Vampires are the most fearsome and fascinating of all creatures of folklore. For the first time, detailed accounts of the vampire and how its tradition developed in different cultures are gathered in one volume by eminent folklorist Alan Dundes. Eleven leading scholars from the fields of Slavic studies, history, anthropology, and psychiatry unearth the true nature of the vampire from its birth in graveyard lore to the modern-day psychiatric patient with a penchant for drinking blood.
The Vampire: A Casebook takes this legend out of the realm of literature and film and back to its dark beginnings in folk traditions. The essays examine the history of the word “vampire;” Romanian vampires; Greek vampires; Serbian vampires; the physical attributes of vampires; the killing of vampires; and the possible psychoanalytic underpinnings of vampires. Much more than simply a scary creature of the human imagination, the vampire has been and continues to haunt the lives of all those who encounter it—in reality or in fiction.

asin: 0299159248 binding: Paperback list price: $19.95 USD amazon price: $17.95 USD other availability:

Posted by Vladimir Wed, 03/21/2007 - 01:43

 

Woman Allegedly Ties Up Valentine, Drinks His Blood

February 16, 2007 (nbc5i.com / Dallas, Fort Worth) - An Arizona woman is under arrest, accused of tying up her lover on Valentine's Day in order to drink his blood. Police in Tempe, Ariz., said 23-year-old Tiffany Sutton allegedly tricked her 43-year-old victim with an offer of kinky sex.

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Vampire comic 'led to Meredith murder'

October 23, 2008 (The Scotsman / Rosa Silverman) -- The murder of the British student Meredith Kercher was inspired by a Japanese manga comic, it was claimed yesterday. Giuliano Mignini, the prosecutor, told an Italian court that one of three people accused of being involved in her death, Raffaele Sollecito, 24, might have been inspired by a comic found in his possession that describes the murder of female vampires at Halloween.

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Spit of Vampire Bat May Help Stroke Victims

January 10, 2003 (The Chicago Sun-Times) - An experimental clot-busting drug that someday might limit damage from strokes is derived from a most unusual source-- vampire bats. The drug might lengthen the three-hour treatment window that limits the effectiveness of the only approved drug in use, according to a study published today in Stroke: Journal of the American Heart Association.

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...And it bleeds through

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Vampires in Afghanistan?

October 29, 2007 (Salem-News.com / Tim King) -- During my two months on assignment in the Afghanistan combat theater last winter, I covered all kinds of military operations for Salem-News.com and Oregon's KPTV FOX-12. While I was there I spent time on forward combat bases, I went on infantry foot patrols, flew in helicopters, and witnessed levels of disparity that were hard to imagine.

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