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The
vampire whose unquenchable thirst for blood
Bram Stoker
chronicled in the 1897 classic, "Dracula," has
returned.
Again.
And once
again, history's ultimate revenant has oozed into our
world out of the dread pen of a Stoker. The count's
postmodern, postmortem return was engineered by Stoker's
great-grandnephew
Dacre Stoker
— coauthor, with Dracula expert and screenwriter
Ian Holt
, of "Dracula the Un-Dead," a terrific and
terrifically bloody sequel to Bram's book, set in
London
20 years after the first book closes.
Stoker,
51, sounds a bit shocked by the positive reception from
fans and critics. He's definitely chuffed.
"Dracula
the Un-Dead" was a publishing sensation months
before its release
Oct. 13
. Stoker and Holt reportedly were paid an advance of
more than
$1 million
. A movie version already has been green-lighted, and
Holt has been commissioned to write the screenplay.
Production is expected to begin in June.
Not bad,
considering this is Stoker's first attempt at writing.
"I
had no ambitions to write before," said Stoker, a
former high school physical education teacher who
coached
Canada's
Olympic pentathlon team. "I had a busy life
teaching and coaching. ... It didn't even enter the
radar screen until Ian tracked me down."
Stoker,
who spoke on the phone before boarding a plane for a
publicity gig in
Paris
recently, said he hadn't even read his ancestor's novel
until college. He said he was inspired to open the book
by Stoker scholars
Radu Florescu
and
Raymond McNally
, who explored the connection between
Bram Stoker's
literary creation and the 15th-century Romanian leader
Vlad III Dracula of Wallachia, who reportedly was one of
the inspirations for the monstrous fictional character.
Stoker
and Holt, who set the new novel in the year of
Bram Stoker's
death, 1912, spent months studying Bram's notes,
including extensive material he eventually cut out of
"Dracula."
Dracula's
historical antecedents fascinated the coauthors. So much
so that they have made "Dracula the Un-Dead" a
veritable cornucopia of historical figures — from
Prince Vlad
to the infamous 16th- and 17th-century sadist,
Elizabeth Bathory
, to
Bram Stoker
himself and his boss, the famed actor Sir
Henry Irving
.
"One
of his inspirations for Dracula may have been Irving,
who "had a reputation for sucking the life of his
employees," said Stoker. "And Bram watched him
play evil characters (including) Mephistopheles and
Richard III for 27 years."
In a move
that will upset
Bram Stoker
purists, Stoker and Holt even moved the action of the
first novel from 1893 to 1888 so they could include
another infamous historical figure — Jack the Ripper.
"It's
clear from his interviews that Bram was aware of the
Ripper murders, which were going on while he was living
in
London
." That most feared of all Victorian bloodletters,
who was never caught or identified, seemed perfect grist
for the authors' bloody mill.
Stoker
and Holt's tale finds the heroes of Bram's novel 25
years older — but none the wiser, or happier.
Bram's
wise, eccentric scientist-theologian, Dr.
Abraham van Helsing
, has one foot in the grave, but he hangs on, convinced
that Dracula will be back. His protege, Dr.
Jack Seward
, has become a morphine addict obsessed with the Ripper
murders.
Bram's
hero,
Jonathan Harker
, has developed a wicked drinking habit. His marriage to
Mina is empty, loveless, meaningless. For her part,
Mina, who hasn't aged a day since Dracula tasted her
blood, lives a life of regret and guilt.
The
authors suggest that Mina may already have been pregnant
when Dracula infected her blood. It means her now-grown
son, Quincey, has a blood-connection to the monster.
The new
novel treats Bram's Dracula as a flawed historical
account of a real incident — and one which unfairly
demonizes Dracula.
"To
us it made sense to merge Dracula with the real
Prince Vlad
," Stoker said. "
Ian (Holt)
believes Vlad is one of the most misunderstood
characters in history.
"Of
course, (our) Dracula isn't a good, upstanding citizen.
He is still an animal — but he has a bit of a
conscience, which makes him a more complex,
self-conflicted character."
The real
source of evil comes from Bathory, a Hungarian countess
who reportedly tortured and killed hundreds of girls so
she could bathe in their blood.
"We
thought Bathory would make for a far more formidable
character than anyone we could come up with in our
imagination," Stoker said.
Stoker
said he was not in the least concerned by the vampire
craze, which has flooded pop culture with toothless,
nice-guy vamps and bloodless, cutie-pie teens.
"I
think it's all good," he said. "What I hope is
that people will want to go back and check out the real
story."
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