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The Vampire Chronicles: Difference between revisions
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The Vampire Chronicles are a series of novels by [[Anne Rice]] that revolve around the adventures of an ever-changing coven of vampires. Throughout the series the protagonist, Lestat, seeks the origin of the vampire species and tries to fit his need for blood into a workable moral system.
== Books in this series: ==
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* [[Ancient Tradition]]: The Talamasca
** The vampire cult that Armand leads...at least until Lestat shows up.
* [[And I Must Scream]]: Akasha had Mekare's tongue cut out, and then sealed her inside a coffin that she set adrift in the Atlantic Ocean.
** Many vampires also believe that if they are left in the sun or burned, and their ashes are left unscattered, they will experience this.
** And then there was the Parisian vampire tradition of burying their criminals alive.
* [[Anti-Hero]]: Lestat becomes a Type V after "interview".
* [[Anti-Villain]]: Lestat in ''Interview''. He's controlling, egotistic, selfish, and proud; he also proves to be Claudia's main obstacle to freedom and Louis goes between tolerating him and flat-out hating him. But at the same time he's easily the most fascinating character in the story and his attitudes set him apart from other actual antagonists encountered later.
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* [[C-List Fodder]]: Once unleashed, Akasha kills off most of the vampire race except, conveniently, for every single major character in the series, and plots to exterminate all men on earth.
** This (except for the "exterminate all men" part) is justified in that Lestat's cadre of friends is the upper echelon of vampires who have been around for hundreds to thousands of years and who have very aggressively marked out their territory. They've gotten that old by being very clever and by learning how to move around in vampire society (i.e. learning who to not piss off). The vampires that Akasha kills are the young ones barely out of their first century, and considering how few older vampires are actually out there it seems reasonable to assume that even if she hadn't gone on a killing spree, most of them would still have died competing with one another for supremacy in a process of natural selection.
** Not to mention, Akasha states that she spared some of the vampires who were not old and powerful yet because Lestat loved them. Louis and Gabrielle fall under this category.
* [[Can't Grow Up]]: Claudia.
* [[Can't Have Sex Ever]]: Once you're a vampire, you can't have actual sex. However, ''everything else'' practically becomes a substitute. Even the ''pattern on a carpet'' can bring rapturous pleasure to one's enhanced senses.
** Though this is possible [[Fanon]] since the books never actually say or show that vampires are incapable of having sex, but rather implies that they lose interest in it because isn't as intimate as killing or exchanging blood.
*** There are several moments in the series where the characters seem to have PLENTY of interest in sex but actual intercourse never occurs. The Vampire Armand is a shining example of this.
** There is no [[Word of God]] regarding vampire impotency in the series and the events of the series never solidly confirm or disprove it.
** Actually, Lestat does in fact specifically note that male vampires' "equipment" no longer functions in ''The Queen of the Damned''. This is why one of the first things he does {{spoiler|when transferred into a human body in ''The Tale of the Body Thief'' is have sex with a woman (without her consent it should be noted)}}.
* [[Character Filibuster]]: Arguably Roger in ''Memnoch the Devil''.
** Lestat does this from time to time, the worst example being all of Chapter 16 in ''Blood Canticle'', wherein he stops the plot to explain why he's in love with a character despite their complete lack of chemistry.
** Lestat also takes time in the preface of ''Blood Canticle'' to complain about the fans' reaction to ''Memnoch the Devil'', saying more or less that he gave them a glimpse into the mysteries of Heaven and Hell and all they wanted was "the fancy fiend" with glamorous leather and heavy motorcycles. He assures them that there's plenty of traditional badassery to go around but that he'll get to it when he's good and ready. Then again, that might be a full-on [[Author Filibuster]], as well as Chapter 7 of the same novel, which has nothing to do with the plot or the series, but is a three page rave about the new Pope and some Saint in Mexico.
