Geneviève Dieudonné
Encyclopedia
Kim Newman
Kim Newman is an English journalist, film critic, and fiction writer. Recurring interests visible in his work include film history and horror fiction—both of which he attributes to seeing Tod Browning's Dracula at the age of eleven—and alternate fictional versions of history...
.
Overview
According to Newman, there are three versions of Geneviève for each series of his (Warhammer Fantasy, Anno Dracula, and The Diogenes Club). Each has a different middle name but each is a "trans-continual cousin". All of them share a number of similar features, however: she is a beautiful blonde female vampireVampire
Vampires are mythological or folkloric beings who subsist by feeding on the life essence of living creatures, regardless of whether they are undead or a living person...
from Brittany
Brittany
Brittany is a cultural and administrative region in the north-west of France. Previously a kingdom and then a duchy, Brittany was united to the Kingdom of France in 1532 as a province. Brittany has also been referred to as Less, Lesser or Little Britain...
(or its otherworldly equivalent), turned by the vampire elder Chandagnac when she was sixteen. Although she is around 400 years old by the time the stories with her are set, she still resembles a sixteen year old. According to Newman, her first name comes from a woman he once knew, while her last name comes from Albert Dieudonné
Albert Dieudonné
Albert Dieudonné was a French actor, screenwriter, film director and novelist.Dieudonné was born in Paris, France and made his acting debut in silent film in 1908 for The Assassination of the Duke of Guise, with musical score by Camille Saint-Saëns. In 1924, he directed the film drama, "Catherine"...
.
Warhammer Fantasy
Genevieve Sandrine du Pointe du Lac Dieudonné originally appeared in the Warhammer FantasyWarhammer Fantasy (setting)
Warhammer Fantasy is a fantasy setting, created by Games Workshop, which is used by many of the company's games. Some of the best-known games set in this world are: the table top wargame Warhammer Fantasy Battle, the Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay pen-and-paper role-playing game, and the MMORPG...
novel Drachenfels, written under Newman's pen name Jack Yeovil. She later appeared in the novel Beasts in Velvet, several short stories collected in Genevieve Undead and Silver Nails, and the complete collection, The Vampire Genevieve. According to Newman, "the reason she doesn't have an accent on her name in GW books is that word-processing/printing techniques were so primitive back then that putting in accents was a major pain and used only on special occasions, like when listing her last name, Dieudonné."
In the fictional setting of Warhammer Fantasy, Genèvieve was born in Bretonnia
Bretonnia
In Games Workshop's Warhammer Fantasy fictional universe, Bretonnia is a country located west of the Empire, between the Grey Mountains and the Great Ocean in the lands that were once part of the domain of the Elves...
in the year 1839 of the Imperial Calendar. She was given the Dark Kiss by Chandagnac in 1855, and traveled with him for some time. Their destinations included the Empire
The Empire (Warhammer)
In Games Workshop's Warhammer Fantasy fictional universe, The Empire is one of the human political factions and armies, and is featured in many games and novels. In terms of location, language, culture, and society, it bears a strong resemblance to the Holy Roman Empire...
, Cathay
Cathay (Warhammer)
Cathay is a fictional nation in Games Workshop's Warhammer Fantasy universe. Cathay is the Warhammer equivalent of China, based upon Chinese History with an added mixture of High Fantasy and Chinese folklore. Cathay was actually the name given to northern China in the 14th century by Marco Polo...
(where she studied magic and martial arts), and Araby (where she was a slave). After Chandagnac's death, she worked at a vampire tavern for a century, before joining a band of adventurers. During this time and afterward, she became a mercenary
Mercenary
A mercenary, is a person who takes part in an armed conflict based on the promise of material compensation rather than having a direct interest in, or a legal obligation to, the conflict itself. A non-conscript professional member of a regular army is not considered to be a mercenary although he...
, spy
SPY
SPY is a three-letter acronym that may refer to:* SPY , ticker symbol for Standard & Poor's Depositary Receipts* SPY , a satirical monthly, trademarked all-caps* SPY , airport code for San Pédro, Côte d'Ivoire...
, a convent
Convent
A convent is either a community of priests, religious brothers, religious sisters, or nuns, or the building used by the community, particularly in the Roman Catholic Church and in the Anglican Communion...
-dweller, an actress (for a single show) playing herself, a wanderer, and an assassin
Assassination
To carry out an assassination is "to murder by a sudden and/or secret attack, often for political reasons." Alternatively, assassination may be defined as "the act of deliberately killing someone, especially a public figure, usually for hire or for political reasons."An assassination may be...
