When people hear the world “Dracula” they think black cape, red blood, and white vampire. The creative story of Count Dracula is fiction, but the inspiration behind it is as real as life itself. In the words of Richard Means, “‘Dracula’ is the story of the Transylvanian Count Dracula, a vampire who terrorizes a group of friends, led by Abraham Van Helsing, in his search for victims in London.” The novel by Bram Stoker is widely known and popular throughout most of the world, although not many people know the initial spark for the story. The fictional character, Count Dracula, was actually inspired by Vlad Tepes, a ruthless Romanian prince, who truly earned his horrid reputation. Some people don’t believe this to be true, but there are many …show more content…
He inherited his name, Vlad, by being born into a royal heritage. His royal bloodline also meant that one day he would get the chance to rule his family’s kingdom. Vlad also went by “Dracula” because of his family’s associations. “..Vlad was known as ‘Dracula’, because his father belonged to a society called the Order Draconis. As this made his father a ‘dragon’, it made Vlad ‘Dracula’, which means ‘son of the dragon’” (Means). Stoker learned of Vlad’s reign from a Hungarian professor, Arminius Vambey. Means explains this connection and also says it is believed Vambey “greatly influenced the novel’s central ideas”. Stoker must have been truly intrigued by these horrifying historical accounts of Vlad causing the spark for his work renowned piece of …show more content…
“Some particularly gruesome accounts claimed that Vlad liked to dine among the impaled bodies of his victims, and would even dip his bread into their blood” (Was Dracula a real person?). There are paintings of Vlad dining on his victims everywhere, and most of them revolve around this one common story. In the story, Vlad held a banquet with his enemies as his guests. As if this didn’t seem suspicious enough, he knew “they would challenge his authority” (The Real Dracula) and had a vicious plan. He took them all as prisoners and led them outside the city. “If they really numbered in the hundreds, the executions must have taken a long time. The last victims had to watch in terror for hours. One by one, the prisoners were impaled--run through with a sharp stake” (Goldberg and Itzkowitz, 13). The prisoners had come for a peaceful, elegant evening, but hey ended up having their last night ever, watching in terror as the doom approached. To make matters worse, the people murdered at the banquet weren’t the only ones affected by this
The novel Dracula by Bram Stoker has plentiful examples of key concepts we have examined in class including: Purity and impurity, magical thinking, strong emotions such as disgust and shame, , formalization, and myth. In this essay I will summarize events that take place within the novel when the protagonists deal with Dracula and then relate these events to the key concepts to demonstrate why the characters view him as dangerous, and therefore something to be avoided completely.
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 between the lines, Stoker’s true message can be revealed. His personal experiences and the time period in which he lived, influenced him to write Dracula in which he communicated the universal truth that good always prevails over evil. Religion was a big part of people’s lives back in Stoker’s time.
