As I noted a week ago, I’ve been curious about Edgar Allan Poe’s knowledge of vampire fiction and whether those stories might have influenced his writing. When looking at the body of Poe’s work, you certainly don’t find any stories about pointy-toothed fiends sneaking around and drinking people’s blood. That said, the tropes in the vampire fiction of the early 1800s were somewhat different than they are today. In reading three novellas that existed prior to Poe’s earliest stories – John Polidori...