Quotations about Monsters, Vampires, Zombies
Part of me would really love being a vampire but another part of me would really hate giving up garlic bread. ~Keith Wynn, 2020
Their kiss... recalled to my fevered imagination another strain of the Gothic — its tales of those eldritch creatures, vampyres, which feed on the blood of their victims, leaving them living shells, inhabited only by the lust for yet more of their vile food. ~Alfred de Musset, Gamiani, or Two Nights of Excess, 1833, translated from the French by John Baxter, 2006
I do not think man was meant to enjoy such easily attained, unmixed happiness. I have often fancied that true happiness is like the palaces in fairy tales from our childhood, where fiery dragons defend the entrance, and monsters of all shapes and kinds must be overcome ere victory is ours. ~Alexandre Dumas, père (1802–1870), Le Comte de Monte-Cristo, 1845 (Edmond Dantès) [This is my rendering of a few different translations, from the French; all had anonymous translators.
He who fights with monsters should be careful lest he thereby become a monster. ~Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil: Prelude to a Philosophy of the Future, 1886, translated by Helen Zimmern
I did not say she was alive, my child... I go no further than to say that she might be
The vampire live on, and cannot die by mere passing of the time; he can flourish when that he can fatten on the blood of the living. Even more, we have seen amongst us that he can even grow younger; that his vital faculties grow strenuous, and seem as though they refresh themselves when his special pabulum is plenty. But he cannot flourish without this diet; he eat not as others. Even friend Jonathan, who lived with him for weeks, did never see him to eat, never! He throws no shadow; he make in the mirror no reflect... He has the strength of many of his hand... He can transform himself to wolf... he can be as bat... He can come in mist which he create... He come on moonlight rays as elemental dust... He become so small... slip through a hairbreadth space at the tomb door... He can, when once he find his way, come out from anything or into anything, no matter how close it be bound or even fused up with fire... He can see in the dark — no small power this, in a world which is one half shut from the light. Ah, but hear me through. He can do all these things, yet he is not free... His power ceases, as does that of all evil things, at the coming of the day... Then there are things which so afflict him that he has no power, as the garlic... crucifix... wild rose... sacred bullet... stake... ~Bram Stoker, Dracula, 1897
No flesh had the spectre, his skeleton skull
Was loosely wrapp’d round with a brown, shrivell’d skin;
His bones, ’stead of marrow, of maggots were full,
And the worms they crawled out, and the worms they crawled in.
His shoes they were coffins, his dim eye reveal’d
The gleam of a grave-lamp with vapours oppress’d;
And a dark crimson necklace of blood-drops congeal’d
Reflected each bone that jagg’d out of his breast...
His tread wakes the echoes, which breathe thro’ the aisle...
Thrice swifter than thought on his heel round he turns...
His quill was a windpipe, his inkhorn a skull...
His lank fingers scrawled invitations in blood...
With groans from their tombs the pale spectres stalk’d forth,
In deadly apparel and shrouding sheets dress’d...
Grinning ghosts, sheeted spirits, skipping skeletons move...
A tomb was the table, now each took his seat...
~Matthew Gregory Lewis (1773–1818), "Grim, King of the Ghosts; or, The Dance of Death: A Church-Yard Tale," c.1802
[I]t is out of the lore and experience of the ancients and all of those who have studied the powers of the
And graves have yawn'd, and yielded up their dead...
Fierce fiery warriors fought upon the clouds,
In ranks and squadrons and right form of war,
Which drizzled blood upon the Capitol;
The noise of battle hurtled in the air,
Horses did neigh, and dying men did groan,
And ghosts did shriek and squeal about the streets.
~William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar, 1599
I saw what I saw, I heard what I heard, and my soul sickened at it... My life is shaken to its roots... ~Robert Louis Stevenson, Strange Case of
As we burst into the room, the Count turned his face, and the hellish look that I had heard described seemed to leap into it. His eyes flamed red with devilish passion; the great nostrils of the white aquiline nose opened wide and quivered at the edge; and the white sharp teeth, behind the full lips of the blood-dripping mouth, champed together like those of a wild beast. ~Bram Stoker, Dracula, 1897
A kiss is but a modified bite... ~Ambrose Bierce [This isn't actually in the context of vampires, but I thought it fit well.
I don't know exactly what the zombie apocalypse will look like, but I have a strong feeling that it will resemble Walmart on a Friday night. ~Keith Wynn, 2017
Vampire: a toothy phlebotomist. ~Terri Guillemets
And then sometimes a sudden chill doth strike
My heart with very horror, and I shrink
Away from their dull touch, shudd'ring to think
How much of human life that, vampire-like,
These books have sucked beneath their leathern wings,
How brains have broken and frail bodies bent
To feed with human blood these bloodless things...
~Charles Washington Coleman (1862–1932), "Of My Books," c.1893
I noticed a thin line of blood on my collar. I felt my neck, a terrible fear overwhelming me. It pained slightly at the touch. I rushed to examine it in the mirror. Two tiny dots rimmed with blood — my blood — on my neck! — two hellish perforations, fresh and raw. It, the thing, had attacked me as I slept! ~Victor Rowan, "Four Wooden Stakes: A Tale of Vampires," in Weird Tales, 1925
I raised the lid... then then I saw something which filled my very soul with horror. There lay the Count, but looking as if his youth had been half renewed, for the white hair and moustache were changed to dark iron-grey; the cheeks were fuller, and the white skin seemed ruby-red underneath; the mouth was redder than ever, for on the lips were gouts of fresh blood, which trickled from the corners of the mouth and ran over the chin and neck. Even the deep, burning eyes seemed set amongst swollen flesh, for the lids and pouches underneath were bloated. It seemed as if the whole awful creature were simply gorged with blood. He lay like a filthy leech, exhausted with his repletion. ~Bram Stoker, Dracula, 1897
Between the shoulder and the head
The guillotine must play
And cleave with clash unmerited
The generating clay…
Till the separated parts, not dead,
Rise and walk away.
~Emanuel Morgan (Witter Bynner), "Opus 16," Spectra: A Book of Poetic Experiments, 1916 [farce
Did you really run into a monster on your path, or just a mirror? ~Terri Guillemets, "Mind the monsters," 2004
I mean, herpes are one thing, but zombie herpes?! ~Zombie Strippers!, 2008, written by Jay Lee, spoken by the character Ian
But perhaps the universe is suspended on the tooth of some monster. ~Anton Chekhov (1860–1904), translated by Constance Garnett