When I was an undergraduate, there was one thing that I wish had been said in crystal clear fashion: use the bibliography at the back of the books you're reading. It's the most obvious thing to do, isn't it? Yet, when you're new to writing essays and studying in a specific (read, critical) manner, certain practices are far from obvious. I remember sitting in the library with some friends in my first year and we would all stare at one another, wondering how on earth we could find out just a little bit more about what we were studying, above and beyond the two books that the lecturer had mentioned.
So for Dracula, or any primary source you're working on, start from the back of the book in your hands. The two editions I mentioned last time are fantastic treasure troves of references which touch upon very many of the secondary resources you'll need. Today, however, I would like to flag up a few other texts that I found of particular interest in my early days, starting from Judith Halberstam's Skin Shows: Gothic Horror and the Technology of Monstrosity. From Frankenstein to The Silence of the Lambs via Oscar Wilde and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, this book has it all. Its greatest strength is an argument that is both elegant and lucid, as spelt out on the back cover, and yet far-reaching in its implications. For Dracula you need chapter 4, known as 'Technologies of Monstrosity: Bram Stoker's Dracula', which is one of the most famous vampire-related essays of all time. The author creates an argument that revolves upon Gothic anti-Semitism, Gothic sexuality and Gothic economies. It reads so effortlessly and is so engrossing (as is the entire book), that when I first read it, it almost completely stifled me. Then I got over it...
After Halberstam's book, you really ought to get Dracula: The Vampire and the Critics, edited by Margaret L. Carter. This is a classic volume which includes the seminal '"Kiss Me With Those Red Lips": Gender and Inversion in Bram Stoker's Dracula' by Christopher Craft. This is quite possibly the most high-profile essay to focus on sexuality. Equally important is Judith Weissman's 'Dracula as a Victorian Novel', also in the same volume.
Also for you to consider are Ken Gelder's Reading the Vampire, Nina Auerbach's Our Vampires, Ourselves, as well as James Frazer's The Fear of the Dead in Primitive Religion (although you'll be very hard-pressed to find a full copy that won't set you back by $$$$) and the classic volume by Ornella Volta The Vampire: Myth or Reality?
And finally, let me suggest the completely wonderful Rosenbach Museum and Library of Philadelphia, which houses Bram Stoker's autograph notes and outlines for Dracula. No question is too obscure or far-fetched for these librarians. I once turned up with a hearsay ('I believe Stoker had a dream the night before he started writing Dracula and I need to know what he wrote about it in his diary') and they were able to assist me. They are all the good things we imagine libraries to be about and I cannot recommend them enough.
I hereby conclude this small series on Bram Stoker's novel dear reader! Soon enough I will share some of my findings on Anne Rice's Vampire Chronicles, which constituted the core of my PhD research. Until then... go forth and don't plagiarise!
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