Florescu, Radu, and McNally, R. T., Dracula: A Biography of Vlad the Impaler, 1431-1476 (1973)
During his rule, Dracula established five monasteries and was always followed by priests and monks as he thought that religious charity would erase sin. Despite being known for his great religious virtues and being a war hero in all of Romania for defending his empire from the Ottoman Empire, Dracula had a thirst for blood. Dracula’s good deeds were overshadowed by his methods of torture as he became known as “Vlad the Impaler”. Dracula’s choice of punishment for his enemies was to impale them and leave them to slowly die a painful death. This did not sit well with the Vatican as they condemned his actions of cruelty. It was also reported that on a separate occasion of impaling his enemies, Dracula was eating his dinner and dunked a piece of bread in blood which some say added to the myth of him being a vampire. Dracula was killed in 1476 while he was battling the Turks and his head was cut off and put on display in Constantinople as a tribute of his actions for the country of
Dracula was concerned with female chastity and often cut women’s sexual organs or breast off, who had committed adultery. Some sources narrate stories of women impaled through the vagina on hot stakes. Despite these acts of cruelty, Dracula insisted Wallachians to be honest and hard working. Scholars believe Dracula’s actions may indeed be interpreted as efforts to strengthen and sustain the government while ensuring the security and productivity of his people. Bibliography: The Historical Dracula, Ray Porter, http://www.eskimo.com/~mwirkk/castle/vlad/vladhist.html, 16/10/04 Vlad Dracula: An intriguing figure in the fifteen century, Benjamin H. Leblanc, http://members.aol.com/johnfranc/drac05.htm, 20/11/04
The late nineteenth century Irish novelist, Bram Stoker is most famous for creating Dracula, one of the most popular and well-known vampire stories ever written. Dracula is a gothic, “horror novel about a vampire named Count Dracula who is looking to move from his native country of Transylvania to England” (Shmoop Editorial Team). Unbeknownst of Dracula’s plans, Jonathan Harker, a young English lawyer, traveled to Castle Dracula to help the count with his plans and talk to him about all his options. At first Jonathan was surprised by the Count’s knowledge, politeness, and overall hospitality. However, the longer Jonathan remained in the castle the more uneasy and suspicious he became as he began to realize just how strange and different Dracula was. As the story unfolded, Jonathan realized he is not just a guest, but a prisoner as well. The horror in the novel not only focuses on the “vampiric nature” (Soyokaze), but also on the fear and threat of female sexual expression and aggression in such a conservative Victorian society.
Dracula is a mythical creature designed to wreak havoc on the lives of mortals through the terror and intimidation of death by bite. Vampires are undead beings that kill humans for their blood to survive. Human blood is the vampire’s sustenance, and only way of staying alive. Throughout time, humans have come up with ways to repel vampires, such as lighting jack-o-lanterns on All Hallows Eve, placing garlic around the neck, a stake through the heart, sunlight, etc. Both beings have a survival instinct, whether it be hunger or safety, both are strong emotions. In the novel Dracula by Bram Stoker, the characters Lucy, John, and Van Helsing strive for survival, therefore killing Dracula.
The famous movie Van Helsing produced by Stephen Sommers, characterizes Dracula with many different meanings. Portrayed as a typical male human being, transforming into a vampire with astonishing bat-like wings that help him fly. Many different concepts reveal Dracula’s identity throughout the movie. By watching Van Helsing repeatedly, the idea of Dracula seems to reveal more and more information every time the movie gets watched. Dracula remains as one of the best devil topics to study due to his changes, attitude, and duties. For example, Sommers demonstrates the whole concept of why Van Helsing was created. The movie title was named Van Helsing because the main character who ends Dracula was named Van Helsing. The setting of the movie remains based on Transylvania, where Count Dracula murdered Frankenstein’s creator (Grant 2004). The whole point of Van Helsing being sent to Transylvania involved the killing of Frankenstein’s creator and the fear of Dracula murdering the rest of the Valerious family. The Valerious family includes only a brother and sister left who names were Velkin and Anna (Grant 2004). The start of the movie introduces how horrific Dracula sustains with his murders and gruesome ideas. A huge concept behind the scenes of Dracula in Van Helsing included the key to Frankenstein’s creators machine. The machine primarily was responsible for creating Dracula’s young and sustaining their life. Ultimately, the machine gave life to Dracula’s unborn creatures. Trying to find the key remained difficult because a key did not accomplish the machine. Over the period of time in which Dracula finally found the key, many lives were taken and many figures were recognized through Dracula. For example, “Count Dracula is the quintessence of the evil creatures we meet in everyday life” (Herbert 2004). Being known as one of the evilest creatures in the
Bram Stoker took the legend of Vlad Tepes and used it as an idea for Dracula. He was the ruler of an old country called Wallachia. He is most famous for impaling his enemies on sticks around his castle. He taught himself how to miss vital organs in the body, causing the victim to die a slow painful death. This is why people consider him an ancient vampire. What people don’t know about him is that the rich loved him, but the poor hated him. To anyone that didn’t have to seal to make it by he was great. But to the poor people who couldn’t buy food, they were always in fear of him. He was abused as a child, and this is what is thought to have caused his behavior. (Melton 1053)
From Transylvania to Hollywood, vampires have transformed from unfamiliar, mysterious personalities to one of the most dominant monsters in the horror genre today. Vampires are one of the oldest and most noted creatures in mythology, with many variations of them around the world. Although the most famous version is Bram Stoker’s Dracula, many variants have come before and after telling of the same legend with their own added ideas and modifications to relate to their cultures. Today, there is a multitude of literary and film works that convey and resurface peoples’ fear of vampires. As gothic works like Dracula, by Bram Stoker and Scooby-Doo! and the Legend of the Vampire directed by Scott Jeralds share certain traits reflective of the genre; These factors include setting, actions of each vampire, the initial reactions to news of them, and how their presence affects the people who live within the region the vampires inhabit.
