SOURCE: Fry, Carrol L. “Fictional Conventions and Sexuality in Dracula.” The Victorian Newsletter, no. 42 (fall 1972): 20-2.

In the following essay, Fry maintains that the latent sexuality of Dracula is an important part of the novel's popular appeal.

To the general reading public, Bram Stoker's Dracula is one of the best known English novels of the nineteenth century. It was an immediate best seller when it appeared in 1897, and the frequent motion pictures featuring the machinations of Count Dracula since the 1931 film version of the novel have helped make vampire folklore very much a part of the English and American popular imagination. The work's fame is in part attributable to its success as a thriller. The first section, “Jonathan Harker's Journal,” is surely one of the most suspenseful and titilating pieces of terror fiction ever written. But perhaps more important in creating the popular appeal of the novel is...