DRACULA by Bram Stoker
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- čas přidán 18. 11. 2013
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Thank you for not being YA obsessed! I have no problem with YA in itself, but I have absolutely no interest in reading it, and it's hard to find people that talk about books outside of that genre. Way to go! Top notch! (etc. etc.)
I make a point of informing people of Dracula's Irish roots whenever the opportunity presents itself. I wrote a 20+ page (required) paper on the subject for a Victorian Lit class I took. I now know far more about the subject than I ever cared to...and so will everyone else.
It's funny you mention Frankenstein in this video as it does have a link to vampires in the sense that it's basic idea was conceived during Shelley's time at the Villa Diodati, where John Polidori created the short story The Vampyre, and is considered by some to be the creator of the vampire genre of fantasy fiction.
I'm pretty certain the author didn't invent vampires per se. They were a big part of Romanian folk lore for centuries. But I suppose the author did bring the notion of vampires to a global audience.
More people know stoker is from Ireland than you think
Thank you for such great reviews,I especially appreciate that you don't speak of only YA books as everyone seems to be obsessed with.You are funny,and intelligent,I look forward to all your vlogs.I joyously subscribed to your channel ! I also want to thank you for speaking in a normal speed,so clearly,and concise.
I really love this book, I remember being surprised by the structure and actual story of it when I first read it, but it is incredible. I really want to re-read it now though, because it's been a few years since I did and several people seem to have been reading it at the moment. It's all reminding me of how much I enjoyed this book!
Excellent review. I have just finished reading Dracula and found it to be impressively sinister. Even though the character of Dracula doesn't directly feature for large chunks of the book, he casts a foreboding presence throughout it. I loved how Bram Stoker made that work.
Great review, it makes me want to read it, along with Frankstein.
I must say though I was afraid of the shadow behind you. I couldn't help staring at it.
Love it! 🖤🤍🖤🤍
Just found your channel. I love the classics. :).
I love this book! I've always thought it interesting too to see that it's more of an influence today than when it was written. Plus interesting to see the beginnings of certain vampire traits i had thought were made up just for twilight, which were actually in Dracula. But Dracula is definitely a far different plot than the culture expresses it as. Everything i knew about the book probably happened in 50 pages and the last 5, as you say lol.
I had to read Dracula in school a few years ago and I did not find it that heavy, maybe because I've always been a avid reader, but yes some of my classmates couldn't read it because they weren't used to reading much. A few months ago I read Frankenstein and I didn't like it as much.
PEDANTS' CORNER: Technically Dracula is Gothic revival, having been published well over a century after the original Gothic horrors of Walpole, Radcliffe, Lewis etc. Jane Austen took the piss out of them in Northanger Abbey and they were unfashionable for a while. Frankenstein - published the year of Bram Stoker's birth - was the last great Gothic from the original run. It was another Dublin-born writer - J. Sheridan le Fanu - who helped make the sub-genre popular again fifty years later with his works Uncle Silas and Carmilla, which inspired so many horror films from Carl Dreyer's Vampyr to Hammer's The Vampire Lovers.
To be fair, if you asked Bram Stoker himself, I imagine he'd be quite emphatic that it is a British (not just Irish) novel. He was a unionist, and most of the novel takes place in London, where he lived a large part of his life and is buried.
I love that book 💀
I'm so glad you that read this! I read it a few years ago. Just love it! It's odd I read it when Twilight became popular though. (I read Dracula when I was 13)
If you have not done so already, you should try the ghost stories of the great 19th century Irish writer J. S. LeFanu.
You are so brave to read Dracula. I got about half way through and got so bored I gave up.
I enjoyed your review on Dracula. I'm from Dublin and whatever written a small novel that has a vampire in it. I managed to get it published in London last year. It's called the sad windows. I wonder what you would think of it.
Bram Stoker lived in London for much of his life, where he managed the Lyceum Theatre. That's definitely worth correcting in your claim that he lived most of his life in Ireland ;)
totally agree with this review.
Yeah I need to read this. I agree that Frankenstein was amazing, I completely changed my mind about it after having read it (the films didn't really do it for me). Would you say Dracula is a similar kind of horror? I generally don't like vampire stuff because of the blood and all, but if it's more psychological horror, then I think I will like it.
Have you read Carmilla? It's older than Dracula and also of the gothic horror genre.
You're no longer making videos, so you're probably not going to see this comment, but you should really read The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson. It is a modern gothic horror (in case you haven't heard of it). I have a love/hate relationship with this novel. I just can't decide if I really like it or if I'm insulted. P.S. Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is one of my all time favorite novels! It IS a masterpiece!
Great review! I loved this book, wich is very surprising, because it's the first horror-novel I've ever read. (I normaly just read Low Fantasy- and sometimes also High Fantasy-books.)
It isn’t really about Dracula, now is it?
