The History of the Female Vampire- Talks in the Pub

Talks in the Pub, from the team behind Seed Talks. A pint, some pub snacks, and everything you never knew about the female vampire. We are running two talks this evening, for tickets to 'Gothic Fiction, Gender & The Rise of Dark Academia', please click here. The female vampire is a monster and a seductress, desirable and deadly, all at once. She represents our fears about uncontrollable female desire, giving us a way to explore forbidden sexuality and challenge what society expects women to be. In this talk, we'll trace her history – from ancient demons like Lilith and the real-life Hungarian countess Elizabeth Bathory, to her most famous appearances in classic novels like Carmilla and Dracula. More recently, feminist and queer writers have transformed the female vampire into a symbol of freedom and female desire. Modern novels like Kirsten White's Lucy Undying and S.T. Gibson's A Dowry of Blood rewrite her story to show her power to liberate, not just terrify. Come and discover what makes the female vampire so endlessly fascinating. Doors open at 8pm, talk starts at 8:15pm - come down early to grab a good seat! Your speaker: Dr Sarah Gamble is Associate Professor in English Literature at Swansea University. She’s a specialist in contemporary Gothic fiction and women’s writing, and has a particular expertise in the life and work of Angela Carter, on whom she’s written two monographs: Angela Carter: Writing from the Front Line (Edinburgh University Press,1997), and Angela Carter: A Literary Life (Palgrave Macmillan, 2006). Most recently, she has co-edited (with Anna Watz of Uppsala University, Sweden) a two-volume collection of academic essays on Carter – Angela Carter’s Pasts: Allegories and Intertextualities, and Angela Carter’s Futures: Representations, Adaptations and Legacies (Bloomsbury, 2025). Her current research involves dark academia and vampires.