We knew that Nick Cage was playing Dracula in the upcoming movie RENFIELD, right?

I ask only because I can’t find that post anywhere. Anyway, Nick Cage is playing Dracula in the upcoming RENFIELD flick. Funny thing: at first I had that reversed: I thought he was playing Renfield in DRACULA. Which would be, like, more… on point for him, right? It’d be a lot less surprising, is all I’m saying.

This one I assume I’ll see in theaters. I like me some Universal monster movies.

Tweet of the Day, Dracula Comes To The BBC edition.

Via @GenevieveCogman.

Continue reading Tweet of the Day, Dracula Comes To The BBC edition.

Intriguing Swedish adaptation of Stoker’s Dracula novel makes its appearance.

So, background: there’s an Icelandic-language version of Bram Stoker’s Dracula (called Powers of Darkness) that’s pretty gonzo (English translation here). We didn’t know about it for a long time, because it was in Icelandic, which meant that anybody who came across it probably just assumed that it was a straight translation. But it’s not: there’s apparently a good bit more sex, action, and Satanic Masonic Conspiracies in the Icelandic text, which made it ideal fodder for Ken Hite’s The Dracula Dossier (you simply must acquire a copy, if you have not yet done so) RPG supplement. Continue reading Intriguing Swedish adaptation of Stoker’s Dracula novel makes its appearance.

Infamous Dracula ‘translation’ Powers of Darkness now translated *from* Icelandic.

The short version: when Bram Stoker’s Dracula got translated into Icelandic, back in 1901, the translator took it upon himself to add a lot of… stuff to it.  Secret societies, serial killings, Norse mythology, and the title became ‘Powers of Darkness.’ Those of you who picked up The Dracula Dossier will know that Ken Hite used all of this to good effect when he converted Dracula into an long-duration British intelligence operation, but even at the time Powers of Darkness was still an Icelandic text.  Well, now they’ve translated it into English.

And, hey, it’s on Kindle. Because this is what Kindle is for: getting obscure books more or less on electronic demand. I love the future.

Happy World Dracula Day!

Via Ken Hite. It’s the 120th anniversary of the first printing of Bram Stoker’s Dracula, which is one of those books that more or less shaped the development of its particular genre without ever actually quite meaning to. Obviously, the vampire legend existed before Stoker; for that matter, the vampire novel existed before Stoker.  But there was something peculiar about his book that made it linger in the cultural consensus.

Possibly it’s because Dracula is fairly easy to bring to film? (Ironic, that.) It — unlike most of the previous entries in the vampire fiction genre — has a reasonably comprehensive blot, and imagery that doesn’t require a heavy special effects budget.  I don’t know if that’s a good enough reason to explain why Dracula went to Hollywood, and then never looked back; but I’d certainly argue it over a beer.

The Real-Time Dracula.

Now this is a clever idea: Dracula Feed is posting every day of Bram Stoker’s Dracula on the day that it actually happened in the book.  Said author can get away with that because a), the book is written in an epistolary style (i.e., it was written out in the form of collected letters and statements*); and b), the book is public domain.

Should be fun. Also: I recommend, if you haven’t read them already, Kim Newman’s Anno Dracula and Fred Saberhagen’s The Dracula Tape, both of which work with the existing Stoker novel in new and interesting ways. I’d say ‘transgressive,’ but one would mock me, and the other would come back from the grave to beat me senseless.

Moe Lane

*Which was, if I’m remembering either my English Lit classes or Stephen King correctly, was considered slightly archaic when Stoker wrote the novel.