Trollheart

Yeah it's the quintessential English travelogue, isn't it: rife with xenophobia, racism and colonialism, but all of that makes it even more poignant when Harker is left trapped in Castle Dracula, pining for home and his lover. It also shows how people - including Stoker - of the day saw "foreign" lands such as Austria and Romania and anywhere ending in -ania: real "darkest Africa" kind of stuff.

It's a wonderful novel, there's no doubt, even if hardly original (as you can see from the other entries) and it just caught the balance, I think, between serious Gothic horror, romance and adventure stories, and a kind of English triumphalism that really struck a chord with the public.

The powers of Dracula are so enhanced here that I bet some people reading it for the first time were checking outside their windows at night if they heard a scratching sound, or waking up in a cold sweat. It seemed the Count could be anywhere, any time.

As it goes, this is merely the beginning of the article. I have a lot more to say about the man before we even get to discussing the novel in depth so, like they say, stay tuned!

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Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018