Spoilers to follow Le Fanu's "Carmilla."

Le Fanu's 1872 Carmilla is a genre prototype on many fronts. It is one of the earliest works of vampire fiction and features the first lesbian vampire to ever exist. The novella's protagonist, Laura, is a young woman living in a castle in Styria (present-day Austria), and her complex, escalating relationship with Carmilla, who seems all too sweet and human, forms the core of the attraction and horror. from Le Fanu's defining work.

The seeds of terror are planted years before the story's key events take place. Laura describes being visited by a beautiful woman who pierced her chest when she was only six years old, but left no wounds behind. The way Le Fanu frames this disturbing childhood memory is particularly chilling, with Laura witnessing the woman turn and hide under the bed after crying out to her nurses. Although the nurses find no one in that cramped space, the floor feels warm to the touch, as if someone had, indeed, been lying there seconds before.

How does Le Fanu portray Carmilla, the vampiric seductress who wants to take Laura's body and soul? At first, Laura sees Carmilla as a like-minded young lady, but recognizes that she is more beautiful, mysterious and unpredictable than anyone she has ever known. At times, Carmilla is honest, soothing Laura's loneliness by appearing as a constant companion she can confide in. “Dear, darling, I live in you; you'd die for me too, I love you so much," says Carmilla in a trance, the implications being explicit and downright weird. Although Laura uses terms like "disgust" and "disgust" when she encounters these advances, her relationship with Carmilla is undoubtedly tinged with unstated temptation, which she repeatedly rejects so as not to "transgress."

These sapphic undertones mingle with the horror of being possessed or defiled, as Carmilla repeatedly feeds on an unconscious Laura every night. In addition, its customs are perceived as "strange". She never wakes up before noon, does not participate in the house prayers and her mood swings to inexplicable extremes. Well, what is Carmilla and what does she want?