The Mammoth Book of Dracula (2 page)

Although he had written the occasional short story, it was during this period that Stoker really began to concentrate on his fiction. Possibly inspired by J. Sheridan Le Fanu’s vampire novella, ‘Carmilla’ (1871), he began working on a novel manuscript entitled
The Un-Dead.
It was finally published in an edition of 3,000 copies as
Dracula
in June 1897, the year of Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee. The book received mixed reviews (“appalling in its gloomy fascination”) and although it sold steadily, Stoker never earned much money from it. Unfortunately, Stoker’s subsequent novels—
The Mystery of the Sea, The Jewel of the Seven Stars, The Lady of the Shroud and The Lair of the White Worm—
failed to achieve even comparable success.

The author loosely based his character on the mid-fifteenth century Wallachian prince, Vlad Tepes IV, known as Vlad the Impaler because of his predilection for impaling live victims on sharpened wooden stakes while he dined. For the Count’s physical form, Stoker took his hero and employer Henry Irving as his inspiration.

Following Irving’s death in 1905, Stoker suffered a stroke which left him weakened and partially sighted for the rest of his life. Also suffering from a degenerative kidney disease, possibly complicated by tertiary syphilis, Bram Stoker died on April 20th, 1912, the same week that the Titanic hit an iceberg and sank in the Atlantic.

The following year, Florence Stoker offered her husband’s working notes for
Dracula
at auction. They were sold for little more than two pounds. In 1914 she published
Dracula’s Guest,
a collection of her husband’s short stories, including the self-contained chapter of the title, which was originally omitted from Stoker’s novel because of length.

Since its author’s death,
Dracula
has gone on to influence countless imitators and formed the basis of a worldwide entertainment industry created around the character.

Dracula has been immortalized in plays, movies and on television by Max Schreck, Raymond Huntley, Bela Lugosi, John Carradine, Christopher Lee, Jack Palance, Louis Jourdan, Frank Langella, Gary Oldman and numerous other, less memorable, actors. In fiction he has met everyone from Sherlock Holmes to Batman. He has appeared in cartoons and comic books, and his image has been used to sell everything from jigsaw puzzles to breakfast cereals. Like Mickey Mouse, James Dean and Marilyn Monroe, Dracula has become a twenty-first century icon. He is also very big business.

In his excellent 1990 study
Hollywood Gothic,
author David Skal has pointed out that the “appeal of Dracula is decidedly ambiguous. Most monsters take and trample. Dracula alone seduces, courting before he kills. Unlike other monsters, he is not always recognizable as such. Dracula looks too much like one of us.” In the literature of the vampire, the monster could be someone we know or, even worse,
ourselves.

As with my other
Mammoth
volumes, I have collected together several reprints which are particular favourites of mine, plus original stories by established writers and a few newer names. I believe that only in this way can the horror genre, particularly the anthology, hope to survive and grow.

I trust you will enjoy this volume as it asks how the King of the Vampires would adapt to the social and technological changes that continue to shape the second decade of the twenty-first century. Is it possible that the Count’s undead condition could be cured by modern medicine? How would the mythology perpetuated by literature and movies have affected the existence of a real bloodsucker? And what if Dracula found himself ruler of a world controlled by vampires? Or perhaps poverty, crime, political instability and ecological disaster will result in the Count’s
final
destruction ... ?

Of course you can dip in and out of the book if you prefer—as the reader that is your prerogative. However, I have designed this volume to be read from the beginning through to the end, thereby creating a loose historical chronicle of Count Dracula, stretching from the Victorian era through to the last millennium and beyond. As an added bonus, I have also included the long-lost Prologue to a theatrical version of
Dracula
by the Count’s original creator, Bram Stoker, presented here for the very first time since its only performance in 1897.

So, I bid you welcome to this special celebration of the World’s Greatest Vampire. Enter freely and of your own will. Come freely, go safely, and leave some of the happiness you bring! But most of all, have fun ...

Stephen Jones

London, England

<>

~ * ~

BRAM STOKER

Dracula: or The Un-Dead: Prologue

AT 10.15 A.M. on Tuesday May 18th, 1897, a few weeks prior to the first publication of Bram Stoker’s
Dracula,
the author himself produced a single performance of his novel at the Royal Lyceum Theatre in London’s West End.

As Sir Henry Irving’s acting manager, he was in an ideal position to produce what amounted to little more than a marathon read-through of the book, which was done solely for the purpose of copyright protection and to file the play with the Lord Chamberlain’s office.

The script was compiled in obvious haste, partially in Stoker’s handwriting and partly by pasting in portions of a proof copy of the book. It consisted of more than one hundred pages containing five acts and no less than forty-seven scenes and took more than four hours to “perform”.

According to Stoker’s biographer and great-nephew, Daniel Farson, when asked what he thought of the reading, Irving, who had listened to a few minutes, loudly responded,
“Dreadful!”

The play is uneven: care has been taken with some scenes, while others waste large amounts of time on Van Helsing’s pontifications. The final scene describing Dracula’s pursuit back to his castle and subsequent death takes up only half a page!

Sardou’s
Madame Sans-Genet,
starring Henry Irving as Napoleon and Ellen Terry in the title role, was currently playing during the week and in Saturday matinees at the Lyceum.
The King and Miller
and
The Bells
were performed on Saturday evenings. Props and scenery from any of these plays could have been used to support the action in
Dracula.

