The vampire-friend in the house : Le Fanu's Carmilla, her secret, and the incitement to discourse

Abstract

This project questions assumptions among scholarship regarding the theme of homosexuality and the reactions it might have provoked to Victorian readers in Le Fanu’s vampire story Carmilla. Specifically considering Victorian ideas surrounding Natural abnormalities, femininity and friendships between women, and infection through the mind and body, this paper argues that Carmilla points to an incitement to discourse on sexuality that begins to problematize the existence and multiplicity of female friends with natural but abnormal desires. After demonstrating the patriarchal roots of these ideas, the investigation concludes that Carmilla demands patriarchal power/knowledge to lead this particular incitement to discourse to then have control and knowledge over vampires/lesbians.