DRACULA: A VILLAIN IN BLACK AND WHITE

Source: Jane Sullivan at The Sydney Morning Herald

If you want a bestseller these days, you have to put a vampire in it. Or so it seems to me in a city bookshop, surveying the rows and rows of books under the “Paranormal” heading, all of them either by Stephenie Meyer or one of her numerous clones. I’m surprised the shelves aren’t dripping blood.

It’s an uncanny phenomenon, and in order to understand it better I decided to go back and read the mother of all vampire novels, Bram Stoker’s Dracula. It’s not the first vampire story by any means, but for more than a century it has captured the imagination of countless readers and has launched a dynasty of films.

Because of those films, we think we know Dracula. Bela Lugosi or Christopher Lee in a cape and fangs, right? Heroes rushing around a crypt, a madman who eats insects, pale maidens languishing with mysterious puncture marks in their necks, and stakes through the heart. Hoary old cliches, good for a belly laugh rather than a shiver.

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This is a really interesting write up of the Classic tale of the most well known Vampire of them all (if you haven’t read the article – no, I’m not talking about Edward Cullen). I really like that Jane Sullivan was compelled to read Dracula to try to understand the vampire phenomenon.

What do you think? Are you a fan of Bram Stoker’s Dracula?

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