. After foiling a plot to start a war between vampires and humans, she settled down and married her lover, the playwright
Playwright
A playwright, also called a dramatist, is a person who writes plays.The term is not a variant spelling of "playwrite", but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder...
Detlef Sierck.
Newman has stated that Genevieve is one of the most popular characters of Warhammer Fantasy and that "a lot of girls were taken with Genevieve as an unusual, non-princessy identification figure (all the Jack Yeovil books have action heroines with Marvel Comics
Marvel Comics
Marvel Worldwide, Inc., commonly referred to as Marvel Comics and formerly Marvel Publishing, Inc. and Marvel Comics Group, is an American company that publishes comic books and related media...
-style 'problems' beyond beating up the next bad guy)."
Anno Dracula
Geneviève Sandrine d'Isle Dieudonné is a major character in the first novel in Newman's Anno Dracula seriesAnno Dracula series
The Anno Dracula series by Kim Newman—named after Anno Dracula , the series' first novel—is a work of fantasy depicting an alternate history in which the heroes of Bram Stoker's novel Dracula fail to stop Count Dracula's conquest of Great Britain, resulting in a world where vampires are common and...
, Anno Dracula
Anno Dracula (novel)
Anno Dracula is a 1992 novel by British writer Kim Newman, the first in the Anno Dracula series. It is an alternate history using 19th century English historical settings and personalities, along with characters from popular fiction...
. The Anno Dracula series combines characters and situations from numerous different works of fiction and Newman credited himself as Jack Yeovil in the back of the book.
Her fictional background is gradually revealed throughout the series. She was born in 1416 Brittany. Her father was a doctor, and she learned much from his trade. Disguised as a boy, she fought for Joan of Arc
Joan of Arc
Saint Joan of Arc, nicknamed "The Maid of Orléans" , is a national heroine of France and a Roman Catholic saint. A peasant girl born in eastern France who claimed divine guidance, she led the French army to several important victories during the Hundred Years' War, which paved the way for the...
; in 1432, after her death, she was given the Dark Kiss by Chandagnac. In the following years, she had a variety of occupations, including nurse, courtesan, slave, and soldier, once more disguising herself as a male to fight under both Francis Drake
Francis Drake
Sir Francis Drake, Vice Admiral was an English sea captain, privateer, navigator, slaver, and politician of the Elizabethan era. Elizabeth I of England awarded Drake a knighthood in 1581. He was second-in-command of the English fleet against the Spanish Armada in 1588. He also carried out the...
against the Spanish Armada
Spanish Armada
This article refers to the Battle of Gravelines, for the modern navy of Spain, see Spanish NavyThe Spanish Armada was the Spanish fleet that sailed against England under the command of the Duke of Medina Sidonia in 1588, with the intention of overthrowing Elizabeth I of England to stop English...
and Napoleon during the French invasion of Russia
French invasion of Russia
The French invasion of Russia of 1812 was a turning point in the Napoleonic Wars. It reduced the French and allied invasion forces to a tiny fraction of their initial strength and triggered a major shift in European politics as it dramatically weakened French hegemony in Europe...
. She was a good friend and implied lover of Carmilla Karnstein
Carmilla
Carmilla is a Gothic novella by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu. First published in 1872, it tells the story of a young woman's susceptibility to the attentions of a female vampire named Carmilla...
.
In 1888 (during the events of Anno Dracula), several years after Count Dracula
Count Dracula
Count Dracula is a fictional character, the titular antagonist of Bram Stoker's 1897 Gothic horror novel Dracula and archetypal vampire. Some aspects of his character have been inspired by the 15th century Romanian general and Wallachian Prince Vlad III the Impaler...
takes over Britain, Geneviève helps Diogenes Club
The Diogenes Club
The Diogenes Club is a fictional gentleman's club created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and featured in several Sherlock Holmes stories, most notably "The Greek Interpreter"...
agent Charles Beauregard hunt down the vampire-killer known as "Silver Knife
Jack the Ripper
"Jack the Ripper" is the best-known name given to an unidentified serial killer who was active in the largely impoverished areas in and around the Whitechapel district of London in 1888. The name originated in a letter, written by someone claiming to be the murderer, that was disseminated in the...
", who is eventually revealed to be Jack Seward
John Seward
John Seward, M.D. is a fictional character appearing in Bram Stoker's 1897 novel Dracula.-In the novel:Seward is the administrator of an insane asylum not far from Count Dracula's first English home, Carfax. Throughout the novel, Seward conducts ambitious interviews with one of his patients,...
, who she had worked with at Toynbee Hall
Toynbee Hall
Toynbee Hall is a building in Tower Hamlets, East London which is the home of a charity working to bridge the gap between people of all social and financial backgrounds, with a focus on eradicating poverty and promoting social inclusion....
