<P> Varney the Vampire ; or , the Feast of Blood is a Victorian era serialized gothic horror story variously attributed to James Malcolm Rymer and Thomas Peckett Prest . It first appeared in 1845 -- 1847 as a series of weekly cheap pamphlets of the kind then known as `` penny dreadfuls '' . The author was paid by the typeset line so when the story was published in book form in 1847 , it was of epic length : the original edition ran to 876 double - columned pages and 232 chapters . Altogether it totals nearly 667,000 words . </P>
<P> Varney the Vampire ; or , the Feast of Blood is a Victorian era serialized gothic horror story variously attributed to James Malcolm Rymer and Thomas Peckett Prest . It first appeared in 1845 -- 1847 as a series of weekly cheap pamphlets of the kind then known as `` penny dreadfuls '' . The author was paid by the typeset line so when the story was published in book form in 1847 , it was of epic length : the original edition ran to 876 double - columned pages and 232 chapters . Altogether it totals nearly 667,000 words . </P>
varney the vampyre is an example of this type of 19th century weekly publication
varney the vampyre is an example of this type of 19th century weekly publication
penny dreadfuls
penny dreadfuls