Why is Dracula such a great horror story?
In my opinion 'Dracula' is a great horror story because it is highly entertaining in its idea of vampirism, its atmospheric descriptions, powerful characterisation and the horrific death of Lucy. The novel is also interesting because of the religious perspectives, such as the use of garlic, holy water and the crucifix as weapons against evil.
Jonathan Harker's journey to Count Dracula's home is described in great detail. The atmosphere not only adds to the dangerous ride to
Dracula's Castle, but also comes alive as we're reading it. The atmosphere surrounding Harker is incredibly frightening but the detail and descriptions used are so astounding that we can feel the 'strange
chills'.
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The
'paralysis of fear' tells us that Harker is clearly too scared to move a muscle.
The detail is very interesting. Each word kept me entertained, as I'm sure it does every reader.
Harker arrives at Count Dracula's Castle. This part of the story is fascinating; Harkers first encounter with Dracula is also 'strange'.
Dracula is described as half-man and half-animal. This is very peculiar. He is a 'tall, old man,' who is 'clad in black head to toe.'
I would definitely not be happy, if I were to meet him. Dracula has
'hair in palms' and also 'massive eyebrows.' Harker also says
Dracula's 'breath was rank.' This image is certainly odd and Dracula is not very attractive! This description of Dracula is frightening for harker mostly, but great for the reader. Stoker's use of language is totally luminous. These animalistic features of Dracula are eerie not only to Harker but also to the readers.
Dracula's domestic attentions towards harker are eccentric. The Count does everything himself. He takes Harker's 'luggage' and 'opened the door.' You would wonder why there aren't any 'servants' in a huge castle. Harker realises this oddity, so he 'looked for a bell' but couldn't find one. This adds another mysterious aspect towards Dracula and should interest the readers. The reader reads on, searching for an explanation for a reason why there are no servants. We assure that
Dracula is unable to employ
Batman beats the Joker. Spiderman banishes the Green Goblin. For centuries story tellers have used the basic idea of good beats bad to guide their tales. Stories of blood sucking, human possessions and other tales have been passed down generations and vary between cultures. Among the creators of the famous protagonists is, Bram Stoker, the creator of Dracula. This fictional character was soon to be famous, and modified for years to come into movie characters or even into cereal commercials. But the original will never be forgotten; a story of a group of friends all with the same mission, to destroy Dracula. The Count has scared many people, from critics to mere children, but if one reads betweens the line, Stoker’s true message can be
With castles, hidden streets, waterways, recurring rainy weather, interesting European architecture, and mystique, London is the perfect location for Bram Stoker's Dracula. London: The capital of Great Britain, and the center of attention in the nineteenth century, due to the many incidents that were going on at the time. The novel includes many daunting scenes, such as when Dracula heaves a sack withholding a deceased child before three female vampires. Stoker may have been influenced by London's numerous enticements; it is no surprise why he choose it to be the setting of his novel, London seems to be "exotic" and unknown. Stoker is obviously inspired by London's castles, hidden
Throughout many types of literature, violence exists to enhance the readers interest in order to add a sense of excitement or conflict to a novel. This statement withholds much truthfulness due to the fact that without violence in a piece of literature such as Dracula by Bram Stoker, the plot would not have the same impact if it was lacking violence. Dracula's power and evilness led to the violent happenings which began with the conflict of Jonathan's inner struggle, as compared to the conflict which blossomed later on with good versus evil.
