Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Writer's Block
While he might have hit on the idea of writing a vampire story, initially Stoker couldn't
think of where to locate it. He was also lost for a name for his bloodthirsty nobleman. But
then he found a book on Vlad Dracula in Whitby Library whilst on holiday, and met a
Hungarian who told him at length about Transylvania (meaning 'the land beyond the
forests'), and suddenly his story slotted together. It was only then that Stoker immersed
himself in the Reading Room at the British Museum Library, swotting up on everything
from geography to Romanian folklore and the mythology of vampires.
In the 1980s the original manuscript of
Dracula
was found in a barn in northwestern Pennsylvania.
