Vampiric Hymenoplasty

The relationship between vampires and virgins in the Western vampire canon is a long and illustrious one, second only to the creature’s unbreakable affiliation with death. From as early as 1748 the vampire has appeared in literary works alongside the maiden, with later forays into the theme featuring vampires who were themselves virgins. HBO television’s True Blood has put a unique spin on that representation of the revenant with its character Jessica Hambly, who experiences what I have termed “vampiric hymenoplasty”. Each time she has sexual intercourse, her hymen grows back, leaving her in a state of perpetual maidenhood. This state will form the topic of this paper, which will reference two early virgin vampires from Johan Wolfgang von Goethe’s The Bride of Corinth (1797) and Henry Liddell’s The Vampire Bride (1833) to foreground the investigation.