Carmilla

This article is about the novella. For other uses, see Carmilla (disambiguation).

Carmilla
Illustration from The Dark Blue by D. H. Friston, 1872
Author	Sheridan Le Fanu
Country	Ireland
Language	English
Genre	Gothic
Publication date	1871-72

Carmilla is a Gothic novella by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu and one of the early works of vampire fiction, predating Bram Stoker's Dracula (1897) by 26 years. First published as a serial in The Dark Blue (1871–72), the story is narrated by a young woman preyed upon by a female vampire named Carmilla, later revealed to be Mircalla, Countess Karnstein (Carmilla is an anagram of Mircalla). The story is often anthologized and has been adapted many times in film and other media.

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Carmilla

Publication

Carmilla, serialized in the literary magazine The Dark Blue in late 1871 and early 1872,^[1] was reprinted in Le Fanu's short story collection In a Glass Darkly (1872). Comparing the work of the two illustrators, David Henry Friston and Michael Fitzgerald, whose work appears in the magazine but not in modern printings of the book, reveals inconsistencies in the characters' depictions. Consequently, confusion has arisen relating the pictures to the plot. Isabella Mazzanti illustrated the book's 2014 anniversary edition, published by Editions Soleil and translated by Gaid Girard.^[2]^[3]

Plot summary

Le Fanu presents the story as part of the casebook of Dr. Hesselius, whose departures from medical orthodoxy rank him as the first occult doctor in literature.^[4]

Laura, the protagonist, narrates, beginning with her childhood in a "picturesque and solitary" castle amid an extensive forest in Styria, where she lives with her father, a wealthy English widower retired from service to the Austrian Empire. When she was six, Laura had a vision of a beautiful visitor in her bedchamber. She later claims to have been punctured in her breast, although no wound was found.

Twelve years later, Laura and her father are admiring the sunset in front of the castle when her father tells her of a letter from his friend, General Spielsdorf. The General was supposed to bring his niece, Bertha Rheinfeldt, to visit the two, but the niece suddenly died under mysterious circumstances. The General ambiguously concludes that he will discuss the circumstances in detail when they meet later.

Laura, saddened by the loss of a potential friend, longs for a companion. A carriage accident outside Laura's home unexpectedly brings a girl of Laura's age into the family's care. Her name is Carmilla. Both girls instantly recognize the other from the "dream" they both had when they were young.

Carmilla appears injured after her carriage accident, but her mysterious mother informs Laura's father that her journey is urgent and cannot be delayed. She arranges to leave her daughter with Laura and her father until she can return in three months. Before she leaves, she sternly notes that her daughter will not disclose any information whatsoever about her family, past, or herself, and that Carmilla is of sound mind. Laura comments that this information seems needless to say, and her father laughs it off.

Carmilla and Laura grow to be very close friends, but occasionally Carmilla's mood abruptly changes. She sometimes makes unsettling romantic advances towards Laura. Carmilla refuses to tell anything about herself, despite questioning by Laura. Her secrecy is not the only mysterious thing about Carmilla; she never joins the household in its prayers, she sleeps much of the day, and she seems to sleepwalk outside at night.

Meanwhile, young women and girls in the nearby towns have begun dying from an unknown malady. When the funeral procession of one such victim passes by the two girls, Laura joins in the funeral hymn. Carmilla bursts out in rage and scolds Laura, complaining that the hymn hurts her ears.

When a shipment of restored heirloom paintings arrives, Laura finds a portrait of her ancestor, Mircalla, Countess Karnstein, dated 1698. The portrait resembles Carmilla exactly, down to the mole on her neck. Carmilla says she might be descended from the Karnsteins.

During Carmilla's stay, Laura has nightmares of a large cat-like beast entering her room and biting her on the chest. The beast then takes the form of a female figure and disappears through the door without opening it. In another nightmare, Laura hears a voice say, "Your mother warns you to beware of the assassin," and a sudden light reveals Carmilla standing at the foot of her bed, her nightdress drenched in blood. Laura's health declines, and her father has a doctor examine her. He finds a small blue spot on her chest and speaks privately with her father, only asking that Laura never be unattended.

Her father then sets out with Laura, in a carriage, for the ruined village of Karnstein, three miles distant. They leave a message behind asking Carmilla and one of the governesses to follow once the perpetually late-sleeping Carmilla wakes. En route to Karnstein, Laura and her father encounter General Spielsdorf. He tells them his own ghastly story.

At a costume ball, Spielsdorf and his niece Bertha had met a young woman named Millarca and her enigmatic mother. Bertha was immediately taken with Millarca. The mother convinced the General that she was an old friend of his and asked that Millarca be allowed to stay with them for three weeks while she attended to a secret matter of great importance.