. Shortly after, she helps Beauregard, whom she has become a lover with, assassinate Queen Victoria on orders of Mycroft Holmes
Mycroft Holmes
Mycroft Holmes is a fictional character in the stories written by Arthur Conan Doyle. He is the elder brother of the famous detective Sherlock Holmes.- Profile :...
, thus dissolving Dracula's claim to the British throne. In the sequel, The Bloody Red Baron
The Bloody Red Baron
The Bloody Red Baron is a 1995 novel by British author Kim Newman. It is the second book in the Anno Dracula series and takes place thirty years after the former.-Plot:...
, Geneviève is absent; according to Newman, this was because she "was becoming too strong a character for her own good" and it allowed him to build up another character, Kate Reed, in her stead. She is mentioned often in the book, however, and is said to have moved to an orange farm
Orange (fruit)
An orange—specifically, the sweet orange—is the citrus Citrus × sinensis and its fruit. It is the most commonly grown tree fruit in the world....
in California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
(which, from later works, would make her one of the first vampires in California, much less the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
). However, she returns as a main character in the third (and so far final) book in the series, Dracula Cha Cha Cha, where in 1959 she has to cope with the deaths of both Dracula and her lover Beauregard. According to Newman, he brought her back because he realized her story still was not finished.
However, she appears in several of the short stories set afterwards. In the 1970s, under the name "Gené Dee", she becomes a private investigator
Private investigator
A private investigator , private detective or inquiry agent, is a person who can be hired by individuals or groups to undertake investigatory law services. Private detectives/investigators often work for attorneys in civil cases. Many work for insurance companies to investigate suspicious claims...
after assisting Philip Marlowe
Philip Marlowe
Philip Marlowe is a fictional character created by Raymond Chandler in a series of novels including The Big Sleep and The Long Goodbye. Marlowe first appeared under that name in The Big Sleep published in 1939...
in a case, although she finally retires from the business after a 1981 investigation involving Orson Welles
Orson Welles
George Orson Welles , best known as Orson Welles, was an American film director, actor, theatre director, screenwriter, and producer, who worked extensively in film, theatre, television and radio...
and a cheerleader called "Barbie the Vampire Slayer
Buffy Summers
Buffy Summers is a fictional character from Joss Whedon's Buffy the Vampire Slayer franchise. She first appeared in the 1992 film Buffy the Vampire Slayer before going on to appear in the television series and subsequent comic book of the same name...
". Her further exploits are unknown, although she will presumably appear in the upcoming fourth novel, Johnny Alucard. According to Newman, he still has plans for her as of May, 2008.
A devout Roman Catholic, she spent much of her early life wondering if she truly was damned
Damnation
Damnation is the concept of everlasting divine punishment and/or disgrace, especially the punishment for sin as threatened by God . A damned being "in damnation" is said to be either in Hell, or living in a state wherein they are divorced from Heaven and/or in a state of disgrace from God's favor...
as her priest had stated, but later learned to ignore and outgrow such self-destructive sentiments. However, she is still very conscious of her responsibilities, and refused to pass along the Dark Kiss in almost all situations. She was also a forward-thinking and imaginative person, harboring an interest in horror
Horror fiction
Horror fiction also Horror fantasy is a philosophy of literature, which is intended to, or has the capacity to frighten its readers, inducing feelings of horror and terror. It creates an eerie atmosphere. Horror can be either supernatural or non-supernatural...
, science fiction
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
, alternate history, and dystopian fiction. She read Napoleon and the Conquest of the World
Louis Geoffroy
Louis Geoffroy was the pseudonym of Louis-Napoléon Geoffroy-Château, a French writer who penned a one of the earliest works of work of alternate history: Histoire de la Monarchie universelle: Napoléon et la conquête du monde [Napoleon And The Conquest Of The World] .In it Napoleon subdues Russia...
, Dracula
Dracula
Dracula is an 1897 novel by Irish author Bram Stoker.Famous for introducing the character of the vampire Count Dracula, the novel tells the story of Dracula's attempt to relocate from Transylvania to England, and the battle between Dracula and a small group of men and women led by Professor...
, Big Brother
Nineteen Eighty-Four
Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell is a dystopian novel about Oceania, a society ruled by the oligarchical dictatorship of the Party...
, I Am Legend, and On the Beach when they came out, and for a time wished to be an astronaut
Astronaut
An astronaut or cosmonaut is a person trained by a human spaceflight program to command, pilot, or serve as a crew member of a spacecraft....
after reading works of Arthur C. Clarke
Arthur C. Clarke
Sir Arthur Charles Clarke, CBE, FRAS was a British science fiction author, inventor, and futurist, famous for his short stories and novels, among them 2001: A Space Odyssey, and as a host and commentator in the British television series Mysterious World. For many years, Robert A. Heinlein,...
