Oh the Sparkles they make....

“What a difference a preposition makes!”

AGREED. Dropping the “with” from “nice to eat with you” turns the sentence into something unfavorable and quite frankly, rude. 

Of course when I read “vampire” I thought not of Dracula or Nosferatu  (yes, I know they are the same character, just copyright issues involved), I thought of the ridiculous Stephanie Meyer excuse for a vampire, Edward Cullen. Who is actually more of a pale princess, NOT a vampire. Honestly he would probably say “nice to stare at you” than “nice to eat you”

I’m just glad our beloved Count Dracula didn't sparkle as well…

But I digress-
The most interesting piece of literature mentioned was Daisy Miller because the vampire is almost implied instead of being a physical person and not in actual form. Daisy died from "contracting malaria on her midnight jaunt" which is when foster brought in an interesting point: "you don't need fangs and a cape to be a vampire" which by Hollywood's definition is extremely debatable. Fortunately enough for Foster, I learned to ignore Hollywood's definition for most things these days. So he made me curious as to what HIS definition for a vampire was.

It is one thing for vampires to not need fangs or capes, but for them to completely lack physical form seems a little absurd to have them lack any physical form whatsoever. Saying that Winterbourne has a "vampiric personality" is a bit amusing, but then i thought about how he actually lines up with the points to be a vampire as listed by Foster earlier in the chapter. (older figure representing corrupt, outworn values the virginal female, etc). It has become intriguing to me that Henry James never explicitly mentioned a vampire, but that it was up to the reader to figure it out for themselves. Especially since James (according to foster) is the master of psychological realism. He has two stories mentioned by foster that while similar are very different. The Turn of the Screw is also a story of his, but it contains a physical vampire instead of an implied vampiric personality.

Honestly, at this point I can say that I would much rather read about a vampiric personality that isn't explicitly stated than read directly about a vampire just casually sucking blood all day (night) long. OR of course, in the case of Edward Cullen, climbing trees, graduating high school an ungodly amount of times, and staring at a girl 90 years younger than him while she sleeps.

Summing up a vampire to be someone (or something or maybe even nothing at all) who places their ugly desires in front of another's needs seems like the perfect explanation for any REAL vampire. I'm sure Count Dracula, Nosferatu, Winterbourne, and even Count Von Count (of Sesame Street fame) are entirely happy with that definition, because while saying that their intentions are "ugly" they are aware of the fact. Just as long as Edward Cullen is not included in the real definition of a vampire, the authentic vampires are free to roam around and steal the life from anyone and everyone (mainly virginal women) all night.