SOURCE: Shuster, Seymour. “Dracula and Surgically Induced Trauma in Children.” The British Journal of Medical Psychology 46 (September 1973): 259-70.

In the following essay, Shuster claims that Dracula is a result of Stoker's long-repressed anxiety stemming from the author's childhood experience with doctors.

The first portion of this paper is intended to show that a connection probably exists between the horror story Dracula and surgically induced trauma experienced by its author as a child. In the second portion of this paper I will try to draw some practical inferences from the work I have done.

In a personal communication with Anna Freud, the author expressed his belief that a connexion existed between the creation of monsters like the Frankenstein monster, Dracula, and Dr Jekyll's evil counterpart, Mr Hyde, and surgically induced trauma. In her reply, Miss Freud expressed fairly strong agreement with the author and added:

I think that, probably...