Comments on: Leslie S. Klinger: The Historical Context Of Dracula

By: webslog

webslog — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 17:55:09 +0000

When you boil it all down, Dracula is a procedural … a fast-moving, plot-driven story whose author relies as much on his ability to research and construct a framework of enough plausibility that even the biggest train-schedule geek in the world could have read the book and given Stoker a pass. (Here, I imagine a bunch of 19-year olds sitting in a pub … “Okay, so even if Van Helsing caught the ferry as the tide was going OUT, steam boats of the age could only have made 6 knots TOPS. Hey, can we get some more Hot Pockets over here?!”

The great thing about procedurals is that they’re a ripping fast read (a la Tom Clancy and every episode of Law & Order ever.) The downside is that once we as readers move beyond the time period in which they were written, crucial pieces of the plot – train schedules, medical procedures, class distinctions – that would have been accepted as holy writ at the time of publication become blurred, antiquated and irrelevant.

While I initially raised eyebrows over Prof. Klinger’s “gentle fiction,” I’ve since given the device a pass. It’s clear that Klinger’s crawled through source and secondary material to annotate the volume. And often times, annotated volumes do *such* a thorough job of contextualizing their material that the drama of the story is beaten to a pulp with the Logic and Truth Hammer. The GentleFiction™ adds back a little bit of the energy that any of us bring to a good story and allows us to suspend disbelief.

By: JoAnn

JoAnn — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 20:00:03 +0000

Professor Klnger’s annotated Dracula has answers to all these questions, including a long discussion on the history of blood transfusion. It’s taking me twice as long to read each chapter because many of the notes are quite interesting, though I find it amazing that anyone studied the “authenticity” of the dates on the letters and diary entries!

By: Elizabeth Miller

Elizabeth Miller — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 00:00:56 +0000

Blood typing did not make an appearance until the first decade of the 20th century, a few years after “Dracula” was published.

By: Damhnait

Damhnait — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 23:22:20 +0000

And on the question of medicine, and transfusions in particular, was the issue of blood type unknown at the time? Are we just lucky that all the menfolk happened to be her type?

By: matt

matt — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 22:23:21 +0000

I have come to the rather disappointed conclusion that everything in this novel is just a plot device.

By: Elizabeth Miller

Elizabeth Miller — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 17:39:52 +0000

I’ll leave it to Leslie to fill in the details re education. But this might be relevant (I posted something about this earlier, in another context, on one of the Forum threads, so pardon the repetition.) Bram Stoker had three brothers who were medical doctors. Best known was Thornley, a brain surgeon and for a time president of the Royal College of Surgeons in Dublin. He was knighted by Queen Victoria in 1895.

By: matthewbaldwin

matthewbaldwin — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 16:39:15 +0000

Exactly–I asked Mr. Klinger to write on this subject and, as it turned out, he had a lengthy passage from his introduction that fit the bill perfectly. It seemed a little silly to ask him to rewrite it just for the sake of calling it “new”.

By: Jamie

Jamie — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 15:30:38 +0000

Well, on the subject of travel – through all the death in recent chapters, I found it a little off-putting how much travel away from urgent affairs was occuring. Arthur’s presence was requested in the afternoon and he arrived before six p.m.?! I understand the father is deathly ill, but if you’re that close to two horribly ill people, surely you can spend time with both. And please let it be discovered that there is something equally urgent requiring Van Helsing’s time in Amsterdam. As soon as the garlic flowers show up in the story, it’s evident that he understands the peril, whether he’s yet ready to share with others his fears. For all the talk of concern, the actions tell a different story.

And an aside – I greatly prefer to read McNicol’s PDF’s rather than the Project Gutenberg text. Are more coming soon?

By: kaehlin

kaehlin — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 15:21:57 +0000

Dr. Klinger, thank you for providing this synopsis. I am not very familiar with the historical context, having read only minimally (and not recently) from this time period. I suspect that Dracula’s most lasting effect on me will be as a history lesson.
I am curious as to the role and position held by physicians. I was under the impression that at the time Dracula was written, physician education was fairly informal and only lightly informed by science – yet Van Helsing and Seward, as physicians, seem to hold significant social status. Can you help me place the physician’s role and education in proper historical perspective?

By: Damhnait

Damhnait — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 15:00:40 +0000

This has been a source of confusion for me too, is it really that easy to spend the night in Amsterdam and make it back again? Also, why is he actually going there? Are there no sources of garlic flowers closer by? Is it just a plot device to ensure that through some peculiar twist of fate Lucy continues to be mysteriously drained of her blood every other night? Van Helsing continues to be extremely irritating by his refusal to tell anyone anything at all about what’s happening.