author
John William Polidori
1795–1821
Best known for "The Vampyre," he helped shape the modern literary vampire long before Dracula. A physician as well as a writer, he moved in the circle of Byron and the Shelleys and left a lasting mark on Gothic fiction despite his very short life.
2 Audiobooks
The Vampyre; a Tale
by John William Polidori
The Diary of Dr. John William Polidori, 1816, Relating to Byron, Shelley, etc.
by John William Polidori
About the author
Born in London on September 7, 1795, John William Polidori was the son of Gaetano Polidori, an Italian scholar and teacher. He studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh and earned his M.D. at the unusually young age of 19, showing early promise in both science and literature.
Polidori is most closely linked with the famous 1816 gathering at Villa Diodati in Switzerland, where he was traveling with Lord Byron and spent time with Percy Bysshe Shelley and Mary Shelley. Out of that moment came his best-known work, The Vampyre (1819), a story widely regarded as a landmark in vampire fiction because it transformed the creature into a polished, aristocratic figure.
Although his life was brief and often troubled, Polidori's influence was far-reaching. He died in London on August 24, 1821, at just 25, but The Vampyre became an important stepping stone in the history of Gothic horror and helped set the pattern for many vampire tales that followed.