#master harker

[theresas-sound-world-blog]

Band: Death

Song: Politicians in my eyes

Genre/s: Proto-Punk/ Punk Rock/ Garage Rock/ Funk

Recorded: 1975

🎧Listen to: ‘Politicians in my eyes’ by Death: https://youtu.be/rl3FstCc_OY?si=wEjIrRZB-sfzdEUp

[master-harker]

Trying out my new guitar ☀️

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[see-arcane]

If I understood correctly, Jonathan was planning on sending Mina to their home because she seems miserable being idle?

That and probably genuine anxiety about the fact that Dracula is active in the area, yeah.

Even though Mina is putting on her best This Is Fine :) act for him and the others just as he’s putting on his own, you can’t really bury what you Know about your beloved after being together for years. Even if Mina were putting on an Oscar-worthy performance, Jonathan was always going to see through it (and vice versa).

All that said, yes, he wants her home where she can be safe and active. Because he loves her and knows her…and likely because he knows the unique hell of being confined like a comforting and kept-ignorant/inert pet from the castle stay. Jonathan Harker has spent approximately two (2) days following Van Helsing and company’s lead on this and Cannot Stand It and knows Mina is cramping against it too.

RIP to the doctor-husband in “The Yellow Wallpaper,” but the Harkers are not about that stagnating bullshit. Tried it. Hated it. Mina already has the train times ready, she’s going home to vampire-proof the house, byyye—

(hey weird why are they both so sleepy all of a suddenzzzzzz)

[the-mummy]

The Acolyte (2024) x Longlegs (2024)

[were-writes]

So, Jonathan's letter that Dracula burnt today, that was the shorthand one, right? Like was Dracula mad because he does know shorthand and now he knows Johnathan is on to him, or was it 'an insult to friendship' because he thinks Jonathan has a secret made up best friend language with Mina like besties do when they're little kids, but not one with him and he's feeling left out?

[georgiacooked]

A quick painting I unfortunately don't have time to finish.

Bad ending Jonathan Harker, trapped in Dracula's castle, waiting for the Master to return home.

I have this notion that vampires retain a twisted aspect of their living loves and desires, but wrenched into the same position as their unending hunger. Jonathan will love Mina, regardless of who or what he is, and that love will remain to consume him when all else is gone.

[inkandrhythm]

Today's entry (Oct. 3) feels like the crux of the story to me. A few things come into sharp focus: the importance of Mina to their entire mission, the value of open and honest communication, but most importantly love.

It's love for Mina that drives Renfield to oppose his master.

It's love for Mina that spurs her friends into action to protect her.

It's love for Jonathan (and the others) that gives Mina the strength to tell her story and to do everything she can to protect them from herself (should it be necessary).

Mina chooses love and pity for Dracula, even after what he did to her, because now she understands him and that he has even less power than she does to change.

It's love that inspires John, Arthur, and Quincey to guard the Harkers while they sleep.

Some of our crew have known each other for years, but the Harkers only met them days ago. And here they are, ready to fight and die in their defense. They eat together, they cry together, all of them. This recently after John, Arthur, and Quincey avoided showing too much emotion in front of each other. Those walls are gone now because they've faced nightmares and stood against them together.

The whole point of the story is love, and that love can come from anyone at any point in your life, and can impact you deeply.

[elizabethswitch]

Jonathan smiled his way through two months immured in Castle Vampire, this shuck 'n jive is nothing for him, even if he is slipping a little. So maybe they are a little oblivious, even a little in denial, but also consider that Harker's innocuous urbane gentleman front is pretty tight.

Maybe too they should be worried over Somebody Else who has become uncharacteristically quiet... laconic even...

lol @ Seward casually writing in his diary thinking about euthanising Mina and also gormlessly writing about Jonathan with his Big Ass Knife that he ~casually~ has to hand when him and Van Helsing are around, and Not picking up on any potential danger there.

Jack, you're so oblivious that if he Did decide to surprise attack you all, you and Van Helsing would be bleeding to death before you realised it. And probably Arthur too. Quincy with that fast gun draw would be a harder sell, but not Impossible.

[kforkourtney]

I'm gonna pretend I posted this on Friday the 13th😅. Taking inspiration from Dracula, this scientist, which one could interpret as Mina Harker (née Murray), has become a master in Chemistry and Hematology. Her clothing echoes the dark suits that scientists and doctors wore in the 1800s. Whether she has gone insane in finding a cure to her vampirism, or is obsessed with blood's scientific properties, one only hopes that her husband hasn't become a victim in her insane experiments! Happy Inktober!!💕🦇

[theresas-sound-world-blog]

Happy 33rd Birthday ‘Loveless’ by My Bloody Valentine!