Funeral, illustration by Michael Fitzgerald for Carmilla in The Dark Blue (January 1872)

Bertha fell mysteriously ill, suffering the same symptoms as Laura. After consulting with a specially-ordered priestly doctor, the General realized that Bertha was being visited by a vampire. He hid with a sword and waited until a large black creature crawled onto his niece's bed and to her neck. He leapt from his hiding place and attacked the beast, which took the form of Millarca. She fled through the locked door, unharmed. Bertha died immediately afterward.

Upon arriving at Karnstein, the General asks a woodman where he can find the tomb of Mircalla Karnstein. The woodman says the tomb was relocated long ago by the hero who vanquished the vampires that haunted the region.

While the General and Laura are alone in the ruined chapel, Carmilla appears. The General and Carmilla both fly into a rage upon seeing each other, and the General attacks her with an axe. Carmilla disarms the General and disappears. The General explains that Carmilla is also Millarca, both anagrams for the original name of the vampire Mircalla, Countess Karnstein.

The party is joined by Baron Vordenburg, the descendant of the hero who rid the area of vampires long ago. Vordenburg, an authority on vampires, has discovered that his ancestor was romantically involved with the Countess Karnstein before she died and became one of the undead. Using his forefather's notes, he locates Mircalla's hidden tomb. An Imperial Commission exhumes the vampire's body. Immersed in blood, it seems to be breathing faintly, its heart beating, its eyes open. A stake is driven through its heart, and it gives a corresponding shriek; then the head is struck off. The body and head are burned to ashes, which are thrown into a river.

Afterwards, Laura's father takes his daughter on a year-long tour through Italy to recover from the trauma and regain her health, which she never fully does. It is implied that she dies some time following her encounter with Carmilla.

Sources

As with Dracula, critics have looked for the sources used in the writing of Carmilla. Matthew Gibson proposes that Le Fanu used Dom Augustin Calmet's Dissertations sur les apparitions des anges, des demons et des esprits, et sur les revenants et vampires de Hongrie, de Boheme, de Moravie, et de Silesie (1746),^[5] which was first anonymously translated into English in a single volume as Dissertations Upon the Apparitions of Angels, Daemons, and Ghosts, and Concerning the Vampires of Hungary, Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia (1759).^[6] and later translated into English in two volumes as The phantom world, or, The philosophy of spirits, apparitions, &c. (1850)^[7]^[8] Gibson also believes that the Reverend Sabine Baring-Gould's The Book of Were-wolves (1863) and his account of Elizabeth Báthory, Coleridge's Christabel (Part 1, 1797 and Part 2, 1800), and Captain Basil Hall's Schloss Hainfeld; or a Winter in Lower Styria (London and Edinburgh, 1836) are other sources for Le Fanu's Carmilla. Hall's account provides much of the Styrian background and, in particular, a model for both Carmilla and Laura in the figure of Jane Anne Cranstoun, Countess Purgstall.^[9]^[10]

Influence

Carmilla, the title character, is the original prototype for a legion of female and lesbian vampires. Though Le Fanu portrays his vampire's sexuality with the circumspection that one would expect for his time, it is evident that lesbian attraction is the main dynamic between Carmilla and the narrator of the story:^[11]

Sometimes after an hour of apathy, my strange and beautiful companion would take my hand and hold it with a fond pressure, renewed again and again; blushing softly, gazing in my face with languid and burning eyes, and breathing so fast that her dress rose and fell with the tumultuous respiration. It was like the ardour of a lover; it embarrassed me; it was hateful and yet overpowering; and with gloating eyes she drew me to her, and her hot lips travelled along my cheek in kisses; and she would whisper, almost in sobs, "You are mine, you shall be mine, and you and I are one for ever". (Carmilla, Chapter 4).

When compared to other literary vampires of the 19th century, Carmilla is a similar product of a culture with strict sexual mores and tangible religious fear. While Carmilla selected exclusively female victims, she only becomes emotionally involved with a few. Carmilla had nocturnal habits, but was not confined to the darkness. She had unearthly beauty, and was able to change her form and to pass through solid walls. Her animal alter ego was a monstrous black cat, not a large dog as in Dracula. She did, however, sleep in a coffin. Carmilla works as a Gothic horror story because her victims are portrayed as succumbing to a perverse and unholy temptation that has severe metaphysical consequences for them.^[12]

Some critics, among them William Veeder, suggest that Carmilla, notably in its outlandish use of narrative frames, was an important influence on Henry James' The Turn of the Screw (1898).

