Supernatural Fiction Readers discussion

This October, if you want to take part in a common read in this group, you have two choices instead of the usual single selection (an unusual situation due to the synchrony of the reading of our other selection in another group, which probably would never happen again). Or, if you want to, you can take part in both! Dracula was selected by vote as one of the choices.

This is the preeminent novel that shaped the 20th-century tradition (it was written near the end of the 19th century) of classic vampire fiction and cinema. There are any number of themes and ideas here that can lend themselves to discussion and debate, so I'm looking forward to one of our more lively exchanges here!

When posting on this (or any other common read thread), if you need to include a spoiler in your comments, please use the Goodreads hypertext marks for a spoiler: the < and > at the beginning and the < followed by a slash and > at the end, with the word spoiler between them. That will automatically hide your comments unless the reader clicks on "view spoiler," and will allow us to have just one thread for this discussion!

Some questions to consider in reading Dracula:

How does Stoker's conception of the vampire differ from the portrayals in some modern literature, such as Anne Rice's? Do you like one better than the other? Or do they both have their merits?

Some critics have discerned Christian symbolism in Dracula. Do you think they're correct?

Other critics see vampirism here as a metaphor for sexuality, which tended to be repressed in Victorian literature and public discourse. Do they have a point, in your opinion, or is this aspect of the novel over-analyzed?

What elements of vampire folklore does Stoker use in creating his title character, and the other vampires? How does he differ from his folkloric sources?

This novel is written in the epistolary style. What are the literary advantages (and/or drawbacks) of this method? Does the book work for you as a story?

Those questions don't exhaust the possibilities, but perhaps they'll help get you started!

Just now restarting the book. I haven't read it in years and I have an audio version this time...wonder if I'll have trouble sleeping?

Found it.

I'm listenin to Dracula on audio and it's really creepy; so I like it. It has been in my TRL foreva and this was the perfect opportunity to read it.

I have the audio to and oddly, I don't think it's quite as effective as reading the print version. It's like I can think of other things as I listen. I think when I get back to it I'll make sure I'm not doing anything else, turn out the lights, close my eyes and just listen.


Then I'll go for therapy.

I'll have to see if my library has the audio book for download. I wanted to read this, but I'm wrapped up in a discussion of A Night in the Lonesome October. I thought it would be a breeze since I read it every year & have notes, but there are a couple of very, very good people in the discussion this year that are making me research & update them which is very cool.

For whatever it's worth, here's the link to my review of Dracula: http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/... .

Here are two more reviews that I liked, and felt had some "meat" to them:
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...

Maybe the linked reviews will help enhance your appreciation of the book, and give you an idea of things to look for; or maybe you'll disagree with one or more of them, and you can use this thread to explain why. In any case, I hope they'll "prime the pump" for discussion. :-) And feel free to link us to your own review, or others that you found helpful!

Give me a day or so and I'll drop back and say something. I watching the debate tonight.

Yeah I know scintillating.

Mike (the Paladin) wrote: "I have the audio to and oddly, I don't think it's quite as effective as reading the print version. It's like I can think of other things as I listen. I think when I get back to it I'll make sure I'..."

Lol. Therapy? It took me awhile to get into audio books, and now I love em. I'm so upset that I have to wait until Nov for Zombie Fallout 6 on audio. Hopefully Jonathan Maberry is interestin.

Wikipedia has helpful write-ups on both this novel and on the real-life, historical Dracula, which might interest some of you for background. Here are the links:
https//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dracula

https//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vlad_the_Impaler

They also have an article on Stoker (https//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bram_Stoker ), but when I checked it out early this afternoon, it was being mutilated by an online vandal who was gleefully bragging about what he was doing, so I don't know what sort of shape it's in now. :-(

The original second chapter of Dracula was excised, pre-publication, by the publisher in order to shorten the novel. Stoker subsequently published it as a short story, "Dracula's Guest," and it's available online at www.literature.org/authors/stoker-bra... .

From discussion elsewhere on Goodreads, I've learned that Stoker (who never actually visited Eastern Europe in person), got a lot of his Transylvanian local color from a book of firsthand observations by Emily Gerrard, The Land Beyond the Trees. (The wiki on Dracula mentions her essay, "Transylvanian Superstitions," but not the book.)