🩷Official music video of ‘Only Shallow’ by My Bloody Valentine: https://youtu.be/nwfCoKNI5hs?si=qAvH1FohI2kGwlkW

[master-harker]

My homemade Diddley Bow/ One string Blues Slide Guitar

[marypsue]

You know, for years I've been thinking "the whole half-vampire situation and 'kill the head vampire and free any half-vampires' thing in The Lost Boys is so unique, I've never seen that particular approach to vampire turning in any other vampire story, and it really fits the story well, I wonder how they came up with it" and.

It's Dracula. It's literally just what happens in Dracula. Michael Emerson and Mina Harker 'having to kill the master vampire whose blood (which you ingested) is slowly turning you into a creature of the night in order to become human again' handshake meme.

[vashhanamichi]

It’s a bit insane how much Harry is like Dracula’s Mina Harker — she too is marked on the forehead by the story’s villain, her violation feels sexual like Harry in the graveyard, and she shall go where her master, her maker, her butcher calls her — like Harry goes to Voldemort when Voldemort calls to him. Mina is also surrounded by men who want to protect her but ultimately cannot, because if she turns, if she becomes Dracula’s, she is lost — death is her only escape. Harry was Voldemort’s Horcrux from the start, he was always lost.

[theholmwoodfoundation]

How likely is it that in The Holmwood Foundation’s universe the multiple terrible adaptations of the original story are a concerted effort by leftover Dracula minions and cultists to smear the Crew of Light’s legacy?

The Harkers are the biggest insult to Dracula there might be. A man who not only escaped Dracula and his thralls but dealt one of the final blows? The woman who helped put all the pieces together and used what he did to her against him? If you were on the side of the vampires, why wouldn’t you reduce the latter to a swooning victim of her undead master’s charms and erase the former as much as you could?

We can’t say how accurate or not-accurate this notion is, but we like it. We like it very much. 👀👀👀👀

[vickyvicarious]

Who's Read What in Dracula? Masterpost

This is a little self-assigned project to try and keep track of who has read (as well as written) what documents, and, importantly, when they do so. Last year I spent some time thinking about this and it informed some of my thoughts about specific characters' perspectives and actions in interesting ways. So I thought it could be a neat resource to have for others!

I'm going to update this in time with the novel, so there won't be any spoilers. This post is going to be a master reference, with links to each individual character's posts. I originally wanted to do this as a series of graphs for each character, with color-coded bars for each document they've read, but I'm not savvy enough to figure out a non-confusing way to do so, especially given the number of different authors/documents. Instead, I'm going to have a separate post for each character, and just have the info in written form there. Here are the links to each of those, in order of introduction:

Jonathan Harker

Mina Murray

Lucy Westenra

Jack Seward

Quincey Morris

Arthur Holmwood

Abraham Van Helsing

Some housekeeping notes: Obviously, each character will have read their own writing. I'm not going to update day-by-day for any such things. Instead, I'll only update whenever they access new information by someone else, or begin what I'm counting as a new document.

Most of the time, we know for a fact when characters get access to a new document. However, there are a few exceptions. I have my theories, but I will mark them as speculative whenever that label applies.

I break up documents based on chunks of information and have assigned titles to them as such. The labels may change as time goes by as needed to avoid spoilers. I also try to add in dates, but for any longer accounts it will just be a range of dates rather than every entry.

Below the cut is a list of all the documents, in order of appearance, with dates. I'm using color-coding for all the main authors, which will match the colors used in individual character posts. This too will be updated over time, so no worries about spoilers here either. Unless, of course, you don't want to know if someone who has only written once before will go on to write often... in that case, don't look below.

Castle Dracula Diary (3 May-30 June) - Jonathan Harker

Invitation to Castle Dracula (3 May) - Count Dracula

Letter to Innkeeper (4 May) - Count Dracula *

Letter to Dracula (5 May) - Mr. Hawkins *

Letters to Lucy (9 May, 17 May?*) - Mina Murray

Letter to Mina (2/3 May?) - Jonathan Harker *

Letters to Mina (11 May?, 24 May) - Lucy Westenra

Dictated Letters Home (11 May, 18 May) - Jonathan Harker *

Letters to Various Solicitors (11 May) - Count Dracula *

Phonograph Diary (25 May-?) - Jack Seward

Letter to Art (25 May) - Quincey Morris

Telegram Reply to Quincey (26 May) - Arthur Holmwood

Intercepted Letters Home (28 May) - Jonathan Harker *

Renfield's Notebook (5 June?-?) - R. M. Renfield *

Log of the Demeter (18 July-4 August) - Captain of the Demeter

Whitby Journal (24 July-19 August) - Mina Murray

Message to Lucy (27 July) - Arthur Holmwood *

Demeter Articles (8-9 August) - Daily Graph Correspondent

Letter from Budapest (12 August) - Sister Agatha

Letter to Carter, Paterson, & Co. (17 August) - Billington & Son

Letter to Mina (17/18 August?) - Mr. Hawkins *

Letter to Billington & Son (21 August) - Carter, Patterson, & Co.

