Mina Murray
Mina Murray is Jonathan Harker’s fiancée and is best friends with Lucy Westenra (Dracula’s first victim). Jonathan and Mina eventually marry after he escapes from Dracula’s castle. She works as a schoolteacher and later becomes a victim of the Count herself. Mina is the heroine in the story as she is regarded by the reader as being innocent and pure. She becomes a victim to the Count but right up until her death she does not want to become evil. She represents goodness.
Lucy Westenra
Lucy is a friend with Mina in the novel but falls into ill health and dies when she is bitten by Dracula. She is an attractive young woman who has been proposed to by three men. In the novel she becomes engaged to Arthur Holmwood who is the son of Lord Godalming. She becomes a vampire but is then killed by Van Helsing and the other three in the normal fashion by plunging a stake through her heart, cutting of her head and stuffing her mouth with garlic.
Dr. John Seward
This young doctor is the manager of an insane asylum that lies near to Dracula’s English estate. He used to be a pupil of Professor Van Helsing but in the novel he cannot diagnose what is wrong with Lucy Westenra until Van Helsing arrives. He is an intelligent, literate man whose diaries make up a lot of the novel. Seward is one of the men who proposed to Lucy Westenra but was refused.
Arthur Holmwood
This man was engaged to Lucy before she died and then ironically tries to kill her when she has become a vampire. He is good friends with Dr. Seward and Quincey Morris and the son of Lord Godalming who dies on the same day as Lucy, giving him that title.
Quincey Morris
He is an American originally from Texas who dies in the attempt to kill Dracula. His friends include Arthur Holmwood and Dr. Seward. In the past Quincey proposed to Lucy but was refused. This character’s presence is like the human race in that our technology cannot defeat the evil that surrounds us as vampires. He thinks a gun can destroy Dracula but it cannot. This gives the reader a sense of helplessness in that nothing can be done if vampires are real.
Renfield
This man lives in Dr. Seward’s insane asylum and is in his fifties. He is driven mad by Dracula who promised him eternal life as one of his disciples. Renfield catches and eats small living creatures in his cell such as spiders, flies and birds. He yearns to serve Dracula and calls him master but eventually the vampire kills him. His presence in the novel shows vampires from a different angle and makes people wonder whether being one would be so bad.
The Plot
At the start of the novel a young man by the name of Jonathan Harker travels from London to visit the castle of Count Dracula. Harker (an English layer) travels across into Eastern Europe in order to settle a deal with the Count about him buying an estate in England. The castle of Dracula is situated in Transylvania where there are many ancient folklores. On his journey he finally stops at Blistritz where there is much superstition and the local people are afraid of evil. The land and language is foreign and mysterious to Jonathan and a woman gives him a small crucifix to keep him safe. At this point Harker is unnerved by what he has seen and wonders why the locals are so afraid.
On the way to the castle along the Carpathian Mountains Harker is on a coach and gets another chance to admire the landscape but gets some strong hints of the doom that surrounds the castle. After some time the coach stops and another one comes along to collect Jonathan Harker on his way to the castle. At this point the weather is very poor and stormy as this dark coach hurries away with Harker. He has an encounter with wolves on the journey that also makes Harker scared.
The castle is huge but ruined and as Harker leaves the coach he makes his way to a large door where he goes in. Finally Count Dracula appears and welcomes him in making Harker feel at home. They both discuss the situation with the estate as Harker has some food but Dracula tells him that he has already eaten. As they talk Harker notices Dracula’s pointed ears, pale skin, and sharp teeth, which give Harker a sense of unease.
Harker soon realizes that Dracula is a supernatural and evil being and sees him crawl down the walls of the battlements like a lizard. Harker becomes a prisoner in the castle and comes across three female vampires by whom he is held as the Count travels to England by boat. Harker ends his diary by planning to climb down the castle battlements to escape.
Back in England, Harker’s fiancée, Mina Murray meets with her friend Lucy Westenra who has been proposed to by three men by the names Dr. John Seward, Arthur Holmwood and an American named Quincey Morris. Lucy then is engaged to Arthur Holmwood. A ship is then found which contains fifty boxes of soil from Count Dracula’s castle. This strange vessel was found with no crew but a dead captain. A large wolf like creature was then seen getting ashore but then disappeared.
Lucy begins to sleepwalk and one night Nina finds her in the cemetery with a dark creature bending over her close friend. As she sees this Nina notices that this creature has red eyes that are menacing. Later on Lucy becomes very ill but no one knows what is wrong with her. Dr. Seward tries to find out what is wrong but finds nothing except two small marks around the neck of the woman. He is unable to diagnose the cause.
Mina goes to join Jonathan Harker who has ended up in Buda-Pest suffering from brain fever. Dr. Seward contacts Professor Van Helsing about Lucy and he covers her chambers with garlic (a charm against vampires) that works for some time. Seward and Van Helsing wrongfully take down their guard and Dracula uses an escaped wolf to break into the Westenra house which gives Lucy’s mother a heart attack. The garlic gets scattered so enabling Dracula to feed. Lucy eventually dies at the same time as her fiancé’s father Lord Godalming. After Lucy’s death Van Helsing leads Arthur, Seward and Quincey to Lucy’s tomb where they kill her by plunging a stake into her heart and cutting off her head then stuffing it with garlic. Their next target is to eliminate Dracula who is more powerful.
Jonathan and Mina get married and then return to England where they join forces with the others in a plot to kill the Count. They aim to find the fifty boxes of earth that the Count uses for sanctuary in the daylight.
Mina goes to stay at the asylum where they say she will be safe. However, Renfield, who is in the asylum, lets the vampire in who then feeds on the young woman. As she slowly turns into a vampire Van Helsing’s group destroy most of the boxes with axes and try to cleanse them with holy water.
However, Dracula flees back to Transylvania to his castle. The others pursue the Count but he continuously outsmarts them. They finally catch up with Dracula just as he is reaching the castle and give chase along the mountain roads, battling against the gypsies. Van Helsing brings Mina along to the castle where they try to cleanse Castle Dracula with communion wafers and some holy water in the daylight when vampires’ powers are not so strong. Jonathan and Quincey, who is mortally wounded and later dies, stab two silver knives into Count Dracula just as the sun is setting. This destroys him forever.
How Dracula Was Written And What Influenced It
Dracula the book is written in epistolary form which means the story is recounted through diary entries, letters and from the occasional newspaper. This form gives the novel a larger sense of realism and creates a sense of suspense. The novel is structured so that it builds to the death of Lucy Westenra, at which point Dracula’s powers are at his peak. This is when all of the efforts of Van Helsing have been in vain. At that moment all of the main characters unite and their power grows until Dracula has to flee. The story begins in Transylvania but the main body of the book is concentrated in England. At the end Dracula flees back to his native land where he is appropriately killed.
This Gothic work has a strong Christian element in that the only weapons against a vampire are a crucifix, holy water and communion wafers. These are strongly Christian symbols which most people would have connected to in England at the time this book was first released in 1897. The book emphasizes the role of Christianity in the struggle to destroy the vampire’s evil.
This book has a gothic genre in that it shows the wickedness of the aristocracy and the innocence of female characters, these were classic themes of Gothic fiction. Mina is depicted as being good against the evil of Dracula and through her suffering she becomes a martyr in the battle with the undead. The action also takes place in typical Gothic locations such as: a mysterious Transylvanian castle, a strange and haunted seaside town and a ruined English estate.
I personally really enjoyed reading this novel and think that the way the book is put together in epistolary form works well as you can relate to the characters even more.
By Finbar Jarrett
