Dracula

Dracula is a gothic novel by Bram Stoker published in 1897. Stoker tells the story of the fight against the vampire Dracula in an epistolary format. The story comprises various letters, telegrams, journal entries, and newspaper articles written by the main characters. Dracula explores the classic theme of good versus evil, but the novel also illuminates the relationships between religion and reason, the East and the West, the modern age versus the old world, and how the repressive mores of the Victorian era clashed with more liberated ideas about female. The novel’s influence on Gothic, horror, and romance genres was profound, and the character of Count Dracula became one of the most influential, recognizable figures in literature, film, television, and even video games.

Plot Summary

Dracula is set during an unnamed year in the last decade of the 19th century. The action begins with an English solicitor named Jonathan Harker traveling to help Count Dracula with legal matters concerning his immigration to London. Dracula is gracious and charming, but also unsettling. Jonathan never sees him eat, he has pointed ears and teeth, and he always ends their conversations just before sunrise. Jonathan eventually learns that he is trapped in the castle, which is also inhabited by three female vampires who attempt to seduce him and drink his blood before Dracula stops them.

Jonathan escapes, and Dracula travels to London on a ship called the Demeter. The ship carries fifty boxes of soil that Dracula will use for his coffins as he hunts new victims in England.

Dracula pursues Lucy Westenra, the best friend of Mina Murray, Jonathan’s fiancée. Lucy begins sleepwalking at night and grows pale and weak; there are small puncture wounds on her throat one morning. Mina and Lucy’s fiancée, Arthur Holmwood, are worried but cannot help her.

Dr. Seward, the administrator of an asylum, is a former suitor of Lucy’s. One of his patients is a man named Renfield, who consumes insects and birds in his cell. Renfield is secretly in league with Dracula. When Seward hears of her case he summons his mentor, Abraham Van Helsing. Van Helsing deduces that a vampire is preying on Lucy, but does not tell anyone until he is sure. By then it is too late. Lucy dies of blood loss after several transfusions spread across several days. After Lucy’s death, Van Helsing takes Holmwood, Dr. Seward, and Harker to Lucy’s tomb. Holmwood pounds a stake through her heart after seeing her, revived, carrying an abducted child.

After Lucy’s is killed, Dracula turns his attention to Mina. He forces her to drink his blood and threatens to kill Jonathan. This links Mina to Dracula. The men locate the boxes of earth Dracula uses for shelter and cover them with communion wafers. Dracula transports himself and the final box back to the Carpathians on a ship called the Czarina Catherine. The men find him by using Mina as a sort of tracking device. Her link with Dracula gives them clues to his location. Ultimately, they find Dracula before sunset and kill him. Morris dies during the attack.