Of course man, you're a life-saver. If you haven't already covered it, another short and interesting one I saw in my curriculum you might be interested in is called "Place of Meeting" by Charles Beaumont. I did an assignment on it, and while it might not be the most interesting thing in the world, I liked it, and it might be one you like too. Side note: he's the guy who wrote a lot of the Twilight Zone episodes. Once again, I really appreciate you. Have a good thanksgiving my man, and try to enjoy life as much as I enjoyed your video!@@TheVampiresCastle
Of course my man! I think I'm gonna have to catch up on your videos, as I'm somewhat new. Being a Dungeons & Dragons DM, I think I want to make a vampire-themed campaign at some point. Maybe I'll have to update you on that. Until then, have a great thanksgiving! @@TheVampiresCastle
Thanks. Here in Norway, another place that can be snowy, I did once read a translation of this story. Now I looked it up again and studied the text as you conveniently read out the English original. The translation seems to me mostly "adequate", but sometimes it is a bit carelessly made, frequently omitting some words or short phrases. Most notably, the old lady's remark near the end, that they should now go to the graves of the vampires and finally stake them down, was missing in the version I first read. I wonder if that may have been a deliberate omission, for arguably the story is creepier without it. Derleth's complete text indicates that there actually is and always was a straightforward way of getting rid of the vampires, which can only undermine the horror (and in addition we have the slightly absurd notion that she will attempt to dig up graves in mid-winter, when the ground is presumably frozen).
That is absolutely fascinating. Arguably, the only line in that story that makes it an actual vampire tale is the one that was omitted? That is just unreal. Thank you very much for telling me you did this. I think it's super cool!
@@TheVampiresCastle The ’vampires’ in this story are rather peculiar. In particular, nothing is said about them drinking blood! Their two victims, when found dead, simply seem to have died from exposure to the cold. There is no mention of bite-marks, or the corpses being drained of blood. As normally conceived, vampires must drink blood fairly frequently to function. When our story begins, the original ’vampiress’ has however only claimed one single victim in many decades, and he later returns with her as a second so-called vampire. Then they keep appearing outside the window in the snow, trying to lure others out, but as far as we are told, their efforts are unsuccessful for many winters on end. They never grow feeble or go dormant for lack of blood (or life-force, or whatever), so presumably they don’t really need it at all. Their whole motivation seems to be a sort of playful evil: they want to lure others out into the cold to die from exposure, and then place their corpses where the original girl was fouind dead as a kind of ’screw you’ to the family. We don’t get the impression that they target anyone else than this particular house and family (indeed, for some bizarre reason they are so limited that they can only appear on one specific side of the house!) Presumably the whole thing is just the original victim having her unending revenge on the family that sent her out to die in the snow, and somehow her own victims join her in that vengeful quest, as if they have no mentality of their own after their transformation. These ’vampires’ are better termed revenants. They just exist to avenge the fatal injustice the original girl suffered, if indeed they have any purpose at all (one might think she would have been satisfied after killing the man who killed her, but apparently his family has to suffer for generations to come). The commonly accepted ’vampire rules’ come and go as the plot requires. We have the normal notion that people who die as victims of a vampire become vampires themselves, but on the other hand, the original ’vampiress’ seemingly needed no one to turn her. Just dying in a horrible way, as a consequence of injustice, did the trick for her. These revenants also seem to follow the ’vampire rule’ that they can’t enter a house (at least uninvited), but it is tempting to see them simply as representing the deadly cold of winter, which the girl somehow merged into and came back as a personification of. It would seem that this ’vampiress’ has some kind of hypnotic power: Henry was initially saved back into the house, but he had already been too close to her and had fallen under her spell; he starts babbling about the girl with her beautiful tiny hands and the snow drifting around her. Before he can be stopped, he runs back out into the snow to die. Taken at face value, he is a victim of vampire hypnosis; if you want to be clever, you can also read it as a metaphor for the alluring beauty of winter despite the dangers it brings.
Merry Christmas Sean! As always Great Content! Hope Santa and no vampires find you....... or maybe you want them too.
Heh, thanks! Little bit of both, not enough of either. :)
Happy Holidays to you, too!
Thank you for this! This is much better than reading the actual thing in my SLAV 2301 class. Have a good one brother.
