Iâve been thinking, as I read along , about why Stoker made the vampire in Dracula Not English
To be clear, Iâm not really interested in why Stoker went with âDraculaâ specifically, but why he chose to make his vampire come from outside of England in the first place. What does it change about the story to have Harker locked up in Count Draculaâs castle, and not Count Strongmoreâs? What was the intention of it? âXenophobia and Orientalismâ are the obvious answers, and also correct, but much too general for what Iâm thinking about. Iâm thinking of specific  things this changes about How The Story Works, on a wrench-and-pulleys level. What would be different--in mood, in function, in tropes-- if Harker was locked up in the castle of Baron Strongmore instead of Count Dracula? Â
 ..and,worryingly, would Dracula have been the hit it was if it didnât trade on Scary Outsider tropes? Those earlier English vampires, after all, didnât have nearly the permanence with the English-language reading audience.Â
I genuinely donât have a set of answers to any of this; itâs just something Iâm always thinking about as the chapters go by.Â
