Chapter 2 of Bram Stoker's Dracula delves into Jonathan Harker's deepening unease and growing suspicions during his stay at Castle Dracula, as mysterious events and unsettling observations about Count Dracula himself begin to surface. The chapter highlights the stark contrast between Dracula's outward courtesy and the underlying predatory nature, foreshadowing the true horror to come.
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Hello and welcome to chapter two of
project Dracul Analysis analysis of
chapter 2 of Bram Stoker's Dracula.
And again, I've just gone through and
picked out some key
quotations and little things I want to
discuss in said chapter. So, without
further ado, have a look. So, this
continues Jonathan Harker's stay at
Castle Dracula, and we're going to find
out more mysterious
things are happening, and we're
obviously introduced to Count Dracula himself.
himself.
So, we start off with
5th of May entry. And again, picking out
things here. This is uh I thought this
was an interesting for description of
Castle Dracula itself and going for that
Gothic medieval look as well and it's
nighttime. Several dark ways led from it
under great round arches perhaps seemed
bigger than it really is. I have not yet
been able to see it by daylight. So it's
a good one for themes of appearance
versus reality and crossing those kind
of boundaries. And of course, Jonathan
Harker has crossed the boundary into
Castle Dracula itself.
And we talked about the driver last time
as well. And notice his pre prodigious
strength and the implication even though
Jonathan Hoger hasn't made the
connection yet, but later on we will
realize he realizes as well as the
reader uh that Stoker intends this to be.
be.
It's Dracula doing his micromanagement
thing again.
We have a nice simile here like a steel
vice that could have crushed mine if he
had chosen. And that actually
foreshadows the power which Dracula has
over Jonathan Jonathan Harker
in Castle Dracula.
And there's also connotations of pain
there as well.
I said close to a great door old and
studded with large iron nails. So that's
definitely got a medieval feel. Whether
that's deliberately evoking the u the
famous or infamous iron maiden torture
device which actually was a Victorian
invention and wasn't really used in
medieval times anyway. But it certainly
has that feel. It doesn't really have
well this is iron nails. This they're
not sticking out. But I think the
connotations of that make you think of
definitely at the very least medieval
and maybe by very subconscious
association you're thinking of yeah
something like the iron maiden itself
but it's not like it's got spikes on a
door the nails are nailed into the wood but
but
then uh said a projecting doorway of
and so again it's medieval it's old the
carving be much worn by time and
weather. Even though I didn't highlight
that, sorry. So, a sense of age and
time. Series of rhetorical questions
here. Stoker gives Harker. What sort of
place had I come to and among what kind
of people? What sort of grim adventure
was it on which I had embarked? Was this
a customary incident in the life of
Clark sent out to explain the purchase
of a London estate to a foreigner?
So, series of rhetorical questions
there. Stoke is using that to
demonstrate or illustrate, I should say,
Jonathan Harker's confusion and sense of
alienation and and isolation as well and confusion.
confusion.
And I've just highlighted that one. I'm
now a full-blown solicitor as well. So,
there's a little bit of a social status
thing going on there and the idea of his
own kind of social class and his own um
stat improving there because he's been
proed. Obviously, that's good for Mina
as well. His relationship with her.
I've highlighted this because the sound
of rattling chains and the clanking of
massive bolts drawn back. There's
definitely like a ghostly connotations
there, isn't it? If if anyone's familiar
with A Christmas Carol, you'll know what
I mean with that one. And again, it's
ominous. The key was turned with loud
grating noise of long disuse and the
great door swung back. So, we've got a
clanking on a matapier there as well.
The description of Dracula is
interesting and not necessarily exactly
how he appears in lots of film versions.
Uh, so should a tall old man clean
shaven say for a long white mustache and
clad in black from head to foot without
a single speck of color about him
anywhere. He held in his hand an antique
silver lamp. Interesting premodifier
there. antique suggesting again age
which the flame burned without chimney
or globe of any kind throwing long
quivering shadows as it flickered in the
draft of the open door. So actually even
the lamp is a little bit mysterious as well.
well.
