UC Riverside

This dissertation employs the vampire genre as a lens to explore and read world literature. It integrates Wolfgang Iser’s reader-response theory and Roman Ingarden’s concept of “schematic views” to highlight the reader’s role in constructing literary meaning. The study analyzes three pivotal vampire texts spanning nearly two centuries and bridging Western and Eastern traditions: Frombald’s “Copia Eines Schreibens” (“Copy of a writing,” 1725), Goethe’s “Die Braut von Corinth” (“The Bride from Corinth,” 1797), and George Soulié’s “The Corpse, the Blood Drinker” (1913).

As the first comparative exploration of these specific works, this research breaks new ground in vampire studies and world literature. It presents the inaugural scholarly comparison of Habsburg, German, and Chinese vampire narratives, expanding the geographical and cultural scope of vampire literature analysis. Furthermore, this approach also advocates for plurality in approaching literary themes and rejects monolithic readings focused solely on chronological evolution or direct transmission. I highlight that literary encounters, mediated by readers and their personal literary backgrounds, contribute to the life of recognizable “schematic views” across cultures and time. Additionally, contemporary readers, often multilingual and products of diverse cultural traditions, bring new perspectives to these schematic views, potentially reshaping the vampire motif while preserving something of its essential core. By reading vampire literature, we read and make world literature.