* [[Creator Breakdown]]: Coming and going. Rice started writing the books to work out her feelings about her daughter's death(which led to her leaving the Catholic church), and stopped the series(and all but disowned them to boot) after experiencing a religious awakening that [[Cue Irony|led her back to her faith]]. She has since left organized Christianity due to its opposition to homosexuality, birth control, feminism, and other liberal positions.
* [[Creepy Child]]: Claudia
* [[Crowning Moment of Awesome]]: YMMV, but {{spoiler|Gabrielle's}} last appearance in The Vampire Lestat was pretty damn awesome; as was {{spoiler|Mekare's}} moment in [[Queen of the Damned]].
* [[Cursed with Awesome]]: The vampires have eternal youth, super speed, super strength, telepathy, telekinesis and the power of flight, but still they see their existence as a curse.
** Though this is averted (kind of) since Lestat admits (after the events of [[Tale Of The Body Thief]]) that, if he's really honest with himself, he would much rather be a vampire than a human.
*** Despite the the bad things he's been through as a vampire.
** Some of the vampires view immortality as a curse and some don't and think the ones that do are ridiculous. The series stresses (at least in the beginning) that there are many different philosophical perspectives from which a vampire can view his situation, all of them equally valid.
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** But at the same time, their society is either anarchic and devil-may-care or conformist and stifling, and the characters are deeply flawed by their emotions and frustrations brought out by the transformation.
** And not to mention that sunlight and fire can (and does) easily immolate them.
*** But even that gets mitigated with age. A sufficiently old vampire can, in fact, withstand exposure to daylight, at least for a time. The very oldest can even handle a full day out with minimal worry.
* [[Driven to Suicide]]: The overwhelming majority of vampires end up this way, because they can't handle the continuous changes in human mindset and lifestyle.
* [[Dropped a Bridge on Him]]: Merrick
* [[Drowning My Sorrows]] - Louis and Quinn. Daniel sort of, although he's trying to drown his on-coming madness from the knowledge that vampires exist.
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* [[Enfant Terrible]]: Claudia. Her favored method of hunting is taking advantage of her cuteness to trick people into thinking she's lost and helpless, and then ripping their throats out.
* [[Even the Guys Want Him]]: Armand, so, so much.
* [[Everyone Is Bi]] - Sort of. Vampires don't have actual sex, but the enhanced senses make them [[Sense Freak|Sense Freaks]] to a point where ''rubbing against any sufficiently interestingly-textured surface'' makes an orgasm seem rather dull. Additionally, gender isn't an issue for romantic or sensual purposes; things become beautiful (to them) because said things are alive. So, everyone is Bi-romantic, bi-sensual and extremely hedonistic.
* [[Eye Scream]]: Akasha had Maharet's eyes cut out. Maharet's solution is to steal the eyes of her victims, pop them into her eye sockets, and let her [[The Power of Blood|vampire blood]] work its magic and allow her to see. [[Better Than It Sounds]].
* [[Grand Theft Me]]: In "The Tale of the Body Thief."
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** Though some are lighter shades of grey than others.
* [[Hemo-Erotic]]
* [[Hermaphrodite]]: {{spoiler|Petronia}} from ''Blackwood Farm'' (s/he seems to prefer being [[
* [[I Hate You, Vampire Dad]]: Either [[Trope Maker]] or [[Trope Codifier]].
* [[I Love You, Vampire Son]]
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* [[Long Running Book Series]]
* [[Mega Crossover]]: ''Blackwood Farm'' and ''Blood Canticle'' cross over characters and stories from both the Vampire Chronicles and the Mayfair Witches.
* [[Monster Progenitor]]: Akasha.
* [[Our Vampires Are Different]]: Let us count the ways:
** No vulnerability to religious artifacts
** Stakes through the heart do not work
** Do not need to sleep in a grave or coffin. Anyplace free of sunlight will do.
*** But the books do imply that the belief that vampires need to sleep in coffins is a commonly held superstition among some groups of vampires (specifically those of the "old world") or, in some cases, a practice based more in tradition than actual necessity.
