sum1

Because it's Transylvania so they're vampires, of course!

PhoenixRising

Really, sum1?

Transylvania is in central Romania.

sum1

I know what country Transylvania is in.

wickedrum

central and West. The old principalities as they were:



See that town right in the West called Oradea? That's where I was born, about 5 miles from the Hungarian border.

PhoenixRising

Yes, I know you know, sum1.


Thanks for the map, Rita. I always kept getting confused as to where Wallachia is relative to Transylvania. Wow, the city of Brasov is really close to the border with Wallachia. Bran Castle, the so-called "Castle Dracula" is right outside Brasov.


I just realized... in order for Dracula to travel from Transylvania to England by boat, he'd have to have been transported by carriage across Wallachia to the Black Sea, and then travel by boat south towards Istanbul, through the canal connecting the Black Sea with the Mediterranean Sea, then westward across the Mediterranean Sea along the Greek, Italian, French, and Spanish coastlines until passing through the Straights of Gibraltar and out into the open Atlantic Ocean, and then north along the coast of Portugal until reaching the English Channel and landing(or crashing) on the coast of southern England. By the time it took to cover that distance, Johnathan Harker should've made it back to England by then.

sum1

Glad to hear you were born, Rita.

wickedrum

Brasov is a beautiful city. It's really not that far from Bulgaria if you're already there anyway. Next time?

Have to pity Dracula for the long journey

PhoenixRising

What, do you think she's a ghost, sum1?



I don't know when I'll get the chance, but that would be nice, Rita. Brasov is a ways from Bulgaria, though. You gotta go straight through Wallachia.

Yeah, I think Bram Stoker may have underestimated the amount of time the trip would take. But don't worry, he spent the time feasting on the crew.

It's shame, because that part of the book was fascinating but it's also the part that movies always gloss over. The Captain's log of the Demeter is actually a terrifying chapter of the book, kind of like Alien, with a ship's crew being stalked and terrorized by some unseen enemy that's killing them one by one.

wickedrum

Ghosts have a birthday too

I never read the whole of Stoker’s Dracula. It felt weird him writing about our folklore.

PhoenixRising

I guess they do.


Any less strange than a Frenchman writing about King Arthur? Or Charles Dickens writing about the French Revolution? Or Mary Shelley writing about a German scientist who creates a monster? Or Shakespeare writing about a prince of Denmark, a Scottish nobleman, a pair of star-crossed Italian lovers, or Julius Caesar? Nobody would write anything if everyone was expected to "stay in their lane." That's really narrow thinking.


I hope you can read the whole book. Like I said, the story of the Demeter alone could make an entire movie. You could probably make Dracula into a four part miniseries.

sum1

The theory goes that Anglo-Irish writers like Stoker writing horror stories were expressing their fear of the indigenous Irish through metaphor.

PhoenixRising

You think? I assumed it was fear of Slavic immigrants or something.

sum1

There were no Slavic immigrants in Ireland back then.

PhoenixRising

I was talking about England. Stoker set Dracula in England, not Ireland.

wickedrum