Presented at the National Popular Culture & American Culture Associations Annual Conference, Saint Antonio, USA, April 20-23, 2011 (Presenter: Joanna Ioannidou)
It is not so common to find a vampire tale where the vampire is not destroyed. As Bruce McClelland points out, in most vampire stories the forces of good, although usually not the center of attention, are able to unearth and defeat the vampire. A long line of slayers, which can be traced back to folkloric vampire tales, has been protecting the community from the vampire’s unquestionably evil presence by killing the returning corpse or banishing it beyond the possibility of return. However, recently vampires are not as unambiguously evil as they used to be and they are more often portrayed as alluring outsiders than as unholy fiends. Consequently the number of narratives where the vampire is neither destroyed nor banished has been increasing. Where does this leave the slayers and what does it mean for the way vampires are portrayed?
In order to provide a possible answer to these questions I will look at Charlaine Harris’ world, where the creation of a substitute for human blood has allowed vampires to make their existence public. I will argue that the members of the ‘Fellowship of the Sun’ could be classified as vampire slayers, however in a world that is willing to accept vampires they seem like fanatics and not heroic protectors of the community. Furthermore, I will argue that this new image of the slayer opposes the stereotype of “good slayers versus evil vampires” and thus invites the audience to judge the vampire characters as individuals (based on their actions) and not as part of a group that is unquestionably associated with evil.
McClelland, Β. (2006). Slayers and Their Vampires. The University of Michigan Press
