Sunlight and Vampires

Burned into the collective memory of our age, it is an image of great power. The vampire looms menacingly, but then the hero reaches up and pulls away the curtains. SUNLIGHT! Like laser beams, the purifying rays of the sun sear the undead creature’s flesh. The foul thing dissolves into the dust it should already have been. Because we all know vampires are destroyed by sunlight, right?

Wrong, actually.

Legends and myths of the blood drinking dead go back millennia, but search in vain for any hint that sunlight will do them any harm at all. Not the lamia, the lilitu, the weng chiang, upir, vyrvolokas or langsuir–not one vampire in folklore suffers from this weakness. Many only go out at night, or become active then. Yet of all the ways to destroy the vampire, including burning or beheading or driving a nail/stake through the forehead/heart of the creature, look for any recommendation that sunlight will do the trick. You won’t find it anywhere.

As far as literature goes, you won’t find it there either, at least not for a long time. Four English-language vampire classics saw print in the nineteenth century. First, John Polidori used his employer as a model for Lord Ruthven, the (literally) Byronic antagonist of “The Vampyre.” But Ruthven walks around in sunlight all the time, seemingly without a qualm. Nor was this some obscure work. Ruthven ended up in nearly as many adaptations, versions, ripoffs as the infamous Count in his day–mostly in a variety of plays (one by Alexandre Dumas of “Three Musketeers” fame) and operas. A tiny echo did pop up in a charming idea Polidori had–namely, that a vampire killed in a seemingly normal fashion could be revived with the rays of a full moon. One must wonder if such was the ultimate source of linking werewolves with the full moon (in folklore they have no such connection). The next major vampire work used an identical literary deceit. “Varney The Vampyre, of the Feast of Blood” proved one of the most successful ‘penny dreadfuls’ ever, with a sprawling two hundred plus chapters! Does Sir Francis Varney burst into flames in the sun? Not at all. As far as we can tell, he doesn’t even wear a hat. Consider next Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu’s “Carmilla,” arguably the genesis of all future lesbian vampire tales. The vampire in that tale must sleep in her grave–evidently from the sources Le Fanu used, from midnight until noon. She also regularly takes strolls during the day with the narrator. Not so much as a sunburn.

What about “Dracula“? Sure the fictional King of Vampires burns in sun? He certainly did when portrayed by Sir Christopher Lee! True enough, but in the novel he went about during the day many times. The two most faithful adaptations of the novel–“Bram Stoker’s Dracula” in 1992 and the BBC “Count Dracula” in 1979–correctly portrayed his as unharmed by sunlight. To be sure, he didn’t seem to like it much, preferring the evening hours. But not one vampire anywhere in the book (there are four) suffers any harm at all from the sun.

Just thinking about it, that makes sense. Look up at the sky after dusk. See all those stars? Each one of them is a sun. For that matter, the moon itself isn’t naturally luminous. All its light is reflected sunlight. Were such really so deadly, vampires should be in a terrible pickle. How to escape sunlight, after all?

So why do we think vampires view the sun the way Superman views kryptonite? Historically this goes back to the German silent film “Nosferatu.” That movie captured an iconic image that struck a chord in audience’s imaginations. Orlock, the ratlike vampire, allows himself to be distracted by the charms of a self-sacrificing young woman. His befanged mouth remains at her throat when a cock crows. Dawn has come! Too late, realizes his peril and tries to flee–only to be caught by morning rays and so vanish. Good stuff! Dramatic, visually exciting, and made a kind of emotional sense. Creature of darkness poisoned by light. With the day, the nightmares that walk are banished. Light as a holy weapon. Little wonder so many filmmakers and storytellers began using the idea so lavishly! As special effects got better, so too did the spectacular nature of a vampire’s end. Orlock merely crossfaded into nothingness. The infected victims of the child vampire in “Let Me In” and “Let The Right One In” became pillars of fire. King Russell on “True Blood” simmered into a man-shaped piece of charcoal with eyes and teeth. More poignantly, little Claudia and her new mother figure became ashen statues, capturing last moments of agony until touched–then falling into the finest dust as ashes do.

It also serves dramatic purposes. When first introduced on the t.v. show “Dark Shadows” Barnabas Collins had a friendly chat with his cousin David. Then the child mentioned sunrise. Jonathan Frid’s face suddenly fell. “Sunrise?” he said, as if reminded of unbearable loss. More than one vampire in cinema committed suicide by simply watching the dawn, often asking some one special to share those final moments with them.

