In Search of Dracula with Mark Gatiss TV - Andrew Graham-Dixon TV - Vampire Forensics - Andy Warhol - The Real Dracula TV - Aryeh Nusbacher - Mei Trow - Tessa Dunlop - Bram Stoker - Dracula Untold 2014 - Dracula: Dead and Loving It 1995 - Dracula 1958 - In Search of History TV - Love at First Bite 1979 - In Search of … TV - In Search of History TV -
Dracula: the name is synonymous with terror. The creation of Irish author Bram Stoker – this iconic tale of a medieval vampire stalking the streets of London has scared and inspired millions around the world for over 120 years. Since its first publication in 1897, Bram Stoker’s novel has never been out of print. In Search of Dracula with Mark Gatiss, BBC 2020
‘Dracula’s so popular he’s got his own emoji.’ ibid. fan
Why do we keep returning to the Count? To what extent has public taste changed our perception of the Vampire, and what is the secret of his hypnotic hold over us all? ibid.
Dracula Has Risen from the Grave, Hammer 1968 … Nosferatu … Over the years the Count proved very difficult to kill … ibid.
The book was finally published on May 26th 1897 and quickly gained critical success. Much was made of Stoker’s clever trick of bringing a medieval monster into modern London. ibid.
Two years after the successful Broadway play, Universal Pictures produced the first version of Dracula on film [1931] with sound. ibid.
In 1958 Christopher Lee made the first of seven Hammer appearances in the role. ibid.
‘The red scar on the forehead showed on the pallid skin like a palpitating wound’. Andrew Graham-Dixon, The Art of Gothic 3/3: Britain’s Midnight Hour: Blood for Sale: Gothic Goes Global, Bram Stoker’s Dracula, BBC 2014
‘My revenge is just begun. I spread it over centuries and time is on my side’. ibid.
In the world of the Gothic all roads lead to Dracula. ibid.
Dracula: based in some reality after all on beliefs that five-hundred years ago were fact. Vampire Forensics, National Geographic 2010
Batman Dracula. Andy Warhol short film, 1964
In a country torn by bloody civil war a young man seizes power: in his native tongue he is called Dracolhat. This is not the vampire Count Dracula, but a real historical figure. A Romanian prince. The Real Dracula, 2006
Vlad’s own private torture chambers – restored in the nineteenth century this tower was perhaps the most striking feature. ibid.
Targovishte was littered with the impaled bodies of the dead and dying. ibid.
They were forced to build a fortress that is the real Castle Dracula. ibid.
He marched into Transylvania where Saxon merchants were threatening to overthrow him. ibid.
In Romania today Vlad Dracula is a national hero despite his brutality. ibid.
Vlad still stands out as a psychotic madman. Dr Aryeh Nusbacher, military historian
The written record is very sparse. Mei Trow, author Vlad the Impaler
There’s nothing cannibalistic about Vlad. Mei Trow
This man really existed and he really was a vicious extraordinarily cruel but extremely successful leader. Tessa Dunlop, historian
I heard a heavy step approaching behind the great door, and saw through the chinks the gleam of a coming light. Then there was the sound of rattling chains and the clanking of massive bolts drawn back. A key was turned with the loud grating noise of long disuse, and the great door swung back.
Within, stood a tall old man, clean shaven save for a long white moustache, and clad in black from head to foot, without a single speck of colour about him anywhere. He held in his hand an antique silver lamp, in which the flame burned without a chimney or globe of any kind, throwing long quivering shadows as it flickered in the draught of the open door. The old man motioned me in with his right hand with a courtly gesture, saying in excellent English, but with a strange intonation.
‘Welcome to my house! Enter freely and of your own free will!’ ibid. Bram Stoker, Dracula, Jonathan’s journal, History 2000
I am Dracula, and I bid you welcome, Mr Harker, to my house. Come in, the night air is chill, and you must need to eat and rest. ibid. Dracula to Jonathan
We are in Transylvania, and Transylvania is not England. Our ways are not your ways, and there shall be to you many strange things. ibid.
Listen to them – children of the night. What music they make. ibid.
You reason well, and your wit is bold, but you are too prejudiced. You do not let your eyes see nor your ears hear, and that which is outside your daily life is not of account to you. Do you not think that there are things which you cannot understand, and yet which are, that some people see things that others cannot? But there are things old and new which must not be contemplated by men’s eyes, because they know, or think they know, some things which other men have told them. Ah, it is the fault of our science that it wants to explain all, and if it explain not, then it says there is nothing to explain. But yet we see around us every day the growth of new beliefs, which think themselves new, and which are yet but the old, which pretend to be young, like the fine ladies at the opera. ibid. van Helsing to Seward
Never did tombs look so ghastly white. Never did cypress, or yew, or juniper so seem the embodiment of funeral gloom. Never did tree or grass wave or rustle so ominously. Never did bough creak so mysteriously, and never did the far-away howling of dogs send such a woeful presage through the night. ibid.
Vlad the Impaler: son of the dragon. Sickened by his monstrous acts, Vlad came to bury his past with the dead, and returned to Transylvania to rule in peace. Dracula Untold 2014 starring Luke Evans & Dominic Cooper & Charles Dance & Sarah Gadon & Art Parkinson & Diarmaid Murtagh & Paul Kaye & William Houston & Noah Huntley & Ronan Vibert & Zach McGowan & Ferdinand Kingsley et al, director Gary Shore
Men do not fear swords, they fear monsters. ibid. Vlad
Sometimes the world no longer needs a hero; sometimes what it needs is a monster. ibid.
There’s something other-worldly about that man that gives me the shivers. Dracula: Dead and Loving It 1995 starring Leslie Neilsen & Peter MacNicol & Steven Weber & Amy Yasbeck & Lysette Anthony & Harvey Korman & Mark Blankfield & Megan Cavanagh & Clive Revill & Mel Brooks et al, director Mel Brooks, woman in opera box
First we open the skull – so. Behold, the naked human brain. ibid. van Helsing’s autopsy
Let me kiss you. Let me show you the deep raw passionate unbridled sexual frenzy. ibid. female vampire
The Diary of Jonathan Harker 3rd May 1885: at last my long journey is drawing to its close. Dracula 1958 starring Michael Gough & Christopher Lee & Melissa Stribling & Carol Marsh 7 Mailes Malleson & John van Eyssen & Olga Dickie & George Benson & Charles Lloyd Pack & George Woodbridge et al, director Terence Fisher, opening lines
Castle Dracula: the castle appeared innocuous in the afternoon sun. ibid.
I have become a victim of Dracula and the woman in his power. ibid.
This unholy cult must be wiped out. ibid. van Helsing
Children of the night! Shut up! Love at First Bite 1979 starring George Hamilton & Susan Saint James & Richard Benjamin & Dick Shawn & Arte Johnson & Ronnie Schell & Isabel Sanford & Sherman Hemsley & Barry Gordon et al, director Stan Dragoti, opening scene
And therefore by unanimous vote of the Central Committee it has been decided to turn this castle into a training camp for our young athletes. ibid. old bird
Without me Transylvania will be as exciting as Bucharest on a Monday night. ibid. Dracula
I love you and I can give you eternal life. ibid. him to her
With you never a quickie, always a longie. ibid.
I propose a toast: here’s blood in your eye. ibid