![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
I received "The Annotated Dracula" that ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
cinchntouch recommended. I've spent a little bit of time flipping through it, and gelling what I thought while reading.
I read the Gutenberg Project edition that came on my little Aluratek e-reader, so it was a bare bones read. There's no question that it's Victorian; all the tropes are there. There's Good Knightly Christian Men and Saintly and Childlike Christian Women. All upper class, of course, and rich. I was, however, very surprised to find that Mina was technologically savvy for the time, knowing how to use both a phonograph and a typewriter.
I found my favourite part of the book was actually the parts when the characters are not in England. The travelogue-like narrative and their sense of wonder as they go to eastern Europe and are confronted by people very unlike (and thus exotic to) them felt very real.
Dracula himself doesn't appear all that much, but he's much more frightening than he's usually portrayed. For instance, he can go out during the day; he's just weak when he does. He can become a bat or a wolf. He can read minds of those who have drunk his blood. He's smart and yet Van Helsing points out that he still has the potential to grow much smarter, and stronger, and that his plans include world domination...
It's a book that invites a lot of contemplation. I imagine this is what makes it such a classic.
cinchntouch recommended. I've spent a little bit of time flipping through it, and gelling what I thought while reading.I read the Gutenberg Project edition that came on my little Aluratek e-reader, so it was a bare bones read. There's no question that it's Victorian; all the tropes are there. There's Good Knightly Christian Men and Saintly and Childlike Christian Women. All upper class, of course, and rich. I was, however, very surprised to find that Mina was technologically savvy for the time, knowing how to use both a phonograph and a typewriter.
I found my favourite part of the book was actually the parts when the characters are not in England. The travelogue-like narrative and their sense of wonder as they go to eastern Europe and are confronted by people very unlike (and thus exotic to) them felt very real.
Dracula himself doesn't appear all that much, but he's much more frightening than he's usually portrayed. For instance, he can go out during the day; he's just weak when he does. He can become a bat or a wolf. He can read minds of those who have drunk his blood. He's smart and yet Van Helsing points out that he still has the potential to grow much smarter, and stronger, and that his plans include world domination...
It's a book that invites a lot of contemplation. I imagine this is what makes it such a classic.
