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Dracula Part 1: Course Introduction 29641 Views
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Description:
Readers may be already be familiar with Dracula, but what about the mathematician and author, Bram Stoker? And yes, he graduated with a degree in math. We’re not confusing him with The Count from Sesame Street. We won’t make that mistake a seventh time.
Transcript
- 00:01
We speak student!
- 00:07
Dracula
- 00:08
Introduction
- 00:11
a la Shmoop
- 00:13
All right.
Full Transcript
- 00:14
Welcome to Dracula a la Shmoop.
- 00:16
We're here with Dennis Jones,
- 00:17
who's a comparative lit PhD student at Stanford.
- 00:20
He specializes in the literature of terror.
- 00:23
No! No! No!
- 00:27
Let me just kick things off. So, Dennis,
- 00:29
can you frame for us first
- 00:31
who is Bram Stoker?
- 00:33
Bram Stoker is an Irish novelist from the 19th century,
- 00:38
the late 19th century.
- 00:39
He's best known for Dracula.
- 00:42
[ high-pitched noise ]
- 00:44
But I think he was --
- 00:46
I think he began as a mathematician.
- 00:48
He at least got a math degree.
- 00:49
He was involved in the theater.
- 00:51
[ applause ]
- 00:52
He crossed paths with Oscar Wilde. They're both Irish.
- 00:56
[ instrumental music ]
- 00:58
And then, in the 1890s, he penned Dracula,
- 01:00
and that was pretty much
- 01:03
it for him in terms of what we know about him,
- 01:05
or what we care to know about him.
- 01:07
Understood.
- 01:08
So Dracula and many of the works in this zone
- 01:12
- are framed in the genre of Gothic literature. - Mm-hmm.
- 01:19
What is a good definition
- 01:22
for Gothic literature?
- 01:23
So the Gothic is kind of difficult to pin down,
- 01:25
- since it's so protean and changeable. - What does protean mean?
- 01:29
Like it's changeable and fluctuates.
- 01:33
I would say --
- 01:35
So a good way to define the Gothic
- 01:37
as a sort of a literary mode that makes use
- 01:40
of terror and suspense and affect.
- 01:43
It's a pretty broad definition,
- 01:45
but I think you --
- 01:47
The genre consists of a broad variety of novels.
- 01:50
So I think it's probably the most generous
- 01:52
definition you can have.
- 01:55
Got it. Makes sense.
- 01:57
[ whoop ]
- 01:58
Who is Bram Stoker?
- 02:00
What is Gothic literature?
- 02:05
[ high-pitched screeching ]
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