Dracula

The first third of the book is dreadfully slow and dry, the middle is alright, and it ends with a Benny Hill-esque chase sequence and then suddenly the book abruptly ends.

All-in-all it's a rather unimpressive book full of misogyny, and it's quite clear that Bram Stoker had never had an actual conversation with a woman in his whole life.

I wouldn't recommend reading it, but I guess there are worse books around.

... But it was far too dry for me. It also took me ages to read it, and I kinda glossed over the end because I wanted to be done with it. I'm going to give it another shot when Dracula Daily comes by again.

Good lord! Abraham Van Helsing is a bore! If I hear anymore of his chatter of child brain vs man brain, I'm gonna invite Dracula to my house for dinner, preferably with Van Helsing as the meal.

I had never given classic horror a go before, but this one was a pleasant surprise. The original Dracula story was something I thought I knew, elements like Dracula’s castle and the power possessed by that monster make an appearance here, but despite what you might expect of the original vampire, the book is still filled with great characters and moments that were truly nerve-wracking.

I couldn’t help but read faster and faster at times where the tension raised up, hoping for it to end when it was only getting worse. But its not all bad, there is always hope, and the determination of the characters to defend their loved ones and the future of humanity from the reign of the un-dead, is just great, but a few moments of old English were a little hard to read.

I listened to different audiobooks while reading, which was quite atmospheric too.

(Review originally written April 1st, 2022)

Dracula was actually quite nice to read. At first, the story advanced quite slowly in my opinion, but towards the middle it became faster. Sometimes the story haunted me in the night, but fortunately this was not that bad and it never lasted long.

This gothic novel is a timeless classic and one I can read over and over again and still come away as emotional as I did the first time I read it in primary school. Whilst not the first book written about vampires, Stoker's work has been the basis of every tale of the Nosferatu ever since. There is a magic in his writing that has ensured the lure of Dracula never ends.

Stoker's ability to describe events in such detail ensures that the reader feels as though they too are in the crumbling Castle Dracula in Transylvania or walking along the waterfront of Whitby hunting down a ship carrying the infamous vampire.

The novel itself is written from the viewpoints of all the main characters who encounter Dracula, bar one - Renfield who is a patient at an insane asylum. I always found it intriguing that we never see events through the eyes of the Count himself and would have been very interested to see what he felt about being hunted through Victorian era Europe. The world for him of course has evolved greatly over hundreds of years and I always wondered to myself 'Why now?' as in what was it that made Dracula leave Transylvania for London at that point. Whilst the obvious thing is the sheer amount of people living there and whilst there is so much life going about people, they rarely notice the dead or missing? That could have been true for other periods in history and places across Europe. (Obviously I know it was written during Victoria's reign but still, curiosity and I'm the cat)

Told through diary entries, letters and newspaper articles Stoker ensures that the reader is given each person's encounter with Dracula and the various beings under his control in wonderful detail. It is of course, Jonathan Harker's viewpoint that is the most disturbing and long as he suffers months with the Count, his three 'brides' and the wolves that linger at the Count's bidding. There are moments when Harker is still in Transylvania that I feel 'spooked' by the story, as you witness the change in the young lawyer from a strong confident man to one who is a shadow of his former self due to what he witnesses. (I won't spoil it for those who haven't read this incredible tale)

Whilst the story is quite simple at heart, we witness many of Victorian England's ideologies and its follies. There is a battle between science and religion as science truly came into its own during this time. The female characters are both at times victims of their own sex, how they are to be guarded and protected from things that would affect their frailty in comparison to strong minded men. Victorian tales often have the damsel in distress play a large role in their telling and whilst Lucy and Mina are strong-minded and relatively modern women for the time? They are also damsels in distress and victims of Dracula's desire to create vampires in England.

Stoker clearly explored so many aspects of mankind both from the religious and the scientific point of view when writing Dracula. He was in my humble opinion a genius and a man whose thoughts and views whilst being very much of the time, were also that of the future. I truly believe Dracula will have a place in literature for eternity even if the Count himself may not.

After a lifetime of hearing the name Dracula, especially at Halloween, it finally occurred to me to read the original, by Bram Stoker. (This was in part because I'd received a Nook last Christmas, and this is one of the many titles that are public domain.)

Anyway, I was impressed that such horror was dreamed up in the late 1800's. The story is told by way of journal entries and letters in a style that now seems quaint, and some of the tone, especially that of Belgian professor Van Helsing, is flowery, wordy, and overly dramatic. His journal has a thick accent, as well, which makes for slower reading.

The story comes together quite well, and the imagery is successfully creepy. This tale is also a very religious one, which isn't surprising, given that everyone knows how a vampire abhors a crucifix. Still, it is more overtly Christian than I had expected.

It is an intriguing experience, reading a novel for the first time after already having so many presumptions about its subject. It could have been a disappointing experience, but it was not; this novel lived up to my scary expectations.