The Un-Dead – review

Author: Joel H Emerson (& Bram Stoker)

First Published: 2007

Contains spoilers

The Un-Dead is described as “the Dracula novel, rewritten to include Stoker’s deleted characters and events.” I first came across it when Emerson wrote a piece for the Dracula Innocence Project, which was based around his reimagining, and I thought to myself, I have to have this book… was my enthusiasm justified?

You are probably aware that ‘The Un-Dead’ was the original title of Stoker’s masterpiece and he only changed the name to Dracula at the last minute. I guess you can sum up what Emerson has done in three threads. He has (self-admittedly) invented an intimation about one of the main characters within the novel that was not there before and the direction of this can be seen on his piece for the Dracula Innocence Project. He has studied Stoker’s notes and then tried to add in characters and threads, as the story flow would allow, that Stoker deleted. Finally he has given the events in the novