Editing Undead (section)

== Literature ==
[[file:Anonyme germanique Amants trépassés.jpg|thumb|upright|''[[The Dead Lovers]]'', ca. 1470 ([[Strasbourg]], [[Musée de l'Œuvre Notre-Dame]])]]

In [[Bram Stoker]]'s novel ''[[Dracula]]'', [[Van Helsing]] describes the Un-Dead as the following:
{{Quote|‘Before we do anything, let me tell you this. It is out of the lore and experience of the ancients and of all those who have studied the powers of the UnDead. When they become such, there comes with the change the curse of immortality.  They cannot die but must go on age after age adding new victims and multiplying the evils of the world. For all that die from the preying of the  Undead become themselves  Undead,  and prey on their kind.  And so the circle goes on ever widening, like as the ripples from a stone thrown in the water... But of the most blessed of all, when this now UnDead be made to rest as [[True death|true dead]], then the soul of the poor lady whom we love shall again be free. Instead of working wickedness by night and growing more debased in the assimilating of it by day, she shall take her place with the other Angels. So that, my friend, it will be a blessed hand for her that shall strike the blow that sets her free.|[[Van Helsing]], [[John Seward|Dr. Seward]]'s Diary, 29 September; ''[[Dracula]]'', Chapter 16}}

Other notable 19th-century stories about the avenging undead included [[Ambrose Bierce]]'s ''[[The Death of Halpin Frayser]]'',<ref>{{cite web|url=http://etext.virginia.edu/etcbin/toccer-new2?id=BieCans.sgm&images=images/modeng&data=/texts/english/modeng/parsed&tag=public&part=1&division=div1 |title=Can Such Things Be |publisher=Etext.virginia.edu |access-date=2012-07-31}}</ref> and various [[Gothic Romanticism]] tales by [[Edgar Allan Poe]]. Though their works could not be properly considered zombie fiction, the supernatural tales of Bierce and Poe would prove influential on later writers such as [[H. P. Lovecraft]], by Lovecraft's own admission.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://gaslight.mtroyal.ca/superhor.htm |title=Supernatural Horror in Literature (1927, 1933–1935) by H.P. Lovecraft |publisher=Gaslight.mtroyal.ca |date=1988-01-01 |access-date=2012-07-31 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091012165932/http://gaslight.mtroyal.ca/superhor.htm |archive-date=2009-10-12 }}</ref> In Russia, the undead was the theme of [[Alexander Belyaev]]'s novel ''[[Professor Dowell's Head]]'' (1925), in which a mad scientist performs experimental head transplants on bodies stolen from the [[morgue]], and reanimates the corpses.

[[File:Utagawa Yoshiiku Specter.JPG|thumb|upright|[[Utagawa Yoshiiku]], ''Specter frightening a young woman'']]