Nosferatu vs. Lepirica: When Vampire Eroticism Meets a Shovel
Recently, I read a vampire short story by the Serbian writer Milovan Glišić, After Ninety Years, which became the basis for the cult folk-horror film Leptirica — one of Robert Eggers’ inspirations. The pop-cultural image of the vampire as a demonic lover collided in my mind with folkloric reality — and it felt like my face had just met a shovel.
What I expected: a dark, erotic vampire tragedy.
What Balkan folklore actually delivers: several villagers with shovels solving the problem.
The story is written in a plain, unadorned style, and its plot is extremely simple: in a Serbian village, there is a cursed mill. Whoever comes there to work as the miller is inevitably found strangled. A young pauper named Strahinja agrees to spend a night at the mill and survives, but learns that every night a vampire named Sava Savanović — who died ninety years ago — comes there in search of a victim. Together with the other villagers, Strahinja digs up his grave.
"They look — and there it is. A man lies in the coffin, perfectly intact, as if he had only been buried yesterday. His legs are crossed, his arms stretched along his body; he is swollen like a bladder, red all over, as if filled entirely with blood; one eye closed, the other open". (с)
The villagers drive a stake into the vampire’s stomach (prosaically — into the stomach, not the heart, as the romantic Gothic tradition would have it), while the village priest pours holy water and recites prayers. Once the vampire is dealt with, the villagers help Strahinja abduct his beloved Radojka, whose father refuses to consent to their marriage. The young couple marry, and the story ends with a wedding scene.
The story was written in 1880. One wonders whether Glišić had read Carmilla or Polidori’s The Vampyre. Even if he had, he would surely have laughed at how much Gothic pathos writers had already piled onto the figure of the vampire: “You’re my affliction! Your passion is bound to me!” Being Serbian, he knew perfectly well that a vampire is not a tragic aristocrat lover but a practical problem — something like a wolf that has taken to stealing sheep.
I admit, I too kept expecting something Gothic and romantic to happen — something that would allow for parallels with Nosferatu. But, alas, the story offers not a trace of the pop-cultural vampire eroticism we have grown accustomed to. Nosferatu Is a Love Story - After Ninety Years Is a Work Instruction.
I can practically see the scene: Strahinja comes at night to Radojka’s window—
Radojka (in a long white nightgown): I felt you… crawling like a serpent in my body…
Strahinja: What serpent in your body? Get a grip—we’re in rural Serbia!
Radojka: What? You’re alive? But you were supposed to become a vampire and start haunting me!
Strahinja: Radojka, we’re not in a Robert Eggers film, and not even in Coppola. This is just a 19th-century village story.
Radojka: No! This is a vampire story! You’re supposed to drag me into eternity as a sinful temptation! I’m a Gothic heroine!
Strahinja: Radojka, accept it. Nosferatu hasn’t been invented yet.
By the way, the film follows the story quite closely for about two-thirds of its runtime—but toward the end, the director introduces a small change that clearly works in the story’s favor. I won’t spoil it, but you’ll like it. I might do a separate post about the film as well.