** Unaffected by garlic (although they cannot eat it, nor any other kind of food)
** They have reflections
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** Their powers are wholly [[Psychic Powers|psychic]] in nature, even physical ones such as [[Flight]], [[Super Reflexes]], [[Super Speed]] and [[Super Strength]] are rationalized as being [[Mind Over Matter|telekinesis]], which is essentially the force that animates the vampires in the first place.
* [[Physical God]]: With the exception of the actual [[God]] and the angels from ''Memnoch'', Akasha and the other First Brood are the closest things the series has to them. To clarify, they apparently can completely probe the minds of people on a global scale, mind control even vampires as powerful as Lestat, they can walk harmlessly through fire, can apparently resist the daylight coma, and it would seem that even vampires of Marius's powers can't even hurt them.
* [[Playing with Fire]]: The Fire Gift.
* [[Plot Induced Stupidity]]
** Lestat is a skilled computer hacker in ''Tale of the Body Thief'', but doesn't know how to use email when it becomes a plot point in ''Blood Canticle''.
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** When Louis falls improbably in love with Merrick, it never occurs to David that something supernatural is going on, even though he's an expert in magic and he knows she's a witch.
* [[Purple Prose]]: every book without fail.
** YMMV, but this is one of the few times when the ridiculously lavish dimensions of a text actually work to the advantage of the novel. This could be due to one of three reasons: 1) the writing itself is actually good quality (unlike [[Twilight (novel)|some books]]), 2) it works to illustrate how hedonistic and sensual Lestat's [[Point of View]] is, or 3) it's a triumphant example of [[So Bad It's Good]]. Personal preference may determine where and if it crosses the line.
* [[Pyromaniac]]: In the first book alone, Louis burns down two houses and a theatre, sets Lestat on fire and says that he could "spend hours just staring at the candles."
* [[Rage Against the Heavens]]
** In the earlier books, it could be called Rage Against the Fact That There is No Heaven. The absence of God or underling moral justice in the universe is a source of a lot of the characters' angst.
* [[Really Seven Hundred Years Old]]: All the vampires. Especially Claudia.
* [[Redemption Equals Death]]: Armand. Lestat tries at the beginning of ''Memnoch the Devil'' but it doesn't quite work.
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* [[Ubermensch]]: Lestat, himself.
* [[Unreliable Narrator]]: The Lestat that appeared in ''Interview with the Vampire'' was not merely the antagonist; he was a stupid, cruel and petty ''villain''. The (vastly different) Lestat of the later books claims he was spitefully misrepresented by Louis.
** Although it can be debated whether Vampire Chronicles fits this trope at all, as we're not talking about one narrator who is inconsistent, we're talking about two completely different narrators within the series (not counting the multiple points of view of ''[[Queen of the Damned|The Queen of the Damned]]''). Of course a depiction of Lestat from the perspective of Louis (who resents him) is going to be more harsh and critical, and a depiction of Lestat from his own point of view is going to be more forgiving. No one sees themselves as being "stupid, cruel and petty." Lestat knows and fully understands the motivations behind his own action and Louis doesn't, which would account for any seeming inconsistencies in Lestat's characterization.
** The simplest explanation is that Lestat went through a lot of personal change as the series progressed, which explains why he became a very different character in the later books than he was in the early ones (toward the end he even starts to believe in God.)
** It is worth noting that Louis is self-absorbed to the point where, unlike most vampires, he almost never seems to exhibit any significant telepathic ability. Thus his point of view is entirely his own. Lestat, in contrast, makes extensive use of telepathy, particularly as his powers grow, and many of the observations in the stories he narrates came directly from the thoughts and memories of other characters. Thus he is to some extent an omniscient narrator.
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[[Category:Vampire Fiction]]
[[Category:Horror Literature]]
[[Category:{{PAGENAME}}]]
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