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Bram Stoker's Dracula

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Dracula: A Review Bram Stoker’s Dracula, originally written in 1897, makes a name for itself as a seemingly immortal tale, continuing to inspire endless film, literature, and stage adaptations over a hundred years later. The story first centers around a man named Jonathan Harker, who ventures on a business trip from London to Castle Dracula in Transylvania. Unaware of his host’s inhumane characteristics, he reluctantly agrees to stay for an extended period of time under the Count’s supervision. Gradually, however, Harker begins to realize the absurdities that occur within the castle walls and just barely escapes before a deadly fate at the hands of his vampire host. The story shifts then to the point of view of Mina, Harker’s fiancee, and …show more content…

The beginning of the novel expresses an abundance of foreshadowing and dramatic irony, creating an entertaining read for those already familiar with the traditional concept of vampirism, which has largely developed and evolved from this book. For instance, the complete absence of mirrors in the castle (Stoker 16) and, later, the Count’s lack of a reflection (Stoker 21) should act as significant red flags to readers of the modern day. Similarly, the Count’s “peculiarly sharp white teeth” (Stoker 15), which Harker notices but disregards, would be key indicators of the Count’s true inhuman identity if his name was not already commonly recognizable. As a reader, I enjoyed being able to anticipate many of these foreshadowed instances that Harker and the other characters were ignorant to. This presiding knowledge of the fantastical elements of the book is contrasted by Stoker’s ability to make each entry seem as real and raw as possible. As mentioned in the previous paragraph, the introduction to the novel states that “all the records chosen are exactly contemporary” (Stoker vi), reiterating the notion that the accounts recorded are very much real and recent; there is no true way to prove how “authentic” (Stoker 326) subjective pieces of text may be, so these excerpts are, in turn, simply no different from real records of personal statements. I love this resulting juxtaposition of reality and fantasy and find it makes Bram Stoker’s Dracula all the more

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