Lessons of the Gothic: Taboos (Interview with the Vampire)

     In the Gothic formula, taboos are a commonplace. In Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, there is the suggestion of incest between Frankenstein and Elizabeth. They refer to each other as cousins and are raised as siblings. Frankenstein also deals in immoral sciences that could be considered taboo. There is the Lolita, Claudia, in Anne Rice's Interview with a Vampire, a child stuck in time but has desires for sex as she ages without her body. Most taboos are sex-related but there are many others like racism, cannibalism, circumcision, drugs, slavery, and menstruation. Some subjects should remain taboo, but others are unjustly considered taboo. We can use taboos to intrigue and hook our audience. People generally have extremely strong feelings about taboos and that's why they are so great at reeling in our audience. When using taboo in a story, we are automatically given a conflict to drive the plot. Plus, every taboo is polarizing, setting apart two opposing sides to battle. Unfortunately using taboos can also shrink our audience by offending the people on the opposing side. Even if that's the case, taboo subjects need to be discussed. Nothing is so sacred that it can't be spoken of or made fun of. But how do we keep our audience from shrinking, you may ask? Well, we can take the offense out of taboo by disguising them with metaphors or hiding the overall offensive material. Here are two examples of this being implemented.

     In Anne Rice's Interview with a Vampire, there are countless discussions of vampires feeding on the blood of humans and animals. Instead of being literal, Rice uses sucking blood as a metaphor for sex. Louis tries to explain how feeding feels to the boy interviewer when the boy interrupts and says "It sounds as if it was like being in love." Louis agreed, "That's correct. It is like love." Making this connection I realized that even though the book is almost devoid of any talk of sex the book is actually all about sex. Anne Rice hid a taboo subject in her story so that a taboo subject could be discussed openly without shrinking her audience or losing her demographic.

     Another example of hiding sexual taboos in plain sight is in the Ringling College short, In a Heartbeat by Esteban Bravo and Beth David. Homosexuality is still considered a taboo to many people even though it doesn't deserve the title. Love is the main subject of the short film but the conflict of the story is homosexuality. To discuss this openly, the short is devoid of sexual undertones, communicating that a relationship should be about love before anything else. Prudent people immediately think of homosexual sex before thinking about how the two people in the relationship feel about each other.

     When starting a story, keep taboos in mind for the subject of your story. For example, a cautionary tale about excluding people by race or country of origin would stand out today and grab audience immediately, but it would need to be disguised with metaphorical characters and locations to be received by the largest audience possible. Using taboos isn't the only way to grab your audience but it is one way to easily establish a conflict that your audience will understand and possibly even relate to.

(note: add bromance blood/sex with louis and lestat)




Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft, et al. Frankenstein: annotated for scientists, engineers, and creators of all kinds. The MIT Press, 2017.


Rice, Anne. Interview with the vampire. Ballantine Books, 1977.


Bravo, Esteban and Beth David, directors. In a Heartbeat.