Was Bram Stokers Dracula simply based upon addiction?

 

Was Bram Stokers Dracula simply based upon addiction?

Is that magnificent novel, Dracula, partly based upon Bram Stokers keen eye as he regarded people as he strode daily through London and helped him conjure up a magnificent and frightful character that has transcended time and space for generations?

Is Bram Stokers Dracula simply a well-known London socialite—a well-heeled drug pusher of the time?

A well-dressed, wealthy, and striking-looking character with a dominating personality?

A man—unknown to the many but to the few—who created legions of addicts prowling the streets.

Seeking money by any means to get more of the magic powder he gave them via an injection.

Did Bram Stoker infuse the symptoms and behaviour patterns of the heroin or opium addicts and their suppliers to create a mythology that survives to this day and beyond?

Was he not a typical drug dealer, but was he instead a socialite?

Did he know or mix with those who engaged in such activities, supplied by a well-heeled dealer, who he based his iconic mesmerising character on?

Dracula's character is a hypnotic figure that creates a faithful legion that eventually falls under his control; did Bram Stoker witness the demise of actors within the Lyceum Theatre and fall under the control of a Svengali-type character supplying them?

In today’s climate of regulations, it is hard to believe, but in early- and mid-Victorian Britain it was possible to walk into a chemist’s shop and buy, without prescription, laudanum, cocaine, and even arsenic. 

The recreational use of opiates was popular with pre-Victorian and Victorian artists and writers.

The Signs of a Heroin User for modern addicts, but can you imagine the signs in 1890!

Change in Behavior

Risk-taking 

Isolation 

Disorientation  

Anxiousness 

Changes in appearance

Heroin addicts who use needles will have needle marks on their bodies

Does the trademark puncture wound simply represent the needle marks of an easily bought set from the local chemist or the expensive tools of a wealthy dealer supplying a certain circle of writers or actors?

Does Dracula's thirst for more victims represent a certain character within Bram Stoker's horizons?

A person who strove to create an endless line of victims to line his pockets?

Are all the victims pale, always exhausted, and looking ill due to the addiction taking effect?

Did the Svengali character only appear at night searching for new victims?

Writers all base stories around people or landscapes they are privy to —have we, for all these years, simply watched a clever storyline interwoven with tales of Want created through drug addiction by a Svengali of the late 1890s?

The Want been reflected by the Svengali forever chasing down more victims, and the victims wanting to experience a newer magical essence that is permeating the social scene.

Seeking to become newer members of a secret club?

Like today in Hollywood?

Copyright John Duffy 

Image shared under fair usage policy