Welcome to my house and to freely and of
your own will. In the folklore, vampires
have a strange thing about courtesy and
invitations and manners and politeness.
And Dracula is definitely polite and at
least appearing friendly as well. So
again, there's appearance versus reality.
reality.
A little simile under there as well.
Welcome to my house. Come freely. Go
safely. That's ironic as well, isn't it?
and leave something of the happiness you bring.
bring.
So that something that you may be
leaving is going to be blood.
The strength of the handshake was so
much akin to what I noticed in the driver.
driver.
There's one of those warning signs that
Jonathan Harker should have really have noticed
noticed
whose face I had not seen that for a
moment I doubted if it were not the same
person to whom I was speaking. So to
make sure I said interrogatively, "Count
Dracula," he bowed in a courtly way as
he replied, "I am Dracula. I bid you
welcome, Mr. Harker, to my house. Come
in. The night air is chill, and you must
need to eat and rest." So I was getting
carried away with doing the voice then
as well.
And again, there's a sense of there's
something mysterious going on because in
terms of the very rigid ideas about how
class worked, he had carried it in
before I could forto him. So he's
carrying in Jonathan Harker's luggage
and to Harker as again Stoker is writing
this. Make sure you always when you're
analyzing and discussing you're
mentioning the writer's names and
you know it's it's very unusual that
this would happen. It's what we've seen again
again
the connection between the driver. It's
Dracula actually doing the driving.
Dracula's carrying in the luggage. So
there's something peculiar going on here
instantly for the reader. Na you're my
guess. This is late. My people are not
available. Let me see to your comfort
myself. It's very unusual for Aris to be
waiting or serving
visitors. Excuse me. [clears throat]
Okay. So, continuing on. The light and
warmth and the count's courteous welcome
seem to have dissipated all my doubts
and fears. Well, there's more irony.
You will, I trust. Excuse me that I do
not join you, but I have dined already
and I do not s.
This is the first of several references
to eating and drinking. And Harker
doesn't ever see
Dracula, Count Dracula, ever actually
eat. And again, it's another warning
sign. It's something that's curious and
suspicious about him and strange.
And a letter there from his boss, Mr.
Hawkins. I mean Jonathan Harker gets
that. This description of Dracula is
very interesting as well and again not
necessarily very faithfully reproduced
in a lot of the film versions and very
marked physioamy. There was a
fascination in Victorian times. So this
is a bit of context about the idea of
facial features
and also they al this frenology was the
bumps on the head as well. But the idea
of facial features suggesting something
about a person's personality and
character and everything and there's no
there's no science in it. It's a pseudo
science, but it was very popular and
very widely believed in the 19th century.
century.
So this detailed description actually
fits in with that really. His face was
strong, a very strong aqualine. So you
got a parenthesis in there.
And aqualine means eagleike. It's a
great premodifier. There is a great
adjective with high bridge of the thin
nose and peculiarly arched nostrils.
Lofty domed forehead and hair growing
scantily around the temples but
profusely everywhere. His eyebrows were
very massive, almost meeting over the
nose, with bushy hair that seemed to
curl in its own profusion. The mouth, so
far as I could see it under the heavy
mustache, was fixed and rather cruel
looking with peculiarly sharp white
teeth. These protruded over the lips
whose remarkable ruddiness showed
astonishing vitality in a man of his
ears. So again, the description of him
seems a bit unusual as well.
And then there's also a sense of the
predator there as well with the sharp
point teeth
and also these intriguing aspects about
him and these hints that there's
something unusual about him. Astonishing
vitality in a man of his years.
Also you see about his hands and
they seemed rather white and fine. But
seeing them now close to me I could not
but notice that they were rather coarse.
broad with squat fingers.
And again, unusually, there were hairs
in the center of the palm.
Now, that's linked to
another widely held Victorian belief
which is possibly a bit too strong for
YouTube, but if I put it delicately,
it was
an association
with, let's say, a man who might frequently
frequently
entertain himself. And I'm not going to
say anything else beyond that.
And it's not necessarily that he's doing
that, but there are lots of
sexual references in the novel or sexual illusions.