I've just checked Wikipedia's article on Stoker, and it's been restored to its original condition. Hooray!

Actually Stoker did very little with Vlad as an actual person. He liked the name and referred back to his postilion as a military figure. He didn't really try to use actual facts from Vlad's life.

I plan to participate more in the discussion but I want to complete it again and think about it. I do think a lot of the "stuff" written about the book over the years says a lot more about the writers of the articles than it does about Stoker.

True, Mike --he picked a figure from the history of the region with an ominous-sounding name and a well-deserved reputation for sadistic cruelty, but he didn't really do anything with the original Dracula's biography. And technically, Vlad Dracula was Voivode of neighboring Wallachia, not Transylvania --though his power (and atrocities) extended into Transylvania.

Having read or listened to some Establishment critics pontificating about Dracula, I agree with your assessment of a lot of their "stuff." :-)

Fred Saberhagen did a lot with Vlad as a person. If you like Dracula, you might like his Dracula series. Thorn was the book I read first, although it is 4th in the series. The Dracula Tape is the first. He's actually a fairly likable character in them, at least quite understandable.

Werner wrote: "True, Mike --he picked a figure from the history of the region with an ominous-sounding name and a well-deserved reputation for sadistic cruelty, but he didn't really do anything with the original ..."

The show I saw long ago on History Channel about Vlad the Impaler gave me the impression he must have been the most sadistic person who ever lived. Have you seen that? Its been a few years back. I did wonder how accurate it was.

He was, but from what I've read it was an extremely sadistic time. In Romania Vlad (and his father) are considered national heroes.

I have read (and seen on TV specials) of him having his food brought out so he could dine among the people he'd impaled and I've seen the account of his having the clergymen's caps nailed to their heads because the clergy didn't normally remove their headgear in the presence of royalty as most did, etc.,etc.

All that said, Eastern Europe is a "hot bed" of vampiric and Lycanthropic tradition, so it's a good spot to set the novel.

The only book I've read in Saberhagen's Dracula series is the second one, The Holmes-Dracula File (my review is here: http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/... ). I liked that one well enough to give it three stars; but readers should be warned that while Saberhagen's Holmes and Watson are faithful enough to Doyle's conceptions, the liberties he takes with Stoker's original are substantial, and Dracula himself and other Stoker characters are drastically reinterpreted. Saberhagen's Dracula is also much more winsome than the historical one.

The Vlads owe their hero status in modern Romania to their victories against the Turks, the unpopular national enemy. (If their modern admirers had to live under their rule, most would probably soon be singing a different tune!)

I picked up a copy of Dracula today at the library and hope to start it soon. The two traditional copies were checked out so this one is a little different.

This one has 120 illustrations and 2 maps.

The Essential Dracula: The Man, the Myths and the Movies

Alice, it's hard to tell from the very minimal entry in the Goodreads database, but I'm not sure if the book you got from the library actually has the text of Stoker's novel or not.

Werner wrote: "Alice, it's hard to tell from the very minimal entry in the Goodreads database, but I'm not sure if the book you got from the library actually has the text of Stoker's novel or not."

Yes, it does and much more. There are notes from when Bram Stoker was writing the book on the side pages. If you can get a copy you will want to look it over due to all the details.

Cool! That sounds like a great resource for this discussion, Alice; glad you found it!

Werner wrote: "Cool! That sounds like a great resource for this discussion, Alice; glad you found it!"

A librarian helped me at the downtown library. She had to take me down in the basement area where they have their law library. I got a kick out of that.

Yay for librarians! :-)

Page 40 note 10 which may be of interest: "Countess Dolingen of Gratz in Styria. Le Fanu's vampire Carmilla was a countess whose activities took place in Styria, southeastern Austria, and who had been laid out in just such a tomb as Stoker describes here. In fact, Stoker's notes indicate that he had initially planned to set his entire novel in Styria. In this special way Stoker acknowledged his debt to Le Fanu for inspiring him to write a vampire tale."

Then there is a picture of an anti-vampire stake in a Romanian graveyard.

