Showing results for "John Polidori" in Gothic

Experience the chilling tale that birthed the modern vampire genre! The Vampyre by John Polidori is a haunting gothic audiobook that follows the enigmatic Lord Ruthven, a mysterious nobleman with a dark secret. Written in 1819, this eerie classic inspired generations of vampire stories, including Dracula. Perfect for fans of gothic horror and supernatural suspense, this immersive audiobook brings Polidori’s sinister tale to life. Listen now and step into a world of aristocratic terror, cursed love, and undead intrigue!

John William Polidori was an English physician and an associate of Byron and Shelley. On a tour with the two poets and Mary Godwin (later Shelley), Polidori participated in a competition to write a short ghost story. Polidori's contribution was The Vampyre, which is considered to be the first modern work of vampire fiction. The central figures in the plot are the mysterious and sinister Lord Ruthven, and a naïve and wealthy young man named Aubrey. Polidori's tale proved very influential.

In 1816, Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley and her husband Percy Bysshe Shelley visited Lord Byron in Switzerland. After reading an anthology of German ghost stories, Byron challenged the Shelleys and his personal physician, John Polidori, to write horror stories of their own. Polidori was the only one to complete a story, and a good one, at that. Mary did come up with an idea though, and it became was the germ of Frankenstein.