Adolescence in vampire narratives: symbolic motifs from the fairy tale <i>Little Red Riding Hood</i> in E.T.A. Hoffmann’s <i>Vampyrismus</i> (1821) and Moira Buffini’s <i>A Vampire Story</i> (2008)

This study examines adolescence as a site of psychological crisis in vampire narratives, focusing on the Oedipal structure and its role in identity formation. Drawing on Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalytic theory and Julia Kristeva’s concept of abjection, the analysis highlights the tension between the principles of pleasure and reality, as young female protagonists disregard maternal injunctions and pursue desire, thereby precipitating vampiric transformation. E.T.A. Hoffmann’s Vampyrismus (1821) dramatizes this inevitability through Aurelie’s abject metamorphosis, whereas Moira Buffini’s A Vampire Story (2008) explores Eleanor’s fragile sensibility and transgressive love for Frank. The analysis employs a comparative close reading of these works that dramatize how female protagonists negotiate tensions between desire and repression. This study demonstrates that the Oedipal complex structure evident in the fairy tale Little Red Riding Hood can be read as the psychological origin of vampirization in Hoffmann’s and Buffini’s narratives. The study also examines Neil Jordan’s contemporary cinematic adaptation to illustrate how these symbolic structures continue across media. The vampire figure emerges as a liminal presence that destabilizes boundaries between subject and object, purity and impurity, and life and death. This study argues that vampirism functions as a metaphor for adolescent identity crises, where desire and abjection mark privileged sites of female subjectivity. This perspective contributes to work at the intersection of gender, psychoanalytic criticism, and narrative folklore.