.
In a proposed Anno Dracula movie, Newman had hoped to cast first Isabelle Adjani
Isabelle Adjani
Isabelle Yasmine Adjani is a French film actress and singer. Adjani has appeared in 30 films since 1970. She holds the record for most César Awards for Best Actress with five, for Possession , One Deadly Summer , Camille Claudel , Queen Margot and Skirt Day...
, and then Juliette Binoche
Juliette Binoche
Juliette Binoche is a French actress, artist and dancer. She has appeared in more than 40 feature films, been recipient of numerous international accolades, is a published author and has appeared on stage across the world. Coming from an artistic background, she began taking acting lessons during...
as Geneviève.
The Diogenes Club
Genèvieve Sandrine Ysolde Dieudonné, also known as "Jennifer Dee" and "Geneva Deodati", has appeared in a number of Newman's Diogenes Club books and short stories, along with several Anno Dracula characters including Beauregard, Edwin Winthrop, and Catriona Kaye. Although she is reticent about her past, it presumably resembles that of her Anno Dracula counterpart up to the late 19th century, where Dracula's invasion of England succeeded in the Anno Dracula timeline and failed (if it occurred at all) in the main Diogenes Club timeline. In this timeline, she remained in England throughout the 20th century, doing occasional work with the Diogenes Club. It is mentioned by the Undertaking that she was excommunicated in 1638 by the Roman InquisitionRoman Inquisition
The Roman Inquisition was a system of tribunals developed by the Holy See during the second half of the 16th century, responsible for prosecuting individuals accused of a wide array of crimes related to heresy, including Protestantism, sorcery, immorality, blasphemy, Judaizing and witchcraft, as...
.
This version of Genèvieve appears in the short story "The Big Fish", battling Lovecraftian
Cthulhu Mythos
The Cthulhu Mythos is a shared fictional universe, based on the work of American horror writer H. P. Lovecraft.The term was first coined by August Derleth, a contemporary correspondent of Lovecraft, who used the name of the creature Cthulhu - a central figure in Lovecraft literature and the focus...
menaces alongside Edwin Winthrop during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
; four stories in the Seven Stars sequence ("The Trouble with Barrymore", a sequel to "The Big Fish"; "The Biafran Bank Manager"; "The Dog Story"; and "The Duel of Seven Stars"); and in the short story "Cold Snap", featuring 1970s Diogenes Club agent Richard Jeperson
Richard Jeperson
Richard Jeperson is a fictional 1970s psychic investigator created by British horror / fantasy author Kim Newman. He appears in many of Newman's short stories as both a central and background character, and is the focal point of a collection of short stories entitled The Man from the Diogenes...
. She is a major character in "Sorceror Conjurer Wizard Witch", which depicts her first meeting with Beauregard in the Diogenes Club timeline.
Other
Geneviève Dieudonné is briefly mentioned in "In the Air", the first segment of Newman and Eugene ByrneEugene Byrne
Eugene Byrne is an English freelance journalist and fiction writer.His novel ThigMOO, and the story it was based on, were nominated for the BSFA award. His story "HMS Habakkuk" was nominated for a Sidewise Award for Alternate History.He was born in Waterford in the Republic of Ireland, but was...
's alternate history work Back in the USSA
Back in the USSA
Back in the USSA is a collection of 7 short stories by Eugene Byrne and Kim Newman, which was published in 1997 by Mark V. Ziesing Books. The stories are linked through their setting, an alternate history of the twentieth century in which the United States experienced a communist revolution in...
. In it, she is a schoolgirl around sixteen years old in a 1951 Kansas that is part of the United Socialist States of America, and has a love song written for her. She is presumably not a vampire in this universe, and it is unexplained how a girl in a poor town in Soviet Kansas had a French name.
In Newman's short story "The Mark of Kane", collected in Tales of the Shadowmen Volume 4: Lords of Terror, Geneviève is briefly mentioned as one of the former agents of the "Angels of Music", a Charlie's Angels
Charlie's Angels
Charlie's Angels is a television series about three women who work for a private investigation agency, and is one of the first shows to showcase women in roles traditionally reserved for men...
-type private detective agency run by Monsieur Erik out of the Paris Opera
Palais Garnier
The Palais Garnier, , is an elegant 1,979-seat opera house, which was built from 1861 to 1875 for the Paris Opera. It was originally called the Salle des Capucines because of its location on the Boulevard des Capucines in the 9th arrondissement of Paris, but soon became known as the Palais Garnier...
.