But really, what I want to know now is how Van Helsing can believe so many things at once. I just finished Chapter 25, where Van Helsing delivers yet another one of his long, LONG monologues, this time about Dracula’s “child-brain” (something I have a hard time not reading strangely since the last thing I think of when I think Count Dracula is a child [unless it's a dead one]).  We seem to be back at criminology, or the psychology of the criminal mind, which Stoker first visited when Jonathan was in Transylvania. This is how Van Helsing decides to deal with Dracula for the moment, which is fine.  I just wonder how Van Helsing, especially as a doctor, can rationalize relying on psychology, medicine and religion all at once in dealing with Dracula. Obviously we’re suspending our disbelief (in just a few ways) for the duration of the book but I was already raising my proverbial eyebrow when Van Helsing began invoking Christianity in earnest.  Van Helsing and Stoker sort of reinvent religion to give it specific guidelines for dealing with things like vampires, when, as far as I know, vampires were never mentioned per se in the Bible (although that would have made Sunday school more fun).

It’s just interesting to wonder where Stoker (and Van Helsing) decided to draw the lines between Van Helsing’s various ways of dealing with Dracula.  When does your faith in Jesus stop aiding you and at what point do you need to start relying on science, either medical or psychological?  Moreover I’m getting sick of Van Helsing’s neverending monologues which he seems to deliver based on whatever’s motivating him at the moment. SHUT UP ALREADY AND GET TO VAMPIRE FIGHTING.  So as long as he’s blabbing I’m just curious what at the moment he’s deciding to use in his war on the undead, and why.

Speaking of vampires, I am going to re-watch Bram Stoker’s Dracula and sink my fangs into some candy come this Halloween, just to compare the book and the movie like I said I wanted to (I still think Keanu Reeves as Jonathan is going to be greater than I remembered).  But last week I watched the film Let the Right One In which is undoubtedly a better movie and probably vampire flick (although the vampirism in the movie isn’t as scary as some other parts of it).  It’s no vampire rock opera from Forgetting Sarah Marshall, but still, I approve.

The team’s biggest folly to date, obviously, is deciding that Mina is suddenly too delicate to keep up with all things vampires, even though Van Helsing declared that “She has a man’s brain.”  Even though she had been an integral part of putting together the puzzle pieces, Van Helsing and the rest decide that the best thing for her is to treat her like a child–in fact, a child that you don’t respect that much.  What’s the best thing for her? To go to bed, all the time.

What disappoints me the most is Jonathan’s newfound desire to keep things from Mina.  Even though, after his return from Transylvania, they made a vow of honesty in their relationship, even though she could obviously handle the truth when she read his journal, now he gets all buddied up with Van Helsing and the boys and it’s suddenly “Ooh let’s not bother the poor woman with the truth.”  Meanwhile while they’re off playing with the terriers Mina’s getting her blood sucked, and she’s not just “fatigued” and “pale”, she’s crying because Jonathan revoked his trust.  Guys, next time you go hunting vampires, take your womenfolk with you and don’t leave them behind in the insane asylum. They might complain but it’s for their own good.

What’s interesting, not to bring this back to the women/men thing in the book once again, is that the more Mina is treated like a weak helpless woman, the more she feels and hence acts like one. She now keeps things to herself in order to avoid upsetting Jonathan and the gang, she goes to bed when they tell her to and she considers her discomfort around Renfield “a new weakness.” I highly doubt she’d be questioning herself this much if she were as much a part of the adventure as she was when all her records were of such necessity to Van Helsing. But now they used what they needed and she’s fading away in more ways than one.

Men! Can’t live with ‘em, can’t drive stakes through their hearts.

Side note: I didn’t know that terriers were enemies of Nosferatu.  Gives even more meaning to that classic song “God Loves a Terrier.“

What I want to know is, is the devotion the three men show to Lucy and to each other more fantastical than the vampires?  There are a few things I am willing to accept as a historical fact in terms of romance being different during the writing of this book than it is today: getting engaged was a different situation a hundred years ago, for instance.  You didn’t wait as long to get engaged, it wasn’t quite as formal and so it wasn’t that weird to get multiple proposals. That’s fine.  I do wonder whether Stoker envisioned why Lucy was indeed so popular, or whether he just had it as a fact: Lucy is beautiful and popular with the mens.  If I were to write Dracula fan fic I might start with Lucy and explore just what makes her so great, since we barely know her before Drac gets to her.  Is she a good listener? A hilarious joke-teller?  An amazing lover?  Or is she kinda stupid and bitchy but just really, really hot? I wonder about these things.

