1. Dracula: History, Myth, and Popular Culture

2. Transformations History: Vlad III Dracula 1431-1476
Literature: Bram Stoker’s, Dracula
Theatre: Dracula & 1927
Film: Nosferatu–Shadow of the Vampire

3. History: Vlad III Dracula 1431-1476
Born: 1431 in Sighisoara, Transylvania
Dracula: “Son of the Dragon/Devil”
Second child of Vlad II Dracul, voivode of Walachia
Walachia: principality between the Danube and the Transylvanian Alps in southern Romania
Voivode (prince and military leader) for 3 separate periods: 1448, , and 1476
To Romanians: Vlad Tepes (Vlad the Impaler)
To Turks: Kaziglu Bey (the Impaler Prince)
Impalement: preferred method of execution
Unified Walachia - resisted Ottoman advances
Killed while fighting Turks near Bucharest in 1476

4. History: Vlad III Dracula 1431-1476
During 2nd reign: murdered between 40,000 and 100,000 people by 1462
Mid-15th century: German, Russian, and Turkish pamphlets establish notoriety
The Frightening and Truly Extraordinary Story of a Wicked Blood-drinking Tyrant Called Prince Dracula.
Nuremberg, 1488: "He had a large pot made and boards with holes fastened over it and had people's heads shoved through there and imprisoned them in this. And he had the pot filled with water and a big fire made under the pot and thus let the people cry out pitiably until they were boiled quite to death.”
An immortal heroic icon
Never associated with vampires

5. Literature: Bram Stoker 1847-1912
November 8th, 1847: Abraham “Bram” Stoker born in Clontarf, Ireland
Attended Trinity College in Dublin
8 years of civil service
1872: First story, The Crystal Cup
1878: Begins managing Henry Irving at London’s Lyceum Theatre
1882: First book, Under the Sunset
1890: First novel, The Snake’s Pass
1897: Dracula published
April 20, 1912: Dies in London

6. Literature: Bram Stoker’s Influences 1890-1896
Researched eastern European vampire folklore (especially Transylvanian myths)
An Account of the Principalities of Walachia And Moldavia, An Extraordinary and Shocking History of a
Great Berserker Called Prince Dracula, and The Historie and Superstitions of Romantic Romania
The Un-dead and Count Wampyr
1890: Met Hungarian professor, Arminius Vanbery
Syphilis in Victorian England
Never set foot in Romania

7. Literature: Bram Stoker’s Influences 1890-1896

8. Literature: Bram Stoker’s Dracula 1897
Epistolary novel
Significant plot changes
2nd to the Bible in sales
Inspired or influenced over 700 films
Never been out of print
Translated into every major language in the world
Only one page in a vast output of political pornography directed against us by our enemies; an attack on the very idea of being a Romanian.
-Adrian Panescu, 1985

9. Literature: the Count or the Voivode 1897
2 major differences
Count: Castle in Transylvanian Alps
Voivode: Castle in Walachia's foothills
Count: of Szekely blood, from the "northern country"
Voivode: of an older Walachian stock
2 Major Similarities
Count Dracula describes his royal heritage: "Is it a wonder that we were a conquering race; that we were proud; that when the Magyar, the Lombard, the Avar, the Bulgar, or the Turk poured his thousands on our frontiers, we drove them back? [...] To us, for centuries, was trusted the guarding of the frontier of Turkeyland; aye, and more than that, endless duty of the frontier guard.“
Count Dracula alludes to an "ancestor" who "sold his people to the Turk and brought the shame of slavery on them!" Vlad III Dracula’s younger brother, Radu, surrendered Walachia to the Ottomans.

10. Literature: the Count or the Voivode 1897
Vlad Tepes
He was not very tall, but very stocky and strong, with a cold and terrible appearance, a strong and aquiline nose, swollen nostrils, a thin reddish face in which very long eyelashes framed large wide-open green eyes; the bushy black eyebrows made them appear threatening. His face and chin were shaven, but for a moustache. The swollen temples increased the bulk of his head. A bull's neck connected [with] his head to his body from which black curly locks hung on his wide-shouldered person.
--Niccolò Modrussa
Count Dracula
His face was strong -- a very strong -- aquiline, with high bridge of the thin nose and peculiarly arched nostrils; with lofty domed forehead, and hair growing scantily round the temple, but profusely elsewhere. His eyebrows were very massive, almost meeting over the nose, and with bushy hair that seemed to curl in its own profusion. The mouth, so far as I could see it under the heavy moustache, was fixed and rather cruel looking, with peculiarly sharp white teeth; these protruded over the lips, whose remarkable ruddiness showed astonishing vitality in a man of his years.
--Bram Stoker

