The Curious Case of the Spanish Televisual Vampire

Aldana Reyes, X (2017) The Curious Case of the Spanish Televisual Vampire. Horror Studies, 8 (2). pp. 241-254. ISSN 2040-3275

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Abstract

This article explores the birth and development of the Spanish televisual vampire within the context of a similarly nascent national television industry and, more specifically, that of its first horror programme, Historias para no dormir / Stories to Stay Awake (1966–82), and the career of its director and scriptwriter, Narciso Ibáñez Serrador. The article reads the intrinsic qualities of the first Spanish televisual vampire, its literary credentials, as well as its reliance on adaptation from canonical sources, as more largely indicative of the role and perception of horror television in that country. Substantial space is dedicated to a study of the historical and contextual coordinates of the vampire as it manifests in the Historias episode ‘La pesadilla’ / ‘The Nightmare’ (1967), but a brief overview of the legacy of this figure in later Spanish television is also provided. The main aim is to understand the ways in which the vampire has been adapted and appropriated in Spain, and, to this end, the article considers its parallel appearance in national literary and cinematic production.