Post-Whitby Letter to Lucy (24 August) - Mina Murray

London Diary (24 August-17 September) - Lucy Westenra

Whitby Letter (30 August) - Lucy Westenra

Letter to Jack (31 August) - Arthur Holmwood

Telegram to Jack (1 September) - Arthur Holmwood

Letter to Van Helsing (1 September?) - Jack Seward *

Letters to Arthur (2, 3, 6, 15?* September) - Jack Seward

Letter to Dr. Seward (2 September) - Van Helsing

Telegrams to Van Helsing (4-8 September) - Jack Seward

Telegram to Arthur (8 September) - Jack Seward

Telegram to John (8 September) - Van Helsing *

Telegram(s?) to Vanderpool (10, 13? September) - Van Helsing *

Delayed Telegram to Seward (17 September) - Van Helsing

Lucy's Memorandum (17 September) - Lucy Westenra

Unread Letters to Lucy (17, 18 September) - Mina Murray

Escaped Wolf Article (18 September) - Pall Mall Gazette

Telegram to Quincey (18 September) - Arthur Holmwood

Mrs. Westenra's Death Certificate (18 September) - Jack Seward/Van Helsing *

Telegram to Arthur (18 September) - Quincey Morris *

Telegram to Summon Arthur (19 September) - Jack Seward *

Hennessey's Report (20 September) - Patrick Hennessey

Letter to Mrs. Westenra's Lawyer (21 September) - Jack Seward *

Post-Whitby Journal (22 September-?) - Mina Murray

Telegram to Mrs. Harker (22 September) - Van Helsing

Letters to Mrs. Harker (24-25 September) - Van Helsing

Bloofer Lady Articles (25 September) - Westminster Gazette

Telegrams to Van Helsing (25, 29 September) - Mina Murray

Telegram to Mina (25 September) - Jonathan Harker *

Letter to Van Helsing (25 September) - Mina Murray

Post-Castle Diary (26 September-?) - Jonathan Harker

Carfax Letters (pre-3 May?) - Jonathan Harker *

Letter from Ring (24/25 September?) - Arthur Holmwood *

Note to Jack (24/25 September?) - Quincey Morris *

Undelivered Note to John (26 September) - Van Helsing

Note to Arthur and Quincey (27 September) - Van Helsing *

Message to Billington & Sons (27/28 September) - Jonathan Harker *

Reply from Billington (27/28 September) - Mr. Billington *

Telegram to Jonathan (29 September) - Mina Murray *

Carter Paterson Documents - Carter, Paterson, & Co *

* We know these documents exist, but never get to read them (or in one case, only get a brief excerpt) as they aren't added to the record. Sometimes some of the main characters do get to read them, but not always.

Question marks after a date denote uncertainty, though they're all likely written within a few days of the tentative one listed. When after a dash (-?) they mark an as-yet incomplete document.

Some documents contain others within them. When this becomes relevant for characters reading them, I will list the main document read, then all others included in it with brackets, like this:

Main document [included document one, two]

[0hcicero]

Some Dracula Daily first entry thoughts:

Stoker really is a master of the slow reveal and of worldbuilding for a *purpose*. The details of the aprons and the folk costumes, the food and the history all *seems* scattered and meandering in that touristy way, but it serves to do a few things:

- separates Jonathan and the reader from the people, and paints them as - in his own words ‘barbarian’ and other. Not necessarily because they are, but because this is an effective means of create *distrust* from the reader to the people of Transylvania - we see what Jonathan sees, just some folksy people clinging to bygone traditions, a superstitious lot - quaint, but not *exactly* with it, like your great uncle who goes on about ancient aliens.

- layers discomfort like colour on an oil painting. Biarritz is old and has seen its fair share of calamity, and bears the scar of that - fire and war both. Interesting historical/worldbuilding fact, but the fact that it still shows that, but he doesn’t over-explain it? It’s so matter of fact! It just *is*. Then the note about famine and disease emptying it further, again, related as mere fact, no extraneous detail describing the empty streets or the charred beams and crumbling plaster, but layers it in there too. This place is quiet and forlorn and shows its wounds. This is not a place of safety. But for Jonathan Harker, it’s just that quaint, othered, old world. If it were just like this in England, would his danger-meter start spiking?

- shows just how off Jonathan’s sense of risk and danger is because he sees this place and these people as ‘other’ — he chooses to normalize the present worries of Bistritz as remnants of history, and distance himself from the people, who could provide him current, effective knowledge (they’ve been surviving through the danger, surely they know how to help him survive as well), because this is not civilized England, but some far nation so different from his own, tra-la-la, how quaint!

The dread this all builds so quietly from day 1!!! Impressive! Ugh STOKER I enjoy it more and differently every time I read it! Poor Jonathan.