Still, the vampires of Hammer’s “Karnstein Trilogy” remained true to their origins and feared no daylight. Neither did the vampires of “Kindred: The Embraced” nor the eerie creatures of “Lets Scare Jessica to Death” as well as both heroine and antagonist in “Razor Blade Smile.” Some might regard the rings that let so many undead in “The Vampire Diaries” work on their tans to be cheating, but the fact remains a lot of those vampires don’t have to worry about daylight. Plus of course the vampires of “Twilight.” Many indeed insist that these last cannot be counted as vampires because they don’t burn up when sunlight hits them. But as methinks I’ve shown, this latter isn’t really a valid criticism. By those standards, Dracula isn’t a vampire.

By david

David MacDowell Blue blogs at Night Tinted Glasses.  He graduated from the National Shakespeare Conservatory and is the author of The Annotated Carmilla. and Your Vampire Story (And How to Write It) as well as a theatrical adaptation of Carmilla.

14 comments

  1. Great article.

    It’s interesting that even as it became increasingly de rigueur for movie and TV vampires to be fatally vulnerable to daylight (so much so that it became the primary method of killing in some franchises) they also became less nocturnal. In Tod Browning’s Dracula the count had to rest in his coffin during the day. But today’s daylight-vulnerable vamps usually can remain active during the day as long as they wear protective gear or are indoors. I think that Near Dark, which used the notion of ‘daytime active but daylight vulnerable’ vamps to great dramatic effect, was a turning point. (A throwback to a truly nocturnal vampire was Vampire Journals’ vamps that not only become inactive but turn into dessicated corpses during the day.)

    Some moviegoers can be pretty closed-minded. Whichever vampires made the biggest impression during their formative years become the model for what a “real vampire” is and they deny the vampirehood of any that deviate from it. (Mine were Hezog’s Nosferatu and The Hunger, so I had both fanged and non-fanged, both heliophobic and daywalkers.) Some of the commenters on IMDB, YouTube etc. are downright indignant about any movie vampires that don’t go up like flash paper in sunlight. (Or have prominent fangs, or – a more recent cinematic vamp trope – have super-speed. I think that last one may have been codified by Frost’s bullet-dodging in Blade.) I say let a thousand vampire varieties bloom.

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  7. Excellent article.
    “Plus of course the vampires of “Twilight.” Many indeed insist that these last cannot be counted as vampires because they don’t burn up when sunlight hits them. But as methinks I’ve shown, this latter isn’t really a valid criticism. By those standards, Dracula isn’t a vampire. ” AMEN! Vampires of Mid-and Eastern European folklore, Lord Ruthven, Carmilla, Clarimonde and Dracula were NOT harmed by sunlight.

  8. I actualy am not upset about the idea of vampires going out into the light unharmed. According to the Vampire Diaries myth there was a time all vampires could go out in the sun. As for Twilght some people have gotten to the point by saying the vampires in that myth are more like dark fairies (especialy the sparkling aspect). I usualy don’t mind aurthors doing different things with vampires. That is one good thing about vampires is that out of all monsters they have changed more then any mythical monster. I don’t mind if vampires are beautiful or have red eyes or gold eyes. It shows thier nature in a way. However, I still think there is fair critisism laid at Twilght. Those red eyed vampires for example are so powerful they could take over the world. I don’t see a reason given why they wouldn’t. No reason as it is the best for nature nor do I see a reason to think they have any complex view of humans. Even if they are outnumbered they could still take over. They have time on thier side. They can slowly kidnap humans in less developed and developed countries, turn some people to make chaos in order to kidnapp humans in developed countries(and then kill most of the new vampires later). This is just and example.

  9. I tend to agree- not only is Dracula depicted in Bram Stoker’s original novel at least once walking around in broad daylight without any ill effects, but the vampiric version of Mina Harker in the 2003 film “The League Of Extroardinary Gentlemen” not only is seemingly immune to sunlight but even crosses- she attends the funeral of fellow League member Allan Quartermain at the film’s conclusion and neither sunlight or the crosses in the cemetery appear to have any ill effect(FYI, she even survives a sword driven through her chest by her former lover Dorian Gray-although it seems the blade missed her heart)!

  10. As for crosses, how could they affect a Jewish or Islamic vampire? Or an atheist vampire? Vampires have been in folklore long before Christianity, or even Judaism.

  11. Two possibilities come to mind. (1) It is not the object but the faith of the wielder that works against the vampire. (2) It is the shape of the cross that for some mystical reason works, and so Romans crucified their victims on that shape to ward away vampires.

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