Having read both Carmilla and Dracula, I'd definitely say that Le Fanu's work was a significant influence for Stoker. That's especially clear in "Dracula's Guest" (which, as noted above, was originally supposed to be part of Dracula).

I've been holding off waiting I suppose for others, LOL. I've liked this book since the first time I read it. Since then I've read it over and over and have read other books supposedly drawn from or based on it...not to mention books about it.

I didn't care for The Holmes-Dracula File, but then I've made clear elsewhere that I'm not a fan of softening the vampire's image (I know Werner and I have discussed it before). That is in many ways a matter of taste.

Stoker does do a very good job of sticking to the view of the vampire that came out of Eastern Europe. As to whether there is any kind of Christian message in the book, I really don't think so. There's no Christian message it's only that the book is told from a (largely Roman Catholic) Christian point of view. That wasn't unusual and really didn't become something to draw attention until maybe 20 or 30 years ago. It's just the point of view from which the story proceeds.

The sexual metaphor? There's a bit, but I don't think it's as over riding as some claim. If you've noticed most of the media retellings of this story (after theBela Lugosi movie) have concentrated on Dracula's sex appeal. This isn't present in the book. We see some of it in Harker's confrontation(s) with the female vampires (vamps) in the castle but while Dracula himself gets power over his victoms there's no sign they're complicit in it.

The last BIG movie "Bram Stoker's Dracula" is obsessed with having Mina fall in love with the Count...not only not in the book, but the farthest thing from the book. A book has recently been published that places Jonathan Harker in the role of the villain and the Count as the protagonist. This is a modern proclivity and has nothing to do with Stoker's novel. It seems to me to be a more dark view of life that leads to these changed plot lines...my opinions throughout of course.

There is a lot of folklore that's accurate here and some that's left out. the word "vampire" is an 18th century word there are several other words out of Eastern Europe...I'm not an expert, but...some words tend to mean "lycanthrope", vampire and witch". A common word that comes from the Greek referring to an undead creature is Vrykolakas. (There's a story where this word is used of a father who goes out to kill an undead. He instructs his family not to let him back in the house if he comes back after dark...but they do.) In the book (Dracula) roses or wild roses are mentioned and Christian symbols also. Stoker didn't specifically mention silver which was also thought to be effective in most vampire legends. He mentions staking (medieval vampire hunters carried stakes and often staked newly dead people to the ground so that couldn't rise) as well as cutting off the head. (view spoiler)[ Note that when they kill Dracula they actually "stake him" with a Bowie knife as his head is being cut off by another Bowie knife. (hide spoiler)]

I like this book (as you may have gathered). Jim Butcher refers back to it as the reason that the "Black Court" of vampires has lost so much power. Stoker told people how to kill vamps. I highly recommend it. Even if you're a fan of the more modern romantic, friendly benign vampire it might be interesting to see where it started.

By the way, if you're interested I reviewed the book a while back:

http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...

Re the question of a Christian message in Dracula, I have to agree with Paul Leggett, author of the article, "Of Heroes and Devils: The Supernatural on Film" from the Nov. 18, 1977 issue of Christianity Today. (His focus was on movies, but since so many of those are based on or influenced by books, he dealt with them as well.) He commented, in part:

"Dracula introduces a modern version of a key medieval character [from the mystery plays]: the wise and spiritually pure Christian warrior whose task it is to defeat the forces of Satan in God's name. Such a character has his roots in Charlemagne, St. George, and Sir Galahad. In Dracula he emerges as Abraham Van Helsing, metaphysician and doctor, who uses prayer and Christian symbols to defeat Dracula, symbol of the anti-Christ. Like their medieval mystery counterparts, these classic tales have unquestioned value in dramatically portraying a Christian view of good and evil.... Since Dracula is only a symbol, Christianity, too, is presented in symbolic form through the cross, the Bible, or holy water. Symbols cannot present all biblical truth, but they can communicate certain truths and for this reason they are found in Scripture itself."

That isn't to say that Stoker was himself a Christian believer (though he was baptized as an infant in the state Church of Ireland). It's more likely, I think, that he was simply someone who grew up in a Christian-influenced culture, and therefore used Christian symbolism naturally when he was dealing with moral and metaphysical themes. In that way, the tale itself can take on and impart messages that the author didn't consciously think much about; that's not an uncommon phenomenon in literature (and not just with religious messages). But that doesn't negate the power with which the message can resonate with a receptive reader. That's just a thought to consider!