Bram Stoker's Dracula

Although Carmilla is a lesser known and far shorter Gothic vampire story than the generally-considered master work of that genre, Dracula, the latter is heavily influenced by Le Fanu's novella. Stoker's posthumously published short story "Dracula's Guest" (1914), known as the deleted first chapter to Dracula, shows a more obvious and intact debt to Carmilla:

In the narrative, an Englishman finds himself in Germany midway upon his journey from England to the castle of Dracula; stumbles upon a tomb of a female vampire whose inscription reads: Countess Dolingen of Gratz / in Styria / sought and found death / 1801.
Both stories are told in the first person. Dracula expands on the idea of a first person account by creating a series of journal entries and logs of different persons and creating a plausible background story for their having been compiled.
Both authors indulge the air of mystery, though Stoker takes it further than Le Fanu by allowing the characters to solve the enigma of the vampire along with the reader.
The descriptions of the title character in Carmilla and of Lucy in Dracula are similar, and have become archetypes for the appearance of the waif-like victims and seducers in vampire stories as being rosy-cheeked, slender, languid, and with large eyes, full lips, and soft voices. Additionally, both women sleepwalk.
Stoker's Dr. Abraham Van Helsing is a direct parallel to Le Fanu's vampire expert Baron Vordenburg: both characters used to investigate and catalyse actions in opposition to the vampire, and symbolically represent knowledge of the unknown and stability of mind in the onslaught of chaos and death.^[13]

In popular culture

Books

(Alphabetical by first author's surname)

In the Japanese light novel series High School DxD, written by Ichiei Ishibumi and illustrated by Miyama-Zero, the vampires are depicted as having a society divided among two major factions: The Tepes and the Carmilla. The Carmilla faction favors a matriarchal society for the world of vampires while the Tepes prefer a patriarchal government.
Carmilla: A Dark Fugue is a short book by David Brian. Although the story is primarily centered around the exploits of General Spielsdorf, it nonetheless relates directly to events which unfold within Carmilla: The Wolves of Styria.
The novel Carmilla: The Wolves of Styria is a re-imagining of the original story. It is a derivative re-working, listed as being authored by J.S. Le Fanu and David Brian.^[14]
Rachel Klein's 2002 novel "The Moth Diaries" features several excerpts from "Carmilla," as the novel figures into the plot of Klein's story, and both deal with similar subject matter and themes.
Carmilla: The Return by Kyle Marffin is the sequel to Carmilla.^[15]
Ro McNulty's novella, Ruin: The Rise of the House of Karnstein, is a sequel to Le Fanu's novella and takes place over 100 years later. Carmilla continues to play games with mortals, inserting herself into their lives and breaking them to her will. She settles herself around a teacher and his family, feeding on his baby daughter.
A vampire named Baron Karnstein appears in Kim Newman's novel Anno Dracula (1992). Carmilla herself is mentioned several times as a former (until her death at the hands of vampire hunters) friend of the book's vampire heroine Geneviève. Some short stories set in the Anno Dracula series universe have also included Carmilla.
Author Anne Rice has cited Carmilla as an inspiration for The Vampire Chronicles; a series of bestselling vampire books she wrote from 1976-2003.
Christopher Thomason identified Carmilla as a key influence for his 2015 novel For The Want Of Beauty.

Comics

(Alphabetical by series)

In 1991, Aircel Comics published a six-issue black and white miniseries of Carmilla by Steven Jones and John Ross. It was based on Le Fanu's story and billed as "The Erotic Horror Classic of Female Vampirism". The first issue was printed in February 1991. The first three issues adapted the original story, while the latter three were a sequel set in the 1930s.^[16]^[17]
In the first story arc of Dynamite Entertainment's revamp of Vampirella, a villainous vampire, named Le Fanu, inhabits the basement of a Seattle nightclub called Carmilla.

Film

Ingrid Pitt portrayed Carmilla/Mircalla in The Vampire Lovers

(Chronological)

