Dracula

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One of those books I never read when a youngster. I think because there were so many films made, it just seemed superflous.

Not So. I hadn't realised the way the book was contructed, all journals, letters and newspaper reportings. Fragmented and a little juddery, but it builds really well.

Your thoughts on Dracula / Bram Stoker etc? I'm thinking of a trip to Romania at the end of June (Euro 2004 permitting). Anyone been to the castle? I know it's all touristy and the literary connections are tenuous, but I used to be a goth and it was always considered one of the top goth pilgrimage sites! Certainly more appealing than Leeds, anyway.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Tuesday, 1 June 2004 12:20 (twenty years ago) link

It was some important Bram Stoker anniversary earlier this week. Publication? Something like that. Anyway, there's a lot of suspiciously Oirishy crap talked about this book around these parts these days, presumably because the Bram Stoker society has seen what a marketing juggernaut Ulysses has become and they want a piece of that action.
I heard an 'expert' on the radio the other day talking about it. He maintained that Dracula was the landlord, bleeding the surrounding areas dry, just like landlords did in Ireland. And that him moving to London is a kind of revenge thing on Stoker's part. And that the look of the vampire is influenced by the victims of the Famine. And that the fact that he drank blood is as well(because desperate Irish people would sometimes drink the blood of dogs mixed with milk to keep them going). Oh, and that the idea of the vampire comes from the fear that Catholics had of suicides.

I don't believe any of that because I've read Peter Haining's books about the subject and he sounds much more convincing.

― accentmonkey (accentmonkey), Tuesday, 1 June 2004 12:33 (twenty years ago) link

I read something similar, tieing in Beyond the Pale too, though I forget the exact context.

It's a very tantalising book. The build up deriving from three or four sources and certain scenes repeated from each angle. I've heard people get frustrated, finding the text too fragmentary, but it works for me.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Tuesday, 1 June 2004 13:19 (twenty years ago) link

I read it one night during the summer leading up to eighth grade. I was so scared I couldn't go to sleep so I read till I finished - about 7:00am the next moring. One image from that reading survived for a long time in nightmares and in my rememberances of that book - when Dracula is witnessed crawing down the side of castle like a lizard.

I never managed to get to Transylvania but I did happen upon the de Sade castle in the south of France. It was in a sorry state but there were folks there trying to improve the property. I haven't a clue as to how kept up Vlad the Impaler's place is but I imagine that, lacking the staked corpse's and the heads on the pikes landscaping that Vlad was partial to it would be hard to recreate the mood of the place.

― Robert Burns, Tuesday, 1 June 2004 13:54 (twenty years ago) link

That scene is quite early on. It's about the time Jonathan Harker realises something is a little odd with the Count.

Dracula's London house is positioned in Purfleet, an awful place, even by the relative standards of south Essex.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Tuesday, 1 June 2004 14:16 (twenty years ago) link

...when Dracula is witnessed crawing down the side of castle like a lizard.

Yes! That's one of the few images from the book that has stayed with me.

I have a special spot in my heart for gothic books. It seems like there's no definite "gothic" structure to this style of writing: Dracula being written in fragments/bits-n-pieces, Frankenstein being a story w/in a story w/in a story, etc.

What I like about gothic books is that they're often more terrifying than horrifying; Characters (usually girls) are terrified by what the shape under the sheet might be, rather than horrified at what actually is under there. I much prefer terror to horror.

If you want more gothic material to read, I would suggest Matthew Lewis' The Monk. Amazon calls is a "romance" [chuckle] but that's hardly what it is. The Mysteries of Udolpho is good but can be tedius. It's more of a "textbook" example of what gothic writing really is like.

― Vermont Girl (Vermont Girl), Tuesday, 1 June 2004 16:59 (twenty years ago) link

I just bought a lovely Folio Society edition of The Monk and am looking forward to it. I believe that one of my heroes, Robert Maturin (whose books I have never read but whose life fascinates me) was a big fan of Lewis. Or so I've been told.

I'd love to get hold of some Samuel Maddens as well, but it's all out of print and really bloody rare. You can go and stay in his family's old house in Clones though.

― accentmonkey (accentmonkey), Wednesday, 2 June 2004 14:31 (twenty years ago) link

Just finished Dracula this morning. I read the introduction (after I've finished the book, natch). Apparently, Dracula was all about sex. You know phallic staves, intense passion etc. The guy who wrote the introduction was trying to insinuate Bram Stoker was gay. This was based on the fact that he was Henry Irving's business manager and because he wrote Dracula. His marriage and son suggested non-gayness, but there you go.

Cracking book and my vampire impression is now top notch. Fear me after dark.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Friday, 4 June 2004 13:03 (twenty years ago) link

So, Frankenstein next Mikey?
(How 'bout the theory that Dracula was really written by Dr. Polidori on that ghost story night in Switzerland becuase Byron was a vampire and Stoker just stole the whole idea.)

― Jocelyn (Jocelyn), Friday, 4 June 2004 17:08 (twenty years ago) link

Oh man, I love Frankenstein. It's much better than Dracula. In fact, Frankenstein could kick Dracula's ASS!

― accentmonkey (accentmonkey), Friday, 4 June 2004 19:19 (twenty years ago) link

'The Waste Land' to thread!

― cozen (Cozen), Friday, 4 June 2004 19:39 (twenty years ago) link

You think I haven't read Frankenstein? I was a goth, it was part of the unholy curriculum. Pilgrimage to Mary Shelley's grave? Check.

I watched a programme on house hunting in Transylvania last night. You wouldn't believe how cheap these places are. 18th century town house, 2 bedrooms, cellar, attic, balconies etc. £23,000!

Commuting could me a problem.

― Mikey G (Mikey G), Monday, 7 June 2004 07:44 (twenty years ago) link

I think Frankenstein's monster could kick Dracula's ass, considering there'd be no blood to drink and the vampire wouldn't be able to use the hypno-eye trick.

So, instead of Alien v. Preditor, it should be Count Dracula v. Franstein's Monster... How 'bout that?

― Vermont Girl (Vermont Girl), Monday, 7 June 2004 12:29 (twenty years ago) link

twenty years pass...

“My Friend.--Welcome to the Carpathians. I am anxiously expecting
you. Sleep well to-night. At three to-morrow the diligence will
start for Bukovina; a place on it is kept for you. At the Borgo
Pass my carriage will await you and will bring you to me. I trust
that your journey from London has been a happy one, and that you
will enjoy your stay in my beautiful land.

“Your friend,

“DRACULA.”

― | (Latham Green), Tuesday, 12 November 2024 18:09 (two days ago) link

He sounds nice

― Booger Swamp Road (Boring, Maryland), Tuesday, 12 November 2024 23:32 (two days ago) link

have always thought this dude was a bit suss tbh

― Daniel_Rf, Wednesday, 13 November 2024 09:28 (yesterday) link

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