I first read Dracula around the 8th grade, I was about 14 or 15 years old at the time. I didn't know that it was told entirely from written accounts, epistolary style which I had never before encountered. Not since then either actually. I remember feeling a little disappointed and damn near bored to death with it as a 14 year old.
Recently I bought a newer copy, a very nice edition Barnes and Noble put out that was cheap for such a nice book. I reread it quite awhile ago now that I think about it, but how my tastes have changed! I freaking loved it this time around. It wasn't boring at all, not how I remembered feeling the first time. Completely understandable how this book is still popular today, over a hundred years later. This is the kind of classic we should've read in high school.
I agree with what a few of the others have mentioned, about the so-called sexual undertones of the story. Obvious with Harker and the 'brides' of Dracula, but not so much, if at all, with Mina or Lucy. I'm trying to go with what I remember since its been probably a year since I last read this. And this is the first time I've heard of the Christian themes of the book. I'm probably too influenced by all the vampire fiction I've read over the years, to really notice anything special about the use of christian symbols in the book. Maybe I should shut up and reread the book again, before I add anything more to this discussion lol.

Nah, Becca, you don't have to re-read the book before you can add to the discussion. (Having read it three times is actually better background than most of us have with it!) With a common read, typically a lot of the people in the discussion are reading it for the very first time, and commenting as they go; the mix of fresher perspectives with longer-standing ones can be interesting. You've already shared some good thoughts!

Here's my little review of this book.

Oh my goodness. Did you know that vampires used to be monsters? Dracula was motivated by revenge and not love. What a novel concept. A monster book about a monster. And he doesn't shimmer in the sunlight? Nice touch.

I could have done without some of Bram Stoker's long-windedness. But I liked this old book. It was creepy durin the creepy parts. The boring parts had me daydreamin. I liked Van Helsing. Anthony Hopkins was a great choice for the movie version. And really, that's the only part of the movie that fits the book. You know, because love story.

Charmer, I saw a large part of the movie version with Anthony Hopkins; but while I think he's a great actor, he didn't really strike me as the physical type that Stoker's verbal portrait in the book mentally conjures. Frank Finlay, who played Van Helsing in the 1977 BBC minseries adaptation starring Louis Jourdan (which I only saw in bits and pieces, unfortunately!) is much closer to the ideal in that respect, IMO.

Yes, vampires here (and in the classic tradition generally) are very much monsters, not round or nuanced characters who make choices and have feelings (unless appetite is a "feeling"). Lucy as a vampire, for instance, has no vestige of Lucy's personality or morality; for all practical purposes, she's ceased to be "Lucy," in any sense except having the same body. In this view, a human's moral/spiritual identity can be erased instantly any time he/she has the misfortune of being exsanguinated by a vampire, voluntarily or not. Undeniably, that's a view that IS existentially horrific, somewhat in the same way that the underlying message of zombie apocalypse movies/books is, though there the scope and gore factor is ramped up. Some of us would argue, though, that this conception doesn't lend itself ideally well to a moral, good vs. evil interpretation of supernatural horror. If a vampire's biology is the sole determinant of his/her behavior, it's hard to view vampires as "evil" in any sense, any more than a rabid dog is evil. (Dangerous and needing to be put down, certainly --but not individually responsible for choosing their behavior.) That's just a thought!

I won't belabor this as Werner and I have hashed it out before... I to prefer the "vampires are evil and no longer human" picture. I have trouble (and this is me, I know Werner wrote a character who's a sympathetic vampire) To start that over, I have trouble picturing a morally good parasitic being. That's why I think of the person being gone and a different being all together taking over.

It's why it's called fiction. Everyone has their own taste.

I disagree though so may think I have no say... They baby isn't parasitic it's simply on life support till it can be born.... :)

Some women lose a tooth as the baby takes so much calcium out of their bodies and many other things too. That is why prenatal vitamins look like horse pills. No woman ever really recovers from having a baby but most men really don't realize this. I still think its a very negative image but so much depends on how well a woman is nourished even before she gets pregnant!