on the place; this makes us feel anxious to find out where he is going
Vlad the Impaler, a.k.a. Vlad III, Dracula, Drakulya, or Tepes, was born in late 1431, in the citadel of Sighisoara, Transylvania, the son of Vlad II or Dracul, a military governor, appointed by Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund. Vlad Dracul was also a knight in the Order of the Dragon, a secret fraternity created in 1387 by the Emperor, sworn to uphold Christianity and defend the empire against the Islamic Turks. Transylvania, along with Moldavia, and Wallachia, are now joined together as Romania. The name Dracul can be interpreted in two ways, the first translation from Romanian would be "Dragon", but it sometimes also means "Devil". Vlad was not called Tepes, which means ""spike" in Romanian, until after
Dracula is a signet classic novel written by Bram Stoker. This novel is portrayed by an antagonist character known as Count Dracula. He has been dead for centuries yet he may never die. He has a peculiar power of hypnotic fascination but he is weak in god’s daylight. He is immortal as long as he is able to drink blood from the living. He can change his form into a wolf, a bat or a puff of smoke. Dracula get in touch with Jonathan Harker through a real estate transaction. He went to Dracula’s castle through a carriage as were planned. After a few days, he felt as if he were prisoned in the castle as his movements were restricted. Meanwhile, Harker has a fiancée named Mina
The main characters of Bram Stoker's novel, Dracula, are motivated for many reasons. Their main reason, as stated throughout the novel, was for their love of Mina, and their desire to keep her safe. At the beginning of the novel when Lucy started having symptoms, Dr. Van Helsing and Dr. Seward did all that they could to try and save her from her misery. They knew that the same might happen to Mina, and that even she might be forced to meet her end the same way as Lucy. Determined to save themselves and Jonathan not only the heartbreak, but also the risks of having a vampire besides Dracula to take care of, the group of men gathered up their courage and forced themselves to find and destroy the source of all this evil. In addition, when Mina
Bela Lugosi is arguably the most classic example of an actor taking on a vampire role. However, during 1931 when the universal studio was casting the 1931’s Dracula, Lugosi could only barely speak English, and therefore almost lost his chance at playing the iconic part (“Dracula (1931 English-Language Film”). Nonetheless his accents and costumes, which has become the classic look of the vampire, he himself was so typecast in his role that he was actually buried after his death in his Dracula costume. Certainly, it is Lugosi’s performance that makes Tod Browning’s film such an influential Hollywood picture. Overall, I will give it a 3 star out of 5, compared with the older version film of Dracula, because of the dialogues and sounds, the plot is much easier for the audiences to understand, without any editing or background music the horror of the film is not inferior to
The epistolary form of the novel consists of a narrative based on letters, diary entries, newspaper clippings and other documentary records. It helps to bring realism into the narrative by lacing it with personal and historical references. It helps to add believability by incorporating a variety of perspectives on the events and characters in the novel. This form works for Dracula because the log of the ship captain and the diary entries of Jonathan Harker provide personal witness accounts to prove that the events are real as opposed to imaginary. Daddy-Long-Legs by Jean Webster are a novel composed nearly entirely of letters by the orphan Jerusha Abbott to her benefactor John Smith. The form helps to record the growth of the character over the years.
Bram Stoker's Dracula is a true Gothic novel that belongs on any gothic literature course. Focusing in on the recurring themes, characters and settings used throughout the novel one sees how Dracula has set the standard for Gothic literature today.
Evil never conquers because good always overcomes it. A good example of this is the book Dracula by Bram Stoker because the author expresses the nature of good vs. evil. Dracula wants to come to London because he wants to turn everyone into vampires. The basic background of the book Dracula is when Jonathan Harker, a realtor who is sent to Transylvania to complete a transaction with Dracula so he can come to England. What Harker does not know is that Dracula has a plan for world domination. Well, while Harker is on a train to Transylvania he enters “the east, a section of Europe whose peoples and customs will be for the most part, strange and unfamiliar” (Dracula, 20). Harker arrives at Bistritz on the eve of St. George’s Day,
The Gothic genre does suppress vulnerable women. They are exploited in order to please the tyrannical male and feed his desires. When the women is no longer of use, she is then discarded. The Gothic genre is described as ‘formulaic” and one of the key features is a tyrannical male who abuses his power to assert his dominance over a perceived futile women. Bram Stoker’s ‘Dracula’ was written in time where women started to want more equal rights and opportunities. For example, in the same year Dracula was published (1897), Millicent Fawcett founded ‘The National Union of Women’s Suffrage’. Bram Stoker feared the decline of the patriarchal figure and could have created ‘Dracula’ as an attempt to scaremonger the public into thinking what would
A horror classic by Abraham Stocker, Dracula, may be one of the most notorious villain stories of all time. Bram Stocker is a Irish writer who changed the view of what to read in his time. He shows dark and twisted situations and metaphors throughout Dracula and many other of his horror novels. This novel was released in the Victorian era, which saw his type of writing as equivalent to the devil. This era was a long time of peace and bright minded people. Stockers style surprised many readers, because he always has you thinking it can’t get any darker than it is but it always exceeds the previous twisted situation or event. Bram Stocker shows Dracula as an iconic creature, with many reasons to be feared, but displayed in the wrong time era.
goes to nurse him back to health and to help him make the trip back to
A noticeable difference in the way movies have changed over the years is evident when comparing and contrasting two films of different eras which belong to the same genre and contain the same subject matter. Two vampire movies, Dracula and Bram Stoker's Dracula, present an interesting example of this type of study.