It's a good book but it isn't easy to read because of the Victorian style of writing. Everyone should visit Whitby - you'll soon see why Bram Stoker based most of his book in the town. It's very evocative, brooding, atmospheric and has a sinister tension running through the shadows.
I just got the book. My mom said it scared the s$&t out of her. I’m only 11. She read it in high school
What would you recommend as a good classic to start of with? I'm really interested in getting into some untimely classics.
The Picture of Dorian Grey since it's easier to read than other Victorian novels. After that I'd recommend Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights (anything by the Brontë sisters really). Enjoy :)
I think it depends on where the classic came from. American novels from the 1800s and British novels from the 1800s tend to be rather different. Books like, for instance, The Scarlet Letter and Moby-Dick; Or, the White Whale, tend to be different than Frankenstein; Or, the Modern Prometheus and The Picture of Dorian Gray.
My first real American classic was The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne. It's a beautiful book, but it can be a slog to get through those beautiful descriptions sometimes. It's actually somewhat short, and has a PLOT (which is much sought after in the world of classics) but Hawthorne is really wordy and you might be put off. I read Huck Finn next but I would by no means suggest it--the massive amount of colloquial language put me off big time. I suppose the best place to start wouldn't necessarily be in the 1800s, but the early 1900s. The Grapes of Wrath or Of Mice and Men are both fantastic places to start.
My first British classic was Frankenstein, and I thought it was magnificent. However, other people tend to think that's not such a great place to start. Many people suggest Wuthering Heights or Jane Eyre, but Jane Eyre is a little longer so I'd say Wuthering Heights. Also, most of Jane Austen's work is accessible. Many suggest Pride and Prejudice, but BookTube's JA expert Ron Lit has before suggested Northanger Abbey as the best place to start with JA. I too would agree with Soroleah that Dorian Gray is a nice place to start.
Read something like Black Beauty or the jungle Book. They are easy to read for a starter.
You speak like President Higgins
I wa really disturbed by the really imperialist undertones in this novel - we have a vampiric, 'eastern' individual who sucks the blood of noble British people and threatens to bring their social order to a collapsing point, it's so Orientalist!
I had similar experience with this book as you. And I really love this story! I recommend you to read "The picture of Dorian Gray". It's also a masterpiece. Greetings from Poland :) !
Oh my goodness I love "Picture of Dorian Gray"!!!! It's one of my favorite books. The writing style is so wonderful and beautiful and the topics throughout the book were really interesting to read. And of course obviously seeing him change.
Love your choice in books! I was just thinking the other day maybe I should do some book reviews that don't revolve around YA and contemporary fiction. :p
It's great listening to your thoughts and opinions. I've also read Dracula (amongst other "boring" books, haha) and loved it. It was nice getting to know the original story rather than just having the experiences with what Hollywood and such have done to it.
Bravo on this discussion!
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"Goings on " only the Irish would say haha !! Sorry but apart from that great review :)
I don't think you can call Dracula "an Irish novel", it's set in whitby- and if I remember correctly, Stoker wrote it while in whitby! Technically the beginning is set in Transylvania but even so that isn't Ireland. I admit, I've only read Dracula as a play adaptation but still... It's one of the few books that I've come across to be set in a country other than the authors home and personally that makes it hold so much more worth to me! point being, it's not an Irish novel.
But surely the author's cultural and national background has more say in the matter than where the novel is set? For example: F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel Tender is the Night is set entirely in France. Does that make it a French novel?. Besides I do believe that Ireland was a part of the UK when the novel was written and published, so Stoker would still have been in his "own country" when he visited Whitby.
I disagree, I think where a novel is set is more relevant to the story than where the author is from, for the simple reason that the author chooses the location and will have chosen to set the story (prodominately) in whitby for a reason but will of had no say in where they were born. I accept that where a person is born will impact them greatly but I can't accept the idea that it shapes them to the point where it overshadows that persons conscious decisions. I do take your point about Ireland being part of the UK at the time though which means this debate is technically mute.
However, the question isn't really how much the author's place of birth influences a particularly story, but rather how to decide which national canon of literature it belongs to. Noone would say that For Whom the Bell Tolls is part of Spanish literary history just because it's set in Spain. And if the case was as you put it, then what to do about Fantasy? Novels set in imaginary worlds? Remember that Dracula is not set in Transsylvania and England, it is set in a version of Transsylvania and England in which vampires exist.
Modern vampire lit is a cheap imitation of Dracula, plain and simple.
I love this book! I've always thought it interesting too to see that it's more of an influence today than when it was written. Plus interesting to see the beginnings of certain vampire traits i had thought were made up just for twilight, which were actually in Dracula. But Dracula is definitely a far different plot than the culture expresses it as. Everything i knew about the book probably happened in 50 pages and the last 5, as you say lol.