My husband found for me the name of the actor on the cover of the book I am reading: Frank Langella...he makes a great looking Dracula. The book says: Frank Langella opens up new deminsions to the character, playing him as a Romantic, lyrical Byron-like hero, who exerts an extraordinary attraction over young women, Langella's Dracula moves effortlessly, like a danseur noble. He is an aristocrat, and he is also the old-fashioned dominant male figure. The attraction he exerts over the audience may spring from from a kind of reaction to the women's liberation movement.
It goes on to say the characters of Langella's Dracula and Lugosi's evoke comforting laughter, not real, deep terror. (that surprises me)

"Innocent Blood" is one of my favorite vampire movies. Ann Parillaude plays a wonderful female vampire. She tries to make sure the food is bad guys & she has a French accent, so she's not only trying to be good, but is sexy as well.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104511/

Saberhagen's Dracula isn't pure evil, but he's a very hard man. He did impale people & thought it was the price of making sure there wasn't any crime in his kingdom.

What's y'all opinion of Anne Rice's vampires?

Jim wrote: ""Innocent Blood" is one of my favorite vampire movies. Ann Parillaude plays a wonderful female vampire. She tries to make sure the food is bad guys & she has a French accent, so she's not only tr..."

Oh, I like that one too. I may have the video.

Hmmm! Good, interesting comments by all, above! I've always thought of vampires as predators rather than parasites, the difference being that parasites usually feed on their victims without killing them. Like fleas or ticks, vampires only suck blood, without eating the meat --but they suck a lot more of it, which to me makes the basic relationship a lot more like hunter and prey, rather than parasite and host. If a vampire kept a victim alive over a long period, but fed on the blood periodically, I suppose he/she would be a "parasite;" but that's not the usual operating method of most literary vamps, in the traditional mold or out of it. E. F. Benson's view of the vampire in "Mrs. Amworth," where it's a malevolent, bloodthirsty (literally!) spirit who inhabits and takes over a human body, fits the parasite model, too. In that approach, a human doesn't "become" a vampire; his/her body just gets invaded and occupied by one, displacing the human. That view would make sense of Mike's picture of "the person being gone and a different being all together taking over," which is harder to explain, IMO, in the usual scenario of the vampire being in some sense the continuation or revenant of the dead person.

From what I've read, some African tribes like the Masai used to bleed their cattle periodically, and drink the blood or mix it with flour and eat it, as a regular part of their food supply. Could a Masai native be morally good? Or is the practice of blood consumption so heinous and unnatural in itself that it morally taints any sentient being who does it? (I would argue that diet in itself does not make a person morally evil, unless he/she engages in morally wrong ways of obtaining that diet.) But how we prefer our fictional vampires is just a matter of personal literary preference, IMO; there are rich literary possibilities in both the classical vision and the more "humanized" modern one (and some of us can enjoy both --I gave Dracula four stars).

Alice, I've never seen either Langella's or Lugosi's Dracula portrayals; but from what I've heard about the latter, I don't think "comforting laughter" is usually the reaction it gets from most viewers. Now, Leslie Nielsen's Dracula in Mel Brooks' Dracula: Dead and Loving It is a figure that evokes laughter. But that's a parody of the vampire mythos, not a serious cinematic exploration of it.

Jim, thanks for the Innocent Blood link! Depending on how the writers/director handle certain aspects of it, I think that could have the potential of being a really intriguing film. I'll have to keep an eye out for that one!

Mike, your comment about parasites made me think of Stephenie Meyer's other successful novel, The Host. There, Wanderer's species actually ARE parasites (in a much more literal sense than most literary/cinematic vampires are portrayed as being!), but Wanderer herself comes across (to me at least) as convincingly morally good. Have you read that one? You might not like it at all, but I'd be curious as to what your thoughts would be about it.

I've tried reading Interview With the Vampire a few times & couldn't get into it. I didn't care much for the writing & never engaged with the characters at all.

I agree with Werner that vampires are predators, not parasites. The creepy thing about them is that we humans are their prey. They bring all the horror of cannibalism (sort of) & the night with them. We're not the top of the food chain.

