Bram Stoker's Dracula

For those of you who don't know, I spent my summer immersed in vampire literature and lore. I began this trip down a dark and stormy path with none other than, I hate to say it, the Twilight book series. Before you laugh or applaud secretly, you must know that I had no intention of reading the series, but after most of my intelligent female students and even some of my male students were talking about nothing but these books, I must admit I became curious. So, I took the plunge and four books later my thirst for more vampire lit was ignited. While I recommend the Twilight books, I also inform my fellow readers that it is not the most creatively written series, but it does well to entertain page after page.

Once the Stephanie Meyer books were put to rest on my overflowing bookshelf, I decided to begin where all vampire literature begins, with Bram Stoker's Dracula. It had been years since I picked this book up and attempted to read it from cover to cover. When I was in middle school, I saw The Phantom of the Opera at the Fox Theatre in St. Louis and was determined to read it and other books that were as famously recreated on stage and screen. Dracula was among these stories. But, to my middle school reader chagrin, I had to put the books down because they were more difficult to read that I had anticipated. Now as an adult with a BA in English, I had much more luck reading Dracula and understanding it.

It's still not an easy read, but the torrid tale is so dark and horrific as to make the work while reading it all that more worthwhile. One thing that makes the reading more difficult is that the story is told in a series of journal entries and letters from some four or five different characters and first names are not readily used. What is interesting is how easily I slipped from 21st century life into the Victorian-era without any trouble. That is what a well-written book should do, completely transport you from your environment to that of another, without a hitch.

The basic plot is that of a man travelling to Transylvania to work out some business with his boss's client, a Count Dracula. Once in the wagon, the main character, Mr. Jonathan Harker, knows that nothing good will come of this visit to a strange land among strange people. Harker is kept captive by his host, Dracula, and all hell breaks loose as Dracula begins to leave his mark on the important people in Harker's life. As Dracula wrecks havoc in Harker's life, Harker regains his wits after many fearful nights and is determined to destroy his captor. And so the hunt begins for the vampire known as Count Dracula. A vampire's many forms and powers are explained in the story as well, which allows you to compare the original vampire to those of today's books.

What I found most interesting about the Twilight series and Dracula, is the way in which the time period plays a huge roll in the characteristics of the vampires/monsters. Stephanie Meyer, being raised a Mormon in today's world of XXX and Romanesque debauchery, writes of vampires that abstain from drinking the blood of humans, and avoid any real relationships with humans. This is the opposite of the vampire in the Victorian era, where showing your skin was a disgrace. The Victorian vampire was full of blood lust and stirred in women a hidden sexuality unknown to them. When there is too much sex, monsters are more conservative in their interaction with humans and when there was no sex, monsters were the embodiment of something that could cause in men and women sexual deviancy.

So, if you want to learn of the original vampire and test my current theory on monsters and when they exist, pick up Dracula and find out how the obsession with the vampire in literature began.