Since the 19th Century, Bram Stoker’s Dracula has entertained its readers taking them to heights of excitement in the climax
Mina Murray was engaged to Jonathan Harker and when Dracula kept him prisoner, the Count wrote letters to Harker’s boss and pretended to be Jonathan and to inform his boss and his fiancé that things were going good with his business trip. The Count was giving Mina and Jonathan’s boss false hope and keeping Harker prisoner at his castle. Dracula would even dress up in Harker’s clothes and mail the letters so it would not arise any suspicion. The Count seemed to only focus on turning women into vampires and he used the men to lure the women into his trap. Therefore, that is why he was keeping Jonathan alive. Everything Dracula did was made with lots of forethought. Such as when Lucy a young woman who also was a friend of Mina was mysteriously getting ill and sleep-walking during the night no one knew what was happening to Lucy because she would get sicker after they discovered she was sleepwalking. Lucy was sleep walking because she had gotten bite by Dracula and every night he called to her so he could feed off her again. He also made sure she was alone and waited a few days before attempting to suck her blood again. Although, Dracula was a smart man in his cunning actions he could not hide the fact that something evil was
Dracula uses his victims’ fear of being prey to his advantage by giving off the appearance of better and stronger. It is a power move that weakens his victims and takes advantage of the “Fight or Flight” brain mechanism. The study continues, “Efficient hunting often requires group coordination, obedience to authority and a high degree of conformity, especially if the prey is large and dangerous” (47-48). The victims believe they are less equipped so they do not even bother fighting back. Professor Helsing describes the power of Dracula with Mina, saying.
With this in mind, looking back to the inspiration behind Dracula and the idea behind vampires is extremely helpful before trying to analyze the character. The character Dracula is rumored to be based off Vlad the Impaler. Vlad was a Romanian warrior and ruler that defended against the Ottomans. He followed in the same footsteps as his father named “Vlad II, who had pledged to defend Christianity in Eastern
He is an undead centuries-old vampire who sleeps in a coffin in the basement, can assume the form of animals, control the weather and is stronger than twenty men, he cannot come into a house unless invited, he cannot walk in water and his favorite meal is human blood, which these traits are consistent with his portrayal in both the novel and the movie (Stoker). Although the novel and movie share many likenesses with Count Dracula’s character there are some unique qualities that are slightly different the book describes a shadow coordinated with Count Dracula’s body while in the movie his shadow works separately from his body movements (“Dracula (Universal Classics)”). Another feature of Count Dracula’s character in the novel is that he cannot be in or near the sunlight or it will kill him, but in the movie, he meets Mina in the daytime and it does not harm him (Bram Stoker’s). Nevertheless, in the book Dracula is a pure evil, terrifying blood hungry monster that wreaks havoc on anyone he meets and feels the need to take life or end life with his arch nemesis being with anyone who wants to preserve life (Stoker). But in the movie when he meets Mina on the streets of London, he pursues her, starts a courtship with Mina and he falls in love with her so when he