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thoughts on Dracula
Jan. 18th, 2009 03:51 am(because apparently I am not meant to sleep tonight)
I have always loved books.
My favourites, as a child, were unabridged copies of Peter Pan, Black Beauty, and Little Women. (I can't recall exactly when I received these books - it was somewhere between 1st and 3rd grade - and I'm sure this explains much about my psyche.) One of the best gifts I received from my father was a three-shelf bookcase, painted red and white and decorated with my italicized name; and the sum total of my books barely filled the shelves.
Mostly I read borrowed books - novels from the library, or from my mother's rather extensive collection. Due to my love of esoteric subjects, I spent a lot of time in the occult sections of libraries; and I caused more than a bit of upset after my family moved to a new school district and I asked the librarian there for books on the devil.
(I was, in fact, looking for "The Devil and Daniel Webster," but...that didn't endear me to her, either.)
Eventually, I would resort to hand-copying passages out of books into piles of notebooks, desperately wanting to keep the words with me and lacking the resources to buy the actual tomes. But our school district did participate in one of those free book programs, where students were allowed to select a book or two from a smattering of titles spread across a table.
And oh oh oh! There in the midst of all those books was a copy of Dracula.
Keeping in mind my love of horror, and my fascination with vampires since the tender age of 5 or so, this was of course the only book I wanted. Sadly, a boy got to it first. I'm relatively sure I begged him for it; I surely do know I didn't end up talking him out of possession; and I *absolutely* know I did not in fact beat him the way I should have when he later had the audacity to complain that it was a boring story written like a diary..how stupid!
Obviously, I did eventually get a copy of my very own. Several copies - the novel, Dracula: A Symphony in Moonlight & Nightmares
(which is such a beautiful illustrated interpretation of the novel and my poster of Muth's painting of Mina remains one of my most treasured pieces of art), The Essential Dracula: The Definitive Annotated Edition
, and so many other related books - now grace my shelves, which, um, number much more than three...and have, since I stopped living under the roof of a woman who forbade me to buy books.
Still. I've never quite forgotten that feeling of defeat. Silly thing, that.
I have always loved books.
My favourites, as a child, were unabridged copies of Peter Pan, Black Beauty, and Little Women. (I can't recall exactly when I received these books - it was somewhere between 1st and 3rd grade - and I'm sure this explains much about my psyche.) One of the best gifts I received from my father was a three-shelf bookcase, painted red and white and decorated with my italicized name; and the sum total of my books barely filled the shelves.
Mostly I read borrowed books - novels from the library, or from my mother's rather extensive collection. Due to my love of esoteric subjects, I spent a lot of time in the occult sections of libraries; and I caused more than a bit of upset after my family moved to a new school district and I asked the librarian there for books on the devil.
(I was, in fact, looking for "The Devil and Daniel Webster," but...that didn't endear me to her, either.)
Eventually, I would resort to hand-copying passages out of books into piles of notebooks, desperately wanting to keep the words with me and lacking the resources to buy the actual tomes. But our school district did participate in one of those free book programs, where students were allowed to select a book or two from a smattering of titles spread across a table.
And oh oh oh! There in the midst of all those books was a copy of Dracula.
Keeping in mind my love of horror, and my fascination with vampires since the tender age of 5 or so, this was of course the only book I wanted. Sadly, a boy got to it first. I'm relatively sure I begged him for it; I surely do know I didn't end up talking him out of possession; and I *absolutely* know I did not in fact beat him the way I should have when he later had the audacity to complain that it was a boring story written like a diary..how stupid!
Obviously, I did eventually get a copy of my very own. Several copies - the novel, Dracula: A Symphony in Moonlight & Nightmares
(which is such a beautiful illustrated interpretation of the novel and my poster of Muth's painting of Mina remains one of my most treasured pieces of art), The Essential Dracula: The Definitive Annotated Edition, and so many other related books - now grace my shelves, which, um, number much more than three...and have, since I stopped living under the roof of a woman who forbade me to buy books.Still. I've never quite forgotten that feeling of defeat. Silly thing, that.