Stoker used mainly supporting and touring members of the company for his cast. Overtime payments would have been unthinkable, with cast and crew obliged to comply with Stoker’s wishes. The first actor to portray Count Dracula was, in the manner of the day, listed simply as "Mr. Jones". The most likely candidate was probably T. Arthur Jones, who could be seen in the role of "Jardin" in
Madame Sans-Genet
and who appeared in the payroll accounts under that name and earned the sum of £2.10s per week (compared to Irving's £70.00). Among the other leading roles, Herbert Passmore played Jonathan Harker and Thomas Reynolds portrayed Professor Van Helsing. Mary Foster took the role of Lucy Westenra and Ellen Terry's daughter Edith (Ailsa) Craig played Mina Harker.

It is unlikely that
Dracula: or The Un-Dead
played to anywhere near a full house, with probably only the general staff, friends of the cast and a few curious onlookers in the audience. The additional cost of mounting the performance ran to £1.7s.8d, with total returns of £2.2s. This compares to the theatre's total running costs of the week of £1,896.13s.3d and returns of £2,128.13s.7d!

Following this single performance, no one undertook the task of bringing Dracula to the stage again until 1924, when Hamilton Deane, with the permission of Stoker's widow Florence, produced what was to become the basis of most future interpretations.

Presented here for the first time, with a few minor corrections, is the Prologue to Stoker's version of the play.

In his creator's own words, this is how the horror of Dracula begins ...

~ * ~

Scene 1

OUTSIDE CASTLE DRACULA.

ENTER JONATHAN HARKER FOLLOWED BY DRIVER OF CALECHE CARRYING HIS HAND PORTEMANTEAU AND BAG. LATTER LEAVES LUGGAGE CLOSE TO DOOR AND EXITS HURRIEDLY.

HARKER: Hi! Hi! Where are you off to! Gone already!
(Knocks at door)
Well this

is a pretty nice state of things! After a drive through solid darkness with an unknown man whose face I have not seen and who has in his hand the strength of twenty men and who can drive back a pack of wolves by holding up his hand; who visits mysterious blue flames and who wouldn't speak a word that he could help, to be left here in the dark before a—a ruin. Upon my life I'm beginning my professional experience in a romantic way! Only passed my Exam at Lincoln’s Inn before I left London, and here I am conducting my business—or rather my employer Mr. Hawkins’s business with an accompaniment of wolves and mystery.
(Knocks)
If this Count Dracula were a little more attentive to a guest when he does arrive he needn’t have been so effusive in his letters to Mr. Hawkins regarding my having the best of everything on the journey.
(Knocks)
I wondered why the people in the hotel at Bistritz were so frightened and why the old lady hung the Crucifix round my neck and why the people on the coach made signs against the evil eye! By Jove, if any of them had this kind of experience, no wonder at anything they did—or thought.
(Knocks)
This is becoming more than a joke. If it were my own affair I should go straight back to Exeter; but as I act for another and have the papers of the Count’s purchase of the London estate I suppose I must go on and do my duty—thank God there is a light, someone is coming.

SOUNDS OF BOLTS BEING DRAWN, AND A KEY TURNED. DOOR OPENS. WITHIN IS SEEN COUNT DRACULA HOLDING AN ANTIQUE SILVER LAMP.

COUNT DRACULA: Welcome to my house! Enter freely and of your own will!

STANDS IMMOVABLE TILL HARKER ENTERS, WHEN ADVANCES AND SHAKES HANDS.

DRACULA: Welcome to my house! Come freely! Go safely! and leave something

of the happiness you bring!

HARKER: Count Dracula?

DRACULA: I am Dracula, and you are I take it, Mr. Jonathan Harker, agent of

Mr. Peter Hawkins? I bid you welcome Mr. Harker to my house. Come in, the night air is chill and you must need to eat and rest.

PLACES LAMP ON BRACKET AND STEPPING OUT CARRIES IN LUGGAGE.

HARKER:
(Trying to take luggage)
Nay sir, I protest—

DRACULA: Nay sir, the protest is mine. You are my guest. It is late, and my

people are not available. Let me see to your comfort myself.

DOOR CLOSED AND BOLTED ETC.

~ * ~

Scene 2

THE COUNT’S ROOM.

LARGE ROOM—OLD FURNITURE—ONE TABLE WITH BOOKS ETC., ANOTHER WITH SUPPER LAID OUT. GREAT FIRE OF LOGS IN HUGE FIREPLACE.

ENTER DRACULA.

DRACULA:
(Calling through open door at side)
When you have refreshed

yourself after your journey by making your toilet—you will, I trust, find all ready—come and you will find your supper here.

DRACULA LEANS AGAINST MANTLE. ENTER HARKER.

DRACULA:
(Pointing to table)
I pray you be seated and sup how you will.

Excuse me that I do not join you, but I have dined already, need I do not sup.

HARKER HANDS LETTER TO COUNT WHO OPENS IT AND READS AS HARKER SITS AT TABLE AND EATS. ,

DRACULA: Ah! from my friend Mr. Peter Hawkins. This will, I am sure, please

you to hear:

(Reads)
“I much regret that an attack of gout from which malady I am a constant sufferer, forbids absolutely any travelling on my part for some time to come, but I am happy to say I can send a sufficient substitute, one in whom I have every possible confidence. He is a young man, full of energy and talent in his own way, and of a very faithful disposition. He is discreet and silent, and has grown to manhood in my service. He shall be ready to attend on you when you will during his stay, and shall take your instructions in all matters.”