Interview With the Vampire

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1976

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Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 1, Pages 1-70

Part 1, Pages 70-159

Part 2, Pages 160-201

Part 3, Pages 202-273

Part 3, Pages 273-319

Part 4, Pages 320-343

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Part 4, Pages 320-343Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 4, Pages 320-343 Summary

Louis tells the boy he never changed. He traveled the world with Armand but feels he died in Paris. One hundred years later, Armand tells him Lestat didn’t die at the Theatre and fled to New Orleans. They return to America and go to Louis’s old home. Louis is nostalgic when he sees the home he shared with Lestat and Claudia.

One night Louis sees a young vampire in the streets. The vampire kills a woman and takes her baby. Louis follows him, assuming the vampire will lead him to Lestat. He finds Lestat in a decrepit house. Lestat is frail, has been surviving on animals, and is obviously a burden to the younger vampire. Lestat is overjoyed to see Louis and believes that he has returned home for him.

Louis says he’s not there to stay as Lestat pleads with him. Louis believes Lestat is dying. Lestat begs for forgiveness, which only annoys Louis. After the young vampire leaves, Louis leaves as well and returns the baby to its home.

A month later he tells Armand he saw Lestat. He is surprised at how little emotion he felt at seeing his creator. Armand admits that he killed Claudia and hopes that the revelation will bring some emotion back to Louis, but it does not because Louis already suspected Armand’s guilt and he scarcely reacts. Now that Louis is so distant, Armand feels that his plans have backfired. He created this version of Louis by killing Claudia, and now he can’t bear to stay with his creation. Louis leaves New Orleans, certain that Armand will die soon. He tells the interviewer,

“I wanted to be where there was nothing familiar to me. And nothing mattered. And that’s the end of it. There’s nothing else” (338).

The boy refuses to accept the ending and begs Louis to make him a vampire. Louis is furious and says he has failed in his story. He feeds on the boy but does not kill him. When the boy wakes, he plays the tape and hears the beginning of Louis’s story. The recording gives him Lestat’s address, and he immediately leaves for Louisiana.

Part 4, 320-343 Analysis

Louis’s story is a sequence of attempts at redemption that fail. His reaction to the boy’s wish to become a vampire shows Louis’s motivation for the interview: He thought that if he could tell his story, it would lead others to eschew passivity and the lust for immortality. He believed that his story would help listeners value their mortal lives rather than wishing for the life and experience of a vampire, but it has the opposite effect on the boy.

Again, Louis’s only liberation is that he no longer has any questions. He says that “nothing mattered. And that’s the end of it. There’s nothing else” (338). There is no point in investigating meaning and truth in a world that is hostile to them.

Louis gains his love when he partners with Armand, who wanted him more than he had ever wanted anything, but with the loss of Claudia Louis’s capacity for a relationship is unsustainable. When Armand finally confirms that he was responsible for Claudia’s death, even that fails to rouse passion in him. Louis has progressed from a melancholy mortal who longed for death to a numbed immortal who no longer feels anything. Also, he is not tempted to stay with Lestat. He says goodbye to both Lestat and Armand without affect or emotion. Whatever soul Louis may have had is gone. Armand and Lestat both strove to make Louis into an unapologetic, detached vampire. The realization of their goal leads to a version of Louis that despises both of his companions. Their punishment is to lose Louis and rob themselves of hope for the future. Armand and Lestat are each dying, a fact that Louis’s absence will accelerate.

As the boy heads to Lestat’s address, it is a sign that the cycle will continue. The boy is naive and believes if he can experience the power of a vampire, he will know how to use and appreciate it better than Louis. Power and corruption have cyclical natures. Many people live their lives in unsatisfying ways, without satisfying answers to their most urgent questions, and then their lives end.

However, there are reasons to argue that the ending is optimistic. Louis does not kill the boy, indicating that he may still have some respect for human life. He told the story because he hoped he could help people learn from his mistakes. It is possible that he will hold onto that hope, even though this interview did not give him the desired result.