In the 1700 and 1800s, vampire legends had quite an influence on political, social and economic discourse. Karl Marx, who enjoyed reading horror tales for relaxation at bedtime, wrote: "Capital is dead labour that, vampire-like, only lives by sucking living labour, and lives the more, the more labour it sucks." He also referred to "the were-wolf's hunger for surplus labour" and stated that "the prolongation of the working day quenches only in a slight degree the vampire thirst for the living blood of labour." In an eerie prediction of 'Dracula' , Marx compared industrial relations to the relationship between peasants and "the Wallachian Boyard". The boyard (or aristocrat) he had in mind was none other than Vlad Tepes - otherwise known as Vlad the Impaler, the model for Bram Stoker's Count Dracula. #Gothic #literature #folklore #weird #marxism #socialism #history #books #vampires #vampire #horror