But fine, she is proposed to three times.  But what are the odds that the three men who proposed to her would be good friends?  A.) As friends, do you think they consulted each other about proposing and just decided to go for it, or did they not mention it to each other and it was just awk-ward!  B.) Stoker imbued all three of these men with a remarkable sense of honor that they would respond to each others’ cry for help in Lucy’s time of need.  Part of me wants to envision a “Curb Your Enthusiasm” version of Dracula where one of them pulls a Larry and says “You know, I’m OK, you go on to the bloodletting without me.”  C.) Not only are they so eager to help each other out but they’re still willing to help Lucy too.  Again, it’s nice that they are so true to their devotion to her, but it would be funny if one of them said “I’ve moved on and my new fiancee really doesn’t want me donating my blood to the lover who spurned me.”  Even Van Helsing finds this weird: he jokes to John that if Arthur felt that he was married to Lucy via his blood donation, that meant she was also married then to John, Quincey and Van Helsing.  John didn’t find this so funny, however.  Killjoy.

Am I just way too cynical? Is Stoker describing a type of man that really was prevalent in 1897 or are these brave, strong sensitive men just chivalrous superheroes that he’s created for Dracula?

It’s just amusing to me how the guys’ heroism, honor and selflessness (dare I utter the term “bromance?”)  is the most unbelievable part of the book thus far.  I guess their near-blind obedience to Van Helsing is another matter but of course I envision Van Helsing as Hugh Jackman so who wouldn’t want to do what he says?

On Monday Kevin noted how submissive Jonathan Harker is as a protagonist, but I’d go so far as to say that he’s kind of dim. Of course I have the benefit of being the “Don’t go in there!!!” reader, but there are times where Jonathan’s British stiff-upper-lip-ness seems idiotic compared to common sense and gut reactions. For instance, if I told some Hungarians that I was heading up to a castle and they all began crossing themselves and weeping and making me wear a crucifix and so on, I’d be a little uneasier than Jonathan was, and not say “It was all very ridiculous.” And he’s always accidentally falling asleep or falling into trances at the most inopportune times–granted, some of these little naps might not be voluntary but you’d think a.) being a skeptic b.) being a stranger in a strange land he’d work harder either to keep his wits about him or would think it was odd that he was often just falling asleep here and there. Sometimes Joanathan’s just sort of a knob in general: after he sees that Dracula has no reflection and steals away his mirror, what’s his reaction? “It is very annoying, for I do not see how I am to shave.” Right, that’s your biggest problem right now. Then, Jonathan decides that he’s going to get some pleasure out of disobeying the Count by falling asleep where he shouldn’t–but this is after he’s had the mirror incident, knows that he’s trapped in the castle and saw the count climbing down the wall like a lizard. Really? Now’s the time when you get spunky? (Of course maybe he knew he was going to be in for “an agony of delightful anticipation,” with those vampiresses, which, Kevin is right, was totally hot).

In contrast is Mina. I haven’t read far enough to really take this observation to town but it is surprising to me how very modern she is especially for the period. I’m not educated enough to know off the top of my head exactly how a proper young lady of 1897 should comport herself but I admire that she seems to have some nerve and is an inquisitive type: she’s not just keeping a journal but hoping to emulate “lady journalists” (that’s on my business card). She’s learning that new-fangled typewriter and wants to understand how the weather works. Instead of being shy and withdrawn she asks the townies in Whitby about the local legends (although of course she probably wished she hadn’t–not, of course, because it turns out to be so sad and creepy but because those old men are so damn hard to understand: “fash masel,” “crammle aboon the grees,” “jouped,” “antherums,” “gawm,” “dowps”: WHAT?) Of course Mina hasn’t yet been put in the dire straits that Jonathan has so we can’t measure her backbone against his but I have a feeling that Mina secretly wears the breeches in this relationship.

What do you think? Or am I just giving Jonathan a hard time? Who would you have cast in the movie other than Keanu? Would you marry a guy who oversees a big lunatic asylum? Is anybody else having a hard time picturing Dracula with a mustache? And if, as Valente opines, Stoker’s appearance conforms to the Victorian “masturbator,”⁴ what do we think think the Count thinks about when he, well, you know?