Title: Dracula
Author: Bram Stoker
Genre: Horror
Why I Read This Book:
I’ve watched old black and white horror movies since I was in a playpen. Ones with Bela Lugosi, Boris Karloff (sp?), and Lon Chaney (sp?) movies became my favorites before I was in kindergarten and I was the only child or teenager in my age group who’s seen those movies, let alone knew the names of the actors. Bram Stokers Dracula with Winona Ryder and Gary Oldman is a movie I’ve seen many times, so as it’s a goal of mine to read the classic novels that interest me during my incarceration, I chose the novel I’ve seen converted into Hollywood films time and time again.
What I Learned From Reading This Book:
I wasn’t surprised that the book differentiated from the films I knew, however I didn’t expect it to be as different as it was. Instead of the handsome, aristocratic man who spoke English so well with an alluring accent, Count Dracula was terrifying, disgusting, and a grotesque monster. While he did speak English well with a Romanian accent, he had a long white beard and hair on his hands. Unlike the movie, there was no backstory of Mina and her ancestor being the princess to Count Dracula’s reign.
Jonathan Harker, the story’s main protagonist, is a solicitor’s clerk traveling in place of his boss to Count Dracula in Transylvania. Just like in the film I mentioned, the novel showed different perspectives from the cast of characters, therefore the book starts off with Harker’s journal entries as he travels, noting his interactions with the superstitious Romanian peasants fearful of the count Dracula. He isn’t superstitious, but accepts one woman’s rosary beads. As we see him being held captive in Dracula’s castle, he transitions into believing in the supernatural. There are no servants, yet everything is well-kept, leading Harker to believe that the Count is the one doing all the housekeeping. He sees and hears peculiarities including wolves howling, odd shadows, and seeing the count climbing the roof upside down. He finds Dracula sleeping in a coffin and runs into three vampire brides who drink the blood of a small child, to Harker’s horror. With Jonathan locked away in his castle, Dracula travels to London, the city he’s spent much time researching.
The people in London aren’t aware of Dracula or vampires, therefore they don’t have the knowledge or equipment to identify, let alone defeat him. Lucy is Dracula’s first victim and dies before coming back to life as a vampire. Mina, Jonathan’s fiance’ and Lucy’s closest friend, sees the beast we know to be Dracula feeding on Lucy on a cliff one dark night. Dr. Stewart works in a sanitarium with a peculiar patient, Mr. Renfield, who is obsessed with blood by capturing and consuming flies. Renfield graduates to larger creatures such as spiders and later begs for a cat. Van Helsing is summoned by Dr. Stewart and tries to help save Lucy from the unknown thing killing her slowly, then later gathers help from Lucy’s fiance’ and men who are in love with her to help him defeat the undead Lucy in a horrific scene. Jonathan eventually escapes the castle, marries Mina, and reunites with the group of unlikely friends with the plan to defeat Dracula. Dracula, angry the group is onto him, bites Mina while Jonathan is knocked unconscious and forces her to drink his blood which starts her transformation to a vampire.
How Will Reading Dracula Help Me With Success:
In his novel, Stoker uses wooden stakes, the drinking of blood, the crucifix, and more, showing how much research the author did into folklore. This shows me how important this kind of knowledge and research is when writing a novel of this kind, which is what I will require when writing my own folklore-inspired fiction novel.
Stoker’s use of details and tone created a creepy, terrifying mood. Details were so rich that it tickled all the senses. For example, you could hear the wind and picture the darkness and eerie shadows while smelling the mustiness of the old dark house in London Dracula used as a hide-out.
Though I’m not the biggest fan of the novel, what I appreciated was the power of friends when looking at the close-knit group that took down Dracula. Though very different from each other, they each had an important role to play in defeating the monster and were valuable to the group. It’s an inspiring message of the importance of having true friends to fall back on and inspires me to be valuable to mine.
As an aspiring fiction author (I’ve only published non-fiction), I was intrigued by how Stoker used narrative shifts. The story moved along through the character’s journal entries, reports, letters, telegrams, and documents. I love this idea and, while I’ve thought of writing one novel with this style, it was helpful to see how creative Stoker got with the process.
It was interesting that Dracula went after members of the group only. If his goal was to take over/rule London, it would’ve been wiser to attack Londoners at random. Attacking members of the group was his downfall, because only together could they defeat him. Perhaps the authors gave us the underlying message of what we can accomplish if we use our talents, value teamwork, and look out for our loved ones, and fight for each other with unbridled determination.
