Gothic Realism And The Vampire Sub Cultures

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Since the 18th century, Vampires have ultimately transcended narrative boundaries and genre divides and the Vampire sub-cultures flourish in neo-gothic aesthetic from science fiction and fantasy, romantic and young adult literature and in celluloid. Vampire graphic narratives are finding increased popularity and have since developed into an “Iconic popular culture phenomenon drawing an obsession and fascination globally”. (Jacqueline, Ng, 2014) So what inspired this new genre of graphic narrative? Ghouls, ghosts and terrifying monsters have been around since the days of old, but the roots of horror graphic narrative begins in the late 18th century with Gothic Literature. To many the word Gothic suggests the supernatural, the sinister. To others it’s an erotic charged nightmare; a representation of undisclosed human desire. The term, "Gothic", was first used by Italian Renaissance artists as an insult to describe anything that did not originate from ancient Greece and Rome, a culture them deemed ‘civilised’. To them, it meant barbaric, wild, and dark, dismissing centuries of medieval art and architecture as crude and worthless. (Bloom, Clive, 2010, p. 20) “I believe the stones of Gothic revival architecture, the terrors painted by Gothic painters, and the words of the great Gothic novelists, amount to nothing less than a secret history of Britain itself during its greatest age of change.” (Graham-Dixon 2014) By the 19th century, “Gothic” began to signify a coincidental

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