#Jonathan Coachman

[aj-the-cat]

Your honor I love him

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[littletroubledgrrrl]

[origami-trust]

Dracula, June 29th: "The Count stood up, and said, with a sweet courtesy which made me rub my eyes, it seemed so real:"

"...I was to be given to the wolves, and at my own instigation. There was a diabolical wickedness in the idea great enough for the Count..."

I really enjoy these lines in staking home what a despicable figure the Count is, one who really delights in the misery he causes. Even now, even still, he's trying (and succeeding!) to make Jonathan doubt what he's experiencing. And Jonathan senses the fatal danger he's about to be in - because it's of the variety that the Count would think is amusing.

[vickyvicarious]

"There was the old party what engaged me a-waitin' in the 'ouse at Purfleet. He 'elped me to lift the boxes and put them in the dray. Curse me, but he was the strongest chap I ever struck, an' him a old feller, with a white moustache, one that thin you would think he couldn't throw a shadder."

How this phrase thrilled through me!

Don't quite have the timeline straight in my head... When was this? During the several days Dracula was stopped from drinking Lucy, or before? After?

I ask because I wonder how rapidly he re-ages if he isn't drinking blood. At the zoo I believe we heard he had "a pointed beard, with a few white hairs runnin' through it."

[psqqa]

SUPER behind on dracula daily and only now catching up but GOD i was wondering why they kept saying this ship was russian but the log and everything was in english. translation by a russian consul clerk. gotcha.

[offonaherosjourney]

Why did no one tell me that Dracula was a fucking COMEDY.

The book opens up with Jonathan experiencing a paprika overload. Dracula pretends to be the coachman and drives Jonathan around in circles until he decides he's established enough of a dramatic atmosphere. By day three in the castle Jonathan has picked up that there are no servants and Dracula is secretly doing all the chores, including driving him there. The first time Jonathan tries to shave, the count barges into the room, yeets his mirror out the window, refuses to elaborate and leaves. Jonathan also notices that he is a prisoner in the castle but doesn't dare to bring it up, which... is a mood, but also hilarious. A week into his stay he sees his employer/kidnapper crawling facedown out a wall

[wiliecoyotegenius]

Stop constantly writing post-Dracula novels about how the Harkers cheat on each other and divorce and Seward turns into Jack the Ripper and everyone but Dracula was the Real Monster Actually and start writing ones where Jonathan reunites with the crucifix lady and the coachman and they dine together with Mina and their little boy.

[the-swift-tricker]

i think it's interesting how many adaptations of dracula have the coachman all but abandon jonathan in the middle of nowhere and leave him to the count without a second thought whereas in the novel he and the other passengers riding with jonathan do almost everything they can to protect him, convince him not to go, and even attempt to leave before dracula arrives at the borgo pass. i mean, dracula specifically calls out the coachman's defiance when he picks jonathan up.

[thegoatsongs]

I'm sure others have pointed it out already, but in the May 5th entry, the "The dead travel fast" quote is from the German ballad Lenore. In which the lovesick heroine, Lenore, rides with -unbeknownst to her- Death.

He is in disguise and tricks her into riding with him to her grave (instead of her marriage bed as promised).

A lot like Dracula disguising himself as a coachman to lead Jonathan to his doom. Dracula himself grins widely upon hearing the quote.

And Lenore's fiance is called Wilhelm. Jonathan's is called Wilhelmina aka Mina.

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[draculasweedsmokinggirlfriend]

Dracula changing from his Coachman Cosplay ready to greet Jonathan at the door:

[lasarusbird]

Dracula plays a very smart game by calling the coachman (someone he totally didn't imitate) foolish and undermining all the peasants who he KNOWS had tried to save Jonathan and warned him as subtly as they could.

He's trying to reassure Jonathan the the people are all fools and that he should trust him, his generous host, only.

[gilgamushroom]

Oh I can already tell I'm going to be so normal about Ben Galpin's Jonathan Harker. The way he intones Jonathan trying to rationalize everything and not give in to fear is just heartbreaking.

It's day one, this man has only now REACHED the castle, and he's already questioning his own perception of reality. Were the coachman's eyes red? No, that's ridiculous, must have been a trick of the light. We seem to be driving in circles... no, but that can't be, why would we be? Oh, oh we are. Well there must be a reason. The coachman and Count Dracula are eerily similar... but don't be stupid, that makes no sense. And he's right! It doesn't! The sheer amount of times he goes “oh, silly me, it must be my own fault that I'm seeing and thinking all these things” and you can tell he's trying so hard to make himself believe it just breaks me.

I'm very happy we seem to be embracing more the “Jonathan Harker is not really naive he's just very anxious and needs this job” approach but also? Jonathan Harker refuses to acknowledge the warning signs because the only two possible explanations are “it's my own fault I'm seeing things” or “I am alone in an isolated area of a foreign country with a man who is not only stronger than me but supernaturally so, is not human and means me harm, and to try to escape him would mean certain death” and the second one is not only far less likely but uh. Leaves him with no choice but to break down in fear. His “naiveté” is not him ignoring his survival instinct, it IS his survival instinct.

(And Dracula KNOWS this, and he KNOWS his facade is easy to see through. But what is Jonathan going to do? So so early in the novel, and Dracula is already playing with his food)