11. Theatre: Dracula & 1927
1924: Dracula, by Hamilton Deane, premiered in Derby, England – popular 3 year tour
3 acts set mostly in a drawing room in London
Count: Raymond Huntley (2000+ performances)
Count: from cadaverous to charming
American entrepreneur, Horace Liveright, bought rights to the Deane production
John Balderston: young journalist/playwright assigned by Liveright to 'Americanize' Deane’s script
Toned down theatrical dialogue – structure remained
Huntley turned down role – Bela Lugosi hired (speech)
1927: Dracula opens in Fulton Theatre in New York City Runs for 33 weeks, earning over $2 million

12. Film: Nosferatu
Nosferatu, Eine Symphonie des Grayens (The Undead, a Symphony of Horror)
Directed by F.W. Murnau ( )
German Expressionist cinema; silent
Earliest surviving vampire film
Max Schreck as Count Orlok – isolated, pathetic, and withdrawn
Murnau drew on popular Vampire lore and Stoker's novel (without permission)
Changed names and setting
Florence Stoker and the British Incorporated Society of Authors destroyed the original negatives and most of the prints
Wordy - journal entries, letters, etc.
Straightforward, unromantic, gruesome, cynical
Max Schreck myth

13. Film: Dracula & Horror of Dracula 1931 & 1958
Dracula (1931): D. Tod Browning
First authorized film adaptation
Dracula: Bela Lugosi (speech)
Script draws heavily on stage play
Dracula a suave, continental lover - handsome and charismatic
Victorian-era English aristocrat
Omits explicit sexuality
Horror of Dracula (1958): D. Terence Fisher
Dracula: Christopher Lee
Significant changes to novel

14. Film: Other Interpretations 1979-2000
1979: Nosferatu, Phantom der Nacht (The Undead, Phantom of the Night) D. Werner Herzog, Count: Klaus Kinski
Set in Netherlands, not England
First film to portray Dracula as tragic figure
Dracula as “the plague" personified with no romantic power over mortals
1992: Bram Stoker’s Dracula D. Francis Ford Coppola, Count: Gary Oldman
Closest to novel (characters & journal entries)
Supernatural romance
Vlad III Dracula and Count Dracula
1995: Dracula, Dead and Loving It D. Mel Brooks, Count: Leslie Nielsen
Unpopular parody
2000: Wes Craven Presents: Dracula D. Patrick Lussier, Count: Gerard Butler
Set in America, modern day
2000: Shadow of the Vampire D. E. Elias Merhige, Count: Willem Dafoe
The making of Murnau’s Nosferatu

15. Film: Other Interpretations 1979-2000

16. Characters Jonathan Harker: a lawyer from London.
Sent to Transylvania to help Count Dracula buy a house in London.

17. Characters Count Dracula: Transylvanian estate owner Vampire
Character inspired by the history of Vlad III The Impaler (1448), known for his brutality in battle
His father was a member of the order of the Dragon or Dracul (an order of Knights sworn to fight the enemies of Christianity)
Dracula means son of the Dragon.

18. Characters Mina (Murray) Harker Jonathan’s fiancé and then wife
Friends with Lucy Westenra, who was killed by Count Dracula after his arrival in London
Became a victim of Count Dracula
Helped Jonathan find Count Dracula and kill him

19. Characters Abraham van Helsing: Dutch doctor and vampire hunter
Comes to London to help hunt down Count Dracula
Follows Dracula to Transylvania and helps kill him

20. Plot Summary
Jonathan Harker is sent to Transylvania to meet with Count Dracula in his castle.
Dracula wants to buy an estate in London.
Harker brings him the papers to sign.
Soon, Harker finds himself held captive in the castle and sees weird and spooky things.

21. Plot Summary Jonathan manages to escape from the castle.
Mina Murray, his fiancé comes to Budapest, where he spends some time recovering.

22. Plot Summary
Count Dracula arranges for his coffin and several boxes of Transylvanian soil to be picked up and put on a sailing boat to England.
The boat sails from July 6 to August 4, where it crashes on the shores of Whitby, England. All the crew are missing and presumed dead. The captain is found dead, tied to the steering wheel of the boat.
All they find is the captain’s log, which tells a gruesome tale.

23. Plot Summary
Count Dracula arrives in London and begins preying on victims.
He finds a close friend of Mina, named Lucy, and begins drinking her blood.
Lucy’s fiancé is worried by Lucy’s “sickness” and calls his friend, Doctor van Helsing, to come and help.
Jonathan and Mina return from Budapest to find Lucy very sick.
Dracula turns Lucy into a vampire and van Helsing destroys her.

24. Plot Summary
Count Dracula begins preying on Mina to take revenge on Jonathan.
This helps Jonathan and his friends find Dracula.
They destroy all his hang outs in London so he has no choice but to return to Transylvania.

25. Plot Summary
Jonathan, van Helsing, Mina and some other friends arrive in Transylvania before Dracula’s coffin.
They are able to destroy him.
Jonathan and Mina return to England and live happily ever after.