New Novels and Holiday Books

17 December 1899 · San Francisco Chronicle

Bram Stoker Estate account · Original source: English

Estate summary

An American notice praises Dracula’s originality, memorable confrontations and ability to make fantastic events persuasive. It places Stoker’s fiction alongside his established association with Henry Irving.

Read the historical review

Historical review as reproduced in Dracula: A Norton Critical Edition, edited by Nina Auerbach and David J. Skal, pp. 366–367. The original newspaper page has not yet been collated. Modern editorial introduction and footnotes are omitted; paragraphing and typography are adapted for reading.

One of the most powerful novels of the day, and one set apart by its originality of plot and treatment is “Dracula,” by Bram Stoker. The author is well known in the dramatic world for his long connection with Sir Henry Irving as manager. Several years ago he wrote a weird story of Irish life, but this is his first long romance. It is a somber study of a human vampire, the Count Dracula, who uses beautiful women as his agents and compasses the death of many innocent people. Theophile Gautier essayed the same subject, but his vampire, who was a priest by day and ravening wolf by night, was not half so terrible as this malignant Count with the three beautiful female devils who do his bidding. Nothing in fiction is more powerful than the scene at the killing of the vampire in Lucy’s tomb or that other fearful scene at the extinction of the malign power of the Count. The story is told in such a realistic way that one actually accepts its wildest flights of fancy as real facts. It is a superb tour de force which stamps itself on the memory.

Original newspaper scan not yet verified. The Chronicle’s historical archive is available through NewsBank; the original page remains to be inspected. The review’s description of this as Stoker’s first long romance is the reviewer’s claim, not the Estate’s bibliography.

Source reproduction

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Contextual illustration: Miss Betty (1898): title page with frontispiece portrait This illustrates the subject; it is not identified as an image printed with the original article.Courtesy of the Bram Stoker Estate.