a matter of milking it for all it's worth.”
So this could mean that the vampire phase will last only as long as the films or series last. But vampire fans take heart. There is still plenty more to come, starting with the release of “Eclipse” at the end of the month. And as for what is so fascinating about vampires, perhaps, actor Ryan Kwanten, who plays Jason Stackhouse on “True Blood”, said it best.
Responding to a question on the sudden popularity of vampires during a television interview, he said, “Albert Einstein said the most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious, and for many people, vampires epitomise mystery.”
