blood – R&D Gothic Discoveries

Hannibal Lecter… For those who know who this man is, does the only mention of his name give you goosebumps? What do you feel when hearing about him if not fear? Well, maybe you think he is somehow nice, and you feel empathy for him, but either way, Lecter is a very interesting character, and this is why I decided to see what makes him so frightening for most people. The novel I will take as a reference in this post is The Silence of the Lambs by Thomas Harris, originally published in 1988.

The first thing is that he is in fact a very charismatic man. For example, when Clarice Starling, the investigator, goes to the psychiatric hospital to meet with Lecter, a patient called Miggs talks to her in a crude and rude way, which would suggest that this man may be mentally deranged. On the contrary, during her first visit at the hospital, Lecter is extremely polite with her, and acts like a gentleman. Indeed, his gentleman-like behaviors make him even more scary since there is no way someone can know whether he is “good” or “bad” without previously knowing from the beginning that he murders people to eat them afterwards.

Lecter needs information to use his psychological power. Without information, he is lost. This means that without information, he has nothing. This reminds us slightly of Dracula from Bram Stoker’s novel, right? Dracula’s power comes from the information he obtains from the blood he drinks, or from the years he has lived. Hence, to stay alive in this modern world, he seeks information. It is similar in the case of Hannibal Lecter. He is indeed a surgeon, but also a psychiatrist. Psychiatry requires a superior knowledge of how the human brain works, and also of social behaviors, which can often be associated to different mental illnesses. Therefore, a psychiatrist must know his or her patients in order to help them properly. The problem in Lecter’s case is that he may be too good at his job, for he instantly knows much information even before the person tells anything. Moreover, once he is told some information, he is able to play with one’s mind to make him or her do what he wants to a certain extent. An example of his need of information is when Clarice Starling investigates the case of Fredrica Bimmel, and for all the information he gives her, he asks for information about her in return, despite the fact that Crawford clearly told her to avoid revealing to him any personal information.

Briefly, if you are boring, according to his standards, you will not last long. The issue is, we do not know how Lecter defines “boring”. This means that there is no way we can adjust to him to avoid being killed because we do not have any clues as to what he considers as boring or not. Therefore, we are kept in obscurity when it comes to Hannibal’s thoughts while this knowledge is the only thing that could possibly save us from a horrible death. In other words, Hannibal does not need to have a motif to kill. It does not matter to him whether we did something wrong or not. That is, he can decide to kill someone because that person did something he disliked, or just because a person is not entertaining enough for him.

Finally, the previous characteristics make him the “perfect” serial killer, but they also show that from the outside, he is the most ordinary human being. Hence, from this fact, another frightful thought arises: there could be a Hannibal Lecter everywhere we go. We do not know what is going on in other people’s minds, and if Lecter is able to hide his true nature so well, then, how many people are able to do it too?

After reading these traits of character, are you now scared of Hannibal Lecter? I know there are many opinions about whether he is good or bad, and it is actually quite interesting to see that a serial killer can make people hesitate in that manner.

Are you one of those who think he is fundamentally good, or fundamentally bad? Or neither?

DelphineC

There are two main sources from which vampires were inspired. The first one is Greek mythology, and the second one is Vlad the Empaler. My guess would be that the story of Vlad the Empaler is considerably more known by people than the one from Greek mythology! But still, both are interesting.

Greek Mythology:

This legend from the Greek people has been found in the “Scriptures of Delphi,” which are said to have been written by the Oracle of Delphi. Delphi is an ancient Greek city that has been inhabited since 1600 BC. It was considered by the Greeks to be the center of the world, due to Greek mythology and Zeus’ eagles, which he released in the wild, and which met at Delphi after encircling the world. The scriptures tell the story of Ambrogio, an Italian adventurer that was going in Greece to have his fortune told by the Oracle of Delphi. The words of the Oracle were the following: “The curse. The moon. The blood will run.” Preoccupied by the words of the Oracle, Ambrogio spent the night outside the temple thinking about their meaning. When daylight came, he saw a beautiful young woman: Selene. She was the Oracle’s sister and came to the temple everyday to take care of her sister (the Oracle). He fell deeply in love with the woman and asked her to marry him. Here is where the problems begin: Apollo, god of the Sun, was also coveting Selene, and to show his anger, he cursed Ambrogio by making his skin burn whenever he was exposed to sunlight, which forced him to hide in a dark cave, unable to warn Selene of what happened. Thus, to try to escape and communicate with Selene, he made a pact with Hades, the god of the underworld: Hades would give him a bow and arrows so he could offer his kill to Artemis, goddess of the hunt and sister of Apollo, to win her favor and eventually steal her silver bow. If he failed to do so, he would have to give his soul to Hades forever, and indeed, he did fail. From there, many things happened but at the end, Artemis proposed he become immortal, which he accepted. However, for Selene and himself to live the afterlife together, she had to be immortal too, and the way to achieve immortality was for him to drink her blood, which would kill her mortal body, but assure them they would be together in the afterlife. Therefore, he drank her blood, and she became goddess of moonlight, and every night, she would come down from the heavens and touch her beloved Ambrogio.

Vlad the Empaler:

Vlad the Empaler’s real name is actually Vlad Dracula. He was born in Transylvania, Romania, and ruled, on and off, the region of Wallachia in Romania between 1456-1462. He fought against the Ottaman Empire, an empire in which the leader, Sultan, had absolute political and religious power over his people. His nickname comes from the fact that his favorite way to kill his enemies was to impale them on a wooden stake. The legend says that Vlad enjoyed dipping his bread in his victims’ blood. However, no one knows whether this is real or not; one thing is certain, Romanian people do not consider him as a monster, but a hero.

Other sources of inspiration:

Of course, many other things may have influenced Bram Stoker to create Dracula’s character. Indeed, an Irish legend about a tyrant called Abhartach relates that this monster was killed and buried three times before asking for the help of the Christian saint to stop him forever. Moreover, it was said that the tyrant asked for sacrifices of blood from the wrists of his subjects.

It is also said that on February 1896, the New York Newspaper featured an article about vampires, and in this article, a section was written about vampire bats. Bram Stoker, who read this article, was thus inspired by science in the creation of the vampire Dracula.

Furthermore, Bram Stoker was well aware of Eastern European folklore as well as other stories talking about vampires that were written before he wrote his own.

Finally, Bram Stoker created a monster from various sources of information he found from different time periods. Even though Dracula has been invented, where do all these legends come from? Why were people so afraid of vampires for about three hundred years? Would it be possible that, even if some characteristics of the “classic” vampire are missing, a creature close to the definition of a vampire would exist somewhere?

DelphineC

Tag: blood

What makes Hannibal Lecter So Terrifying

Where Does Dracula Come From?