27 pages • 54 minutes read
John PolidoriThe Vampyre
Fiction | Short Story | Adult | Published in 1819A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Literary Devices
Melodrama
Gothic fiction is often melodramatic, featuring larger-than-life personalities and appeals to extreme displays of emotion. The melodrama of the Gothic is part of Romanticism’s pushback against the Enlightenment and rationality. In melodrama, the characters are flat and use greatly exaggerated dialogue for emotional appeal. The goal of melodrama is to elicit emotional reactions in the audience, such as horror and sadness. Melodrama often relies on sweeping themes about human nature, such as Polidori’s theme of Good Versus Evil.
Aubrey is an inherently melodramatic hero. He is supremely naïve and views the world through romantic storybooks and poetry. His view of the world is flat and melodramatic: Ruthven is a romantic hero, while Ianthe is the epitome of nature’s beauty and innocence. In The Vampyre, melodrama substitutes high emotional appeal for character development, allowing Polidori to keep the work highly condensed and fast-paced throughout its relatively simple plot.
Foreshadowing
The tragic ending of The Vampyre is foreshadowed throughout the story. Ruthven’s attraction to virginal young women at the parties he attends is evident from the outset. When Aubrey learns that he ruined one such woman and appears to be pursuing another, Aubrey briefly cuts tie with his companion. While he is traveling by himself in Greece, Aubrey’s love interest, Ianthe, regales him with tales about vampires. When Ianthe herself is killed by a vampire bite, Aubrey suspects Ruthven. Aubrey’s sister’s death is foreshadowed by every interaction between women and Ruthven.
The short story has a single revelation: Ruthven’s true identity. This revelation is the object of the narrative’s suspense and conflict. Polidori’s frequent foreshadowing bends the entire story’s framework around the suspense of this one revelation.
Tragic Flaw
Aubrey demonstrates two tragic flaws. The first is his skepticism towards the supernatural. He persists in “persuading [Ianthe], that there could be no truth in her fears [about vampires], though […] he wondered at the many coincidences which had all tended to excite a belief in the supernatural power of Lord Ruthven” (42-43). Even after Ianthe herself perishes from a vampire bite, Aubrey resumes traveling with Ruthven.
Aubrey’s other tragic flaw is his naïve sense of honor. When Ruthven binds Aubrey to an oath, Aubrey keeps the oath even when he realizes that Ruthven has come back from the dead and is preying on his sister.
