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A review by heddas_bookgems
Carmilla by J. Sheridan Le Fanu
4.0
“For some nights I slept profoundly; but still every morning I felt the same lassitude, and a languor weighed upon me all day. I felt myself a changed girl. A strange melancholy was stealing over me, a melancholy that I would not have interrupted. Dim thoughts of death began to open, and an idea that I was slowly sinking took gentle, and, somehow, not unwelcome possession of me.”
When Laura is young she has a very vivid nightmare about a woman that clung to her chest and bit her. When she and her father, some time later, witnesses an accident with a carriage from their window, they come to the rescue. They decide to take in the daughter, Carmilla, to come back to strength. But then Carmilla begins to behave strangely and inflammable.
Carmilla, a gothic novella about the upir, better known under the name vampires, that predates the most known novel about vampires, Dracula. It’s been said that Bram Stoker was inspired by this novel by the Irish author Sheridan Le Fanu that was published between 1871-72. And this is without a doubt recognizable.
Beginning of this year, in my vampire month, I read Dracula for the first time. Although I enjoyed reading this classic, it was kind of sexist and drawn out. This short novella by Le Fanu is ten times smaller but also ten times more enjoyable. It’s revolutionary for it’s time period as it’s about sapphic love and suppressed sexual desire. While all the time it’s covered in a warm blanket of philosophical melancholy prose. I really enjoyed this book and would consider this the real founder of vampire fiction from now on.
When Laura is young she has a very vivid nightmare about a woman that clung to her chest and bit her. When she and her father, some time later, witnesses an accident with a carriage from their window, they come to the rescue. They decide to take in the daughter, Carmilla, to come back to strength. But then Carmilla begins to behave strangely and inflammable.
Carmilla, a gothic novella about the upir, better known under the name vampires, that predates the most known novel about vampires, Dracula. It’s been said that Bram Stoker was inspired by this novel by the Irish author Sheridan Le Fanu that was published between 1871-72. And this is without a doubt recognizable.
Beginning of this year, in my vampire month, I read Dracula for the first time. Although I enjoyed reading this classic, it was kind of sexist and drawn out. This short novella by Le Fanu is ten times smaller but also ten times more enjoyable. It’s revolutionary for it’s time period as it’s about sapphic love and suppressed sexual desire. While all the time it’s covered in a warm blanket of philosophical melancholy prose. I really enjoyed this book and would consider this the real founder of vampire fiction from now on.