UN VIAJE MONSTRUOSO E ICÓNICO: REESCRITURAS ESTÉTICO-NARRATIVAS DEL VAMPIRISMO Y DRÁCULA EN DEMETER (2015), DE ANA JUAN

Abstract

The figure of the vampire, especially the figure of Dracula, has become one of the most characteristic visual icons of our society since the 19th century. It has constituted an iconographic and visual representation that has proliferated in traditional iconic mass media, configuring an emblematic model of representation that, even with variations, has survived throughout the 20th century and so far in the 21st, with a special preponderance of the figure of the Transylvanian count created by Bram Stoker in 1897. In this sense, we investigate the iconographic forms of Ana Juan’s adaptation of one of the passages in the Irish writer’s novel: the vampire’s journey from his homeland to the English coast. To this aim, we selected the illustrated album Demeter: logbook from Varna to Whitby as an object of study to analyze the visual rewriting carried out by the Valencian author, focusing on her main sources of inspiration, artistic
models and visual influences, for concluding about the innovative work that reflects the complex historical iconography of the vampire.