- issues are timeless
- Stoker stressed the need to censor unwholesome literature
Epistolary Form:
- Stoker’s fragmentary quasi-historical grouping of documents creates the multiple narrative perspectives
- positions the reader to identify with each character in turn – disrupts the tendency for the reader to identify or give
privileged credibility to any one narrator
- creates distance between author and reader
- the linguistic range of the narrative includes formal and informal tone, standard English, dialect, archaic expression,
personal memoir reportage along with other styles
BBC Podcast (Bridget Kendall, Dacre Stoker, Dr Sorcha Ní Fhlainn & Dr Sam George):
- Bram Stoker:
- diseased time in Ireland
- sickly for first 7 years of life
- nanny/mother told stories to entertain
- felt like he was one of the premature buried (sick people buried because thought they were dead with his
sickness
- Sir Henry Irving – Stoker’s boss; his character - Mephistopheles resembles Dracula
- Ireland rising up, upheaval/struggle
- stake -> corrective/restorative procedure for unleashed uncontrollable sexual desire
- original ending – as Dracula was stabbed, a massive volcanic eruption destroys Castle Dracula and everyone else
- Dracula could have shifted into dust and survived
- Nosferatu, 1922 – silent film ‘about Dracula’; copyright infringement and tried to remove it; created sunlight’s harm to
vampires
- Bela Lugosi buried in his Dracula costume
- 1931 Dracula film debuted on Valentine’s Day – associated with seduction
- Folklore Vampire -> Romantic Byron -> Satanic Lord -> reluctant/sympathetic modern Vampire
Historical
- 1790s – French Revolution
- 1790s – Industrial Revolution
- 1790s – Enlightenment (human equality, science, rationality)
- 1790s – Romanticism
- Stoker stressed the need to censor unwholesome literature
Epistolary Form:
- Stoker’s fragmentary quasi-historical grouping of documents creates the multiple narrative perspectives
- positions the reader to identify with each character in turn – disrupts the tendency for the reader to identify or give
privileged credibility to any one narrator
- creates distance between author and reader
- the linguistic range of the narrative includes formal and informal tone, standard English, dialect, archaic expression,
personal memoir reportage along with other styles
BBC Podcast (Bridget Kendall, Dacre Stoker, Dr Sorcha Ní Fhlainn & Dr Sam George):
- Bram Stoker:
- diseased time in Ireland
- sickly for first 7 years of life
- nanny/mother told stories to entertain
- felt like he was one of the premature buried (sick people buried because thought they were dead with his
sickness
- Sir Henry Irving – Stoker’s boss; his character - Mephistopheles resembles Dracula
- Ireland rising up, upheaval/struggle
- stake -> corrective/restorative procedure for unleashed uncontrollable sexual desire
- original ending – as Dracula was stabbed, a massive volcanic eruption destroys Castle Dracula and everyone else
- Dracula could have shifted into dust and survived
- Nosferatu, 1922 – silent film ‘about Dracula’; copyright infringement and tried to remove it; created sunlight’s harm to
vampires
- Bela Lugosi buried in his Dracula costume
- 1931 Dracula film debuted on Valentine’s Day – associated with seduction
- Folklore Vampire -> Romantic Byron -> Satanic Lord -> reluctant/sympathetic modern Vampire
Historical
- 1790s – French Revolution
- 1790s – Industrial Revolution
- 1790s – Enlightenment (human equality, science, rationality)
- 1790s – Romanticism
