“Remember Your Oath” - Literal and Symbolic Bonds in John Polidori’s The Vampyre Boglarka Toth College

The summer of 1816 in Geneva was a rather sublime and therefore inspirational season. The weather was so harsh and unpredictable that it ushered a group of remarkably talented people around the hearth instead of roaming the dangerous Alps. Being without any English books in the villa, they started to read out German ghost stories for themselves as a means of entertainment and bonding with one another. A competition was soon sparked by the host, in which these young, diverse artists attempted to create their own gothic tales, free form the other’s influence and interference. (Shelley 12) This is the basic story of Mary Shelley’s introductory anecdote in her preface written for the first edition of her novel, Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus. It is needless to remark here that Shelley’s masterpiece was the only completed horror story of those enclosed evenings in Lord Byron’s Villa Diodati, but we must acknowledge that a different, similarly prominent, idea was born within this circle. The aforementioned host, Lord Byron had also began a story “but became bored with it and gave it up,” although his personal physician, who had strong literary ambitions and was also present in Geneva, John Polidori “appropriated his idea and...