Danish director Carl Dreyer loosely adapted Carmilla for his film Vampyr (1932) but deleted any references to lesbian sexuality.^[18] The credits of the original film say that the film is based on In a Glass Darkly. This collection contains five tales, one of which is Carmilla. Actually the film draws its central character, Allan Gray, from Le Fanu's Dr. Hesselius; and the scene in which Gray is buried alive is drawn from "The Room in the Dragon Volant".
French director Roger Vadim's Et mourir de plaisir (literally And to die of pleasure, but actually shown in the UK and US as Blood and Roses, 1960) is based on Carmilla and is considered one of the greatest of the vampire genre. The Vadim film thoroughly explores the lesbian implications behind Carmilla's selection of victims, and boasts cinematography by Claude Renoir. The film's lesbian eroticism was however significantly cut for its US release. Mel Ferrer stars in the film.
A more-or-less faithful adaptation starring Christopher Lee was produced in Italy in 1963 under the title La cripta e l'incubo (Crypt of the Vampire in English). The character of Laura is played by Adriana Ambesi, who fears herself possessed by the spirit of a dead ancestor.
The British Hammer Film Productions also produced a fairly faithful adaptation of Carmilla titled The Vampire Lovers (1970) with Ingrid Pitt in the lead role, Madeline Smith as her victim/lover, and Hammer's regular Peter Cushing. It is the first installment of the Karnstein Trilogy.
The Blood Spattered Bride (La Novia Ensangrentada) is a 1972 Spanish horror film written and directed by Vicente Aranda, is based on the text. The film has reached cult status for its mix of horror, vampirism and seduction with lesbian overtones.
Carmilla (1980) is a black-and-white made-for-television adaptation from Poland, starring singer Izabela Trojanowska in the title role and Monika Stefanowicz as Laura.
In the direct-to-video movie, The Batman vs. Dracula (2005), Carmilla Karnstein is mentioned as Count Dracula's bride, who had been incinerated by sunlight years ago. Dracula hoped to revive her by sacrificing Vicki Vale's soul, but the ritual was stopped by the Batman.
The book is directly referenced several times in the 2011 film, The Moth Diaries, the film version of Rachel Klein's novel. There are conspicuous similarities between the characters in "Carmilla" and those in the film, and the book figures into the film's plot.
Carmilla is featured as the main antagonist in the movie Lesbian Vampire Killers (2009), a comedy starring Paul McGann and James Corden, with Silvia Colloca as Carmilla.
The Unwanted (2013) from writer/director Brent Wood relocates the story to the contemporary southern United States.
The Curse of Styria (2014) is an adaptation of the novel set in late 1980s with Julia Pietrucha as Carmilla and Eleanor Tomlinson as Lara.

Music

Opera

A chamber opera version of Carmilla appeared in Carmilla: A Vampire Tale (1970), music by Ben Johnston, script by Wilford Leach. Seated on a sofa, Laura and Carmilla recount the story retrospectively in song.

Rock music

(Alphabetical by group/artist)

Jon English released a song named Carmilla, inspired by the book, on his 1980 album Calm Before the Storm.
The Cradle of Filth's lead singer Dani Filth has often cited Sheridan Le Fanu as an inspiration to his lyrics. For example, his British extreme metal band's EP, V Empire or Dark Faerytales in Phallustein (1994), includes a track titled "Queen of Winter, Throned", which contains the lyrics: "Iniquitous/I share Carmilla's mask/A gaunt mephitic voyeur/On the black side of the glass". Additionally, the album Dusk... and Her Embrace (1996) was largely inspired by Carmilla and Le Fanu's writings in general. The band has also recorded an instrumental track titled "Carmilla's Masque", and in the track "A Gothic Romance", the lyric "Portrait of the Dead Countess" may reference the portrait found in the novel of the Countess Mircalla.
The lyrics for "Blood and Roses", LaHost's track on the EMI compilation album Fire in Harmony (1985), are loosely based on the Roger Vadim film version of Carmilla.
The title track of the album Symphonies of the Night (2013), by the German/Norwegian band Leaves' Eyes, was inspired by Carmilla.^[19]
Alessandro Nunziati, better known as Lord Vampyr and the former vocalist of Theatres des Vampires, has a song named "Carmilla Whispers from the Grave" in his debut solo album, De Vampyrica Philosophia (2005).
Theatres des Vampires, an Italian extreme gothic metal band, has produced a video single called "Carmilla" for its album Moonlight Waltz. They also reference the novel in innumerous other songs.

Periodicals

A Japanese lesbians' magazine is named after Carmilla, as Carmilla "draws hetero women into the world of love between women".^[20]

Radio

The Columbia Workshop presented an adaptation (CBS, July 28, 1940, 30 min.). Lucille Fletcher's script, directed by Earle McGill, relocated the story to contemporary New York state and allows Carmilla (Jeanette Nolan) to claim her victim Helen (Joan Tetzel).^[21]
The character Dr. Hesselius is featured as an occult sleuth in the The Hall of Fantasy episode, "The Shadow People" (September 5, 1952), broadcast on the Mutual Broadcasting Network.
In 1975, the CBS Radio Mystery Theater broadcast an adaptation by Ian Martin (CBS, July 31, 1975, rebroadcast December 10, 1975). Mercedes McCambridge played Laura Stanton, Marian Seldes played Carmilla.^[22]
Vincent Price hosted an adaption (reset to 1922 Vienna) by Brainard Duffield, produced and directed by Fletcher Markle, on the Sears Radio Theater (CBS, March 7, 1979), with Antoinette Bower and Anne Gibbon.^[23]^[24]
On November 20, 1981, the CBC Radio series Nightfall aired an adaptation of Carmilla written by Graham Pomeroy and John Douglas.
BBC Radio 4 broadcast Don McCamphill's Afternoon Play dramatization June 5, 2003, with Anne-Marie Duff as Laura, Brana Bajic as Carmilla.^[25]

Stage