Ha! Glad to hear it!
Of course man, you're a life-saver. If you haven't already covered it, another short and interesting one I saw in my curriculum you might be interested in is called "Place of Meeting" by Charles Beaumont. I did an assignment on it, and while it might not be the most interesting thing in the world, I liked it, and it might be one you like too. Side note: he's the guy who wrote a lot of the Twilight Zone episodes. Once again, I really appreciate you. Have a good thanksgiving my man, and try to enjoy life as much as I enjoyed your video!@@TheVampiresCastle
Place of Meeting...yes, here it is in my Penguin Book of Vampire Stories! Very interesting...
Thanks, Scabbish!
Of course my man! I think I'm gonna have to catch up on your videos, as I'm somewhat new. Being a Dungeons & Dragons DM, I think I want to make a vampire-themed campaign at some point. Maybe I'll have to update you on that. Until then, have a great thanksgiving! @@TheVampiresCastle
Thanks. Here in Norway, another place that can be snowy, I did once read a translation of this story. Now I looked it up again and studied the text as you conveniently read out the English original. The translation seems to me mostly "adequate", but sometimes it is a bit carelessly made, frequently omitting some words or short phrases. Most notably, the old lady's remark near the end, that they should now go to the graves of the vampires and finally stake them down, was missing in the version I first read. I wonder if that may have been a deliberate omission, for arguably the story is creepier without it. Derleth's complete text indicates that there actually is and always was a straightforward way of getting rid of the vampires, which can only undermine the horror (and in addition we have the slightly absurd notion that she will attempt to dig up graves in mid-winter, when the ground is presumably frozen).
That is absolutely fascinating. Arguably, the only line in that story that makes it an actual vampire tale is the one that was omitted? That is just unreal. Thank you very much for telling me you did this. I think it's super cool!
@@TheVampiresCastle The ’vampires’ in this story are rather peculiar. In particular, nothing is said about them drinking blood! Their two victims, when found dead, simply seem to have died from exposure to the cold. There is no mention of bite-marks, or the corpses being drained of blood.
As normally conceived, vampires must drink blood fairly frequently to function. When our story begins, the original ’vampiress’ has however only claimed one single victim in many decades, and he later returns with her as a second so-called vampire. Then they keep appearing outside the window in the snow, trying to lure others out, but as far as we are told, their efforts are unsuccessful for many winters on end. They never grow feeble or go dormant for lack of blood (or life-force, or whatever), so presumably they don’t really need it at all. Their whole motivation seems to be a sort of playful evil: they want to lure others out into the cold to die from exposure, and then place their corpses where the original girl was fouind dead as a kind of ’screw you’ to the family. We don’t get the impression that they target anyone else than this particular house and family (indeed, for some bizarre reason they are so limited that they can only appear on one specific side of the house!) Presumably the whole thing is just the original victim having her unending revenge on the family that sent her out to die in the snow, and somehow her own victims join her in that vengeful quest, as if they have no mentality of their own after their transformation.
These ’vampires’ are better termed revenants. They just exist to avenge the fatal injustice the original girl suffered, if indeed they have any purpose at all (one might think she would have been satisfied after killing the man who killed her, but apparently his family has to suffer for generations to come). The commonly accepted ’vampire rules’ come and go as the plot requires. We have the normal notion that people who die as victims of a vampire become vampires themselves, but on the other hand, the original ’vampiress’ seemingly needed no one to turn her. Just dying in a horrible way, as a consequence of injustice, did the trick for her.
These revenants also seem to follow the ’vampire rule’ that they can’t enter a house (at least uninvited), but it is tempting to see them simply as representing the deadly cold of winter, which the girl somehow merged into and came back as a personification of. It would seem that this ’vampiress’ has some kind of hypnotic power: Henry was initially saved back into the house, but he had already been too close to her and had fallen under her spell; he starts babbling about the girl with her beautiful tiny hands and the snow drifting around her. Before he can be stopped, he runs back out into the snow to die. Taken at face value, he is a victim of vampire hypnosis; if you want to be clever, you can also read it as a metaphor for the alluring beauty of winter despite the dangers it brings.
Very interesting story it's like a barrier between worlds opening due to the storm.
Ooo, I like that. Hadn't thought about it that way, but it really works!