Reviews tagging 'Forced institutionalization'

Dracula by Bram Stoker

70 reviews

trulydevious's review against another edition

dark emotional slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Violence, Grief, Forced institutionalization, and Death

Moderate: Stalking, Racism, Murder, Mental illness, Death of parent, and Body horror

Minor: Alcohol

_ciaranmoss's review against another edition

adventurous dark hopeful slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

2.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death and Forced institutionalization

Moderate: Sexism, Death of parent, and Stalking

Minor: Sexual assault and Xenophobia

brnineworms's review against another edition

adventurous dark hopeful mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

If Dracula had ended after chapter four, I might have given it a full five stars. The first fifty-odd pages are undoubtedly the best part of the book. Jonathan Harker is trapped in Dracula’s castle, and slowly realising that he is trapped. The atmosphere is tense and eerie. Both Harker and Dracula are interesting and well-developed characters, and the interactions between them are great.

I want to talk for a moment about Count Dracula specifically. In the first four chapters he is depicted as (seemingly) kind, hospitable, careful, and emotionally intelligent, but there’s something sinister about him too. There’s also quite a bit of queer subtext. Dracula is a complicated and sympathetic character at this point, but later his characterisation changes drastically and he ends up being reduced to a cartoonish villain with very little depth. He also becomes a much less prominent part of the narrative – he’s not entirely absent, but he takes on more of a peripheral role. I wish we’d seen more of him. (Interestingly, this is the exact reverse of my view regarding Frankenstein’s monster)

Of course, I must address the elephant in the room – the bigotry. Dracula is a character crafted from several antisemitic tropes. His hooked nose is emphasised many times, and there are parallels between his vampirism (specifically his preying on children) and blood libel. Something else that stands out when viewing the character through this lens is the way he is presented as both an immensely powerful mastermind and a weakling with a “child-brain” – proto-fascist rhetoric, perhaps? The book as a whole is riddled with xenophobia, racism, ableism, and sexism. In many ways it’s a product of its time. Its age doesn’t excuse these problematic elements, but it does offer some context at least.

I was led to believe that Dracula is slow-paced but for a gothic horror story it’s actually very quick. It’s relatively well-written, and the epistolary format is executed well. Excellent build-up to an anticlimactic ending. There’s so much more I could say about the characters and the story (both praise and criticism) but I think I’ll wrap things up here.

Overall I did enjoy Dracula and I’m glad I finally sat down and read it. It’s certainly not without its flaws but I think it’s worth reading if you haven’t already.

“The last I saw of Count Dracula was his kissing his hand to me, with a red light of triumph in his eyes, and with a smile that Judas in hell might be proud of.” 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Antisemitism, Blood, Confinement, Death, Forced institutionalization, Gore, Medical content, Mental illness, Misogyny, Murder, Racism, Sexism, and Violence

Moderate: Ableism, Alcohol, Animal death, Child death, Death of parent, Drug use, Grief, Kidnapping, Racial slurs, Stalking, Suicidal thoughts, and Xenophobia

Minor: Body horror, Self harm, Slavery, Suicide, and Vomit

pastry's review against another edition

dark mysterious sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

Right, so this wasn't a bad read necessarily, but all of the main characters are dumbasses. They are all fooled so easily, and they're so blind to the obvious (which, okay, vampires are much more known nowadays, bit still) and they also disregard Mina because she is a weak woman, which is the whole reason why Dracula gets to her in the first place. So yes. Dumbasses. And Mina is so clearly written by a man, it hurts sometimes.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Blood, Cultural appropriation, Death, Forced institutionalization, and Violence

bambidew's review against another edition

adventurous emotional sad tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Forced institutionalization, Racism, and Kidnapping

Moderate: Blood and Death of parent

wordswoods's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood

Moderate: Animal death, Body horror, Child death, Death, Forced institutionalization, Grief, Mental illness, Murder, Physical abuse, Suicidal thoughts, and Violence

lezzieborden's review against another edition

adventurous dark slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Confinement and Forced institutionalization

Moderate: Blood and Death

Minor: Gun violence, Xenophobia, Suicidal thoughts, and Sexual violence

catearedwriter's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional informative tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Animal death, Blood, Confinement, Death, Forced institutionalization, Grief, Medical content, Sexism, Stalking, and Toxic relationship

knightbirds's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Blood, Death, Grief, Medical content, Mental illness, Racial slurs, and Sexism

Minor: Animal death, Antisemitism, Child abuse, Child death, Forced institutionalization, Gun violence, Racism, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, and Terminal illness

-Moderate Racial slurs: the word "g*psy" is used multiple times throughout the novel -Moderate Sexism: There is no sexism encountered by the characters in the universe of the story, but the narration and word choices of the author are dated and express antiquated opinions on gender roles and gendered expectations throughout the novel

accidentalspaceexplorer's review against another edition

mysterious tense slow-paced

• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.25

I have owned this copy of Dracula for a long time, and never read it, because I'm not usually a horror or thriller person, but I decided it was either time to read it or get rid of it!

I was really pleasantly surprised by it, honestly - it's much more gripping than I was expecting it to be, and the tropes have not been so well copied that I knew every step of the plot. There were definitely parts that I could really clearly see sign-posted because of Dracula's lasting impact on the genre, but I wasn't expecting the section in England to last as long as it did or be as interesting as it was. And honestly, a lot of the early portion of the novel was pretty hilarious, with modern eyes - the time that Dracula chucks the mirror out the window, the awkwardness of all the men proposing to Lucy on the same day, them subsequently lining up to give Lucy blood transfusions - which really helped me get into the novel. But I do think that Dracula shines best when it is building tension and suspense - all of the long conversations between people about what to do next, and the drawn-out unnerving nights where you don't know whether someone will live or die, and the slow ramp-up where you know Dracula is around but the main characters don't.

As soon as it switches to action, it loses a lot of its grip, because the complicated run-on sentences and padding of the events being related that worked so well to create tension makes it difficult to follow the action sequences. The ending was just a blur of "I guess they're fighting now" that left me pretty confused, and I definitely skipped a lot in the last fifty or so pages because I was tired of the endless talking when the time for action was here.

Other things that bothered me - the casual sexism of talking about Mina as though she has a "man's brain" just because she's smart, the casual disregard for rural people and their traditions as backwards and quaint, some of the asylum stuff, the depiction of criminals as people with "child-brains" which was really weird, and the random scene right at the end where Mina exults about how great money is.

Despite its flaws, however, I think that this classic holds up pretty well, although it is much better in the beginning and middle than it is at the end.

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Content Warnings

Minor: Misogyny and Forced institutionalization