A certain attraction

A poster for true blood season 4 has me wondering about vampires today. What is it about them? The genre is very popular at the moment, possibly at an all-time high. Twilight, true blood, the vampire diaries... All feature sexy casts and gripping plot lines, but is that the key to it? I'm inclined to think that it's probably due to the forbidden love aspect.  Which brings me on to my next thought. Can forbidden love ever be real love? Why should something so wonderful and blessed be denied? Granted the idea of necrophilia isn't something I'm inclined to go for, but if they are essentially alive (albeit in a dead way) then is that something which should be denied? Part of me wonders if vampires really do exist. The legends about them have existed for centuries, and something that survived so long must have a reason for its longevity.  An example I can think of is falling for a married person. I'm not seeking to excuse any behaviours or justify them, but having been unfaithful myself (not something I'm proud of) I know from personal experience that to fall for someone else means there is something not right about your relationship. Which brings me back to the idea of eternal monogamy. Who knows if it really works. But if a vampire, a creature who lives by others' deaths, can fall so spectacularly for a mortal and commit to them for eternity - eternity in the true sense, not a human lifetime - then surely that shows we can, too? Before going any further down a path that may lead my readers to question my sanity, I am fully aware that they are fictional characters. But despite being depicted by so many authors and producers, with variant agendas and ideas of what sells, they do have common characteristics - ability to turn off humanity, ability to entice humans to do their bidding, ability to fall in love and remain monogamous, passionately and brutally so. So where do these shared characteristics come from? It is said that when writing, authors rely on some of their own experience. Have all of them awoken in the night to a deathly pale beauty having flown in their window? Nowadays that would be punishable by a custodial sentence. But why have the stories endured? There are only so many times you can hear a story, tell a story, before it becomes stale. What is it about this world that readers and viewers cannot get enough of the vampire genre?  Their old world manners is something that does appeal to me. The SATC episode in which petrovsky writes a song on the piano in front of a roaring fire, before surprising her with a beautiful dress and a trip to the opera, dancing with her in the square to a busker, is one I would love to emulate. But without telling him obviously. I think true romance may have gone out the window in modern-day western society. For a girl raised on ballet and art, this is a tragedy. But then, there's nothing worse than fiction in a relationship. And I want REAL in my next one. Just maybe some escapism and fun.