Vampires from Space is not a new idea. Science Fiction has always felt a bond with Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1897) just as it did with Frankenstein (1818). The big difference between the two is that Frankenstein is an actual SF novel while Dracula is not. This hasn’t stopped SF writers from offering fantastic space creatures or the creations of mad scientist that drink blood. They may not be Transylvanian or even human in form, but the Pulps gave us some great Space Vampires.
The earliest is Gustave la Rouge’s The Prisoners of Mars (1908) and its sequel, The War of the Vampires (1909). I’ve written about these early novels in my post on Alien Space Bats. This book has Martians who are vampires. In the first volume the hero must survive on Mars and in the second the vampires follow him back to Earth.
“The Vampires of the Desert” (Amazing Stories, December 1929) by A. Hyatt Verrill is a nod to the Victorian plant vampire, “The Flowering of the Strange Orchid” by H. G. Wells. Verrill ups the ante having an entire valley filled with giant blood-drinking plants.
“Vampires From Space” (Astounding Stories of Super-Science, March 1932) by Sewell Peaslee Wright is part of his Hanson of the Space Patrol series. Much of what Wright creates will be mirrored in Star Trek thirty years later. (Including a space vampire known to fans as the Salt Sucker in “The Man Trap” (September 8, 1966). This story about the Electites is actually closer to “The Immunity Syndrome” (January 19, 1968).
“The Fire Vampires” (Weird Tales, February 1933) by Donald Wandrei is part of Lovecraft’s Cthulhu Mythos. Readers sometimes forget that the Mythos has many SF elements in it. Lord Fthaggua, Lord of Ktynga could only belong to the Mythos!
“Shambleau” (Weird Tales, November 1933) by C. L. Moore was Northwest Smith’s debut. The rollicking spaceman (think Han Solo) rescues a woman from a mob only to fall victim to her vampiric nature. Fortunately Yarol the Venusian is there to save the day. Moore would repeat elements of this story in later Smith tales like “Black Thirst”.
“Vampires of the Moon” (Weird Tales, May June July 1934) by A. W. Bernal was once proclaimed to have written the worst story in Weird Tales. And it wasn’t even this one. This story was a lengthy novella that was serialized over three issues. More than a shadow of Edgar Rice Burroughs lies here.
“Vampire of the Void” (Planet Stories, Spring 1941) by Neil R. Jones is part of his Durna Rangue series, not a Zoromes tale. This series is closer to chiseled-jaw Space Opera.
“Asylum” (Astounding Science Fiction, May 1942) by A. E. van Vogt has a couple of Dreegh, space energy vampires, come to earth as scouts to help plan an invasion. This story was something of a coup. Van Vogt sold a supernatural-sounding SF tale to the most discerning of editors, John W. Campbell. In 1942, Campbell’s Unknown Worlds was still publishing but “Asylum” appeared in Astounding Science Fiction. AEVV would use the story for a fix-up novel called Supermind (1977).
“Vampire Queen” (Planet Stories, Fall 1942) by John Russell Fearn as Thornton Ayre
“The Stellar Vampires” (Science Fiction Stories, July 1943) by Frank Belknap Long has two spaceships landing on Mars to explore. One goes to Phobos while the other lands on the planet. When the second one joins the others, they find the ship sealed and the earthmen missing. The reason turns out to be a third ship from another dimension. The aliens look like a burning flame and can read minds. The first crew have been trying to hide their knowledge of uranium fission by thinking of nursery rhyme or poetry to block their thoughts. Long complicates the plot by having the hero and his girl making love through all this. The ending is muddy and unsatisfying but FBL did use an idea that Alfred Bester would expand in The Demolished Man (1953), using repetitive jingles to block psi readers.
“The Chemical Vampire” (Amazing Stories, March 1949) by Leroy Yerxa as Lee Francis has a monster created in a lab that feeds on blood. Typical Ray Palmer Amazing, though one of his last.
“The Mind-Worm” (Worlds Beyond, December 1950) by C. M. Kornbluth gives us the psychic vampire. The idea of mutants and psionics was big in the 1950s. As SF moved into the 1950s, vampires had to adapt to remain relevant. If they were not energy drinkers they were psychic mutants.
“Vampire of the Deep” (Amazing Stories, May 1951) by Rog Phillips has a creature from the seas that fills the usual blood-drinking requirements. This story reminds me of Robert E. Howard’s “Out of the Deep” (The Magazine of Horror, November 1967). Though written before Phillips’ tale, it appeared afterwards.
“Blood” (Fantasy & Science Fiction, February 1955) by Fredric Brown was a flash fiction story, something Brown began to write more and more as his career went on. Vampires use time travel to escape into the future. They think they have found new victims until they find out all life on Earth is vegetable-based.
“Vampires From Outer Space” (Super-Science Stories, April 1959) by Robert Silverberg as Richard F. Watson is probably one of those stories Bob doesn’t put on his resume. In fact, he was quite willing to let no one know he was Richard F. Watson for decades. Fortunately, Silverberg has softened towards his early stuff and now offers these old stories in collections like In the Beginning: Tales of the Pulp Era (2006).
The Pulps died out around 1955 but the concept of vampiric forms coming from space did not end with them. Two important examples from the 1970s include “Night of the Vampyres” by George R. R. Martin (Amazing Stories, May 1975), which reminds me of Norman Spinrad’s The Solarians (1966), with its focus on spaceship battles. and the popular The Space Vampires (1976) by Colin Wilson, SF in a Lovecraftian vein again.
You didn’t convey the irony of the Frederic Brown short-short. It was not broadly that the future life was plant based, but that it evolved from the turnip (and you can’t get blood from one!)
I like to leave some surprises!