Blood as food, isn't bad. It's quite nourishing & morally no different than eating muscle tissue, IMO. I don't know why the question of a Masai native being morally good should even be raised, if they live properly within their society. Their religion has nothing to do with their morals.

I had The Host, but never got around to reading it & finally traded it away. It was such a huge brick. The more I heard about it, the more it sounded like Meyer's take on Heinlein's The Puppet Masters, which is an old favorite & only about 200 pages. I just couldn't bring myself to read a wordy remake.

Werner, I think you'd like "Innocent Blood". While the vampire is a 'good' one, it is well done. There is one fairly hot sex scene in it, but otherwise it's pretty clean & funny, as well as exciting.

Charmer, we actually did a common read of Interview with the Vampire, back in February of 2009. Here's the link to that thread: http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/6... .

Jim, I just raised the question of a Masai being morally good to put the morality of blood drinking in a different perspective. It's not uncommon for people (not you necessarily, Mike!) to think that vampires are most naturally viewed as inherently evil because they drink blood; so I was posing the question of whether that principle applies to humans too. (And if it doesn't, is it a flawed principle as applied to vampires?) I wasn't suggesting that the Masai were immoral in those days because they were pagans (actually, Christian missionaries were active in Africa since the early 1800s, so probably quite a few blood-drinking Masai were just as good Christians as anyone on Goodreads). All humans have consciences and experience common grace, so decent behavior is a possibility for everybody --not perfect behavior, due to the shared limitations of our moral nature, but reasonably decent behavior. (On the principle that "all fiction should be true," I'm one of those who want to extend the same chance to fictional vampires. :-) )

Thanks for the added info on Innocent Blood. I'm game to give it a try! I can appreciate movies and books with bad Undead; but if I'm going to like a vampire personally, he/she has to want to be good.

I've never read The Puppet Masters (and don't know whether or not Meyer did), so the premise of The Host was quite fresh, for me. That no doubt made a difference in my reception of it.

I'll agree with the definition of vampire as predator (it is a good fit and seems to be the way traditional vamps regard themselves). That would be true of say werewolves (or lycanthropes in general) to.

I was was using parasite more as in the relationship between vamps and human society. Still, I do agree it's a better word for individual vamps.

I think my "chosen" view of vamps is greatly influenced by personal beliefs. So, when I write vamps that's how I see them and it's the view I prefer. There are books that I like that don't use that view, but even when I like the book the "friendly" vamp or vamp as a romantic interest (Rob Thurman's book) isn't one I'm comfortable. That's me. Obviously others don't agree.

That's cool. If everybody agreed all clothes would be the same color and Baskin Robbins wouldn't have all those flavors. :)

Mike wrote: "if everybody agreed all clothes would be the same color and Baskin Robbins wouldn't have all those flavors :)"

Well put, Mike!

I read a few of Ann Rice's books back when my son was reading them as I wanted to see what he was reading. I found them to be very disturbing. I didn't like them at all as they are the type of horror that can give me nightmares. I saw a couple of the movies too and liked Brad Pitt at that time. I cannot recall which vampire he played. I also read a book by the sister of Ann Rice and I think she is Alice Borchardt. It was a werewolf book and I liked it much better as it was not so scary.

Werner wrote: "Charmer, we actually did a common read of Interview with the Vampire, back in February of 2009. Here's the link to that thread: http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/6......"

From reading at your link here I can see that I need to read Interview with the Vampire again. I only became really interested in vampires since I got on goodreads.

Have you read They Thirst?

Alice, the vampire character that Brad Pitt played in the movie version of Interview with the Vampire was the titular vampire, Louis. (I never saw the whole thing, but I saw bits and pieces of it one time when my youngest daughter was watching it on TV.)

Werner wrote: "Alice, the vampire character that Brad Pitt played in the movie version of Interview with the Vampire was the titular vampire, Louis. (I never saw the whole thing, but I saw bits and pieces of one..."

I saw the whole thing but only remember tiny bits of it. I mainly just remember that it was horrifying and I wanted nothing more to do with that series but I have read more of them. Thanks for letting me know that Brad Pitt was Louis. I will try to remember that. And that reminds me I thought of a neverending quiz question I wanted to do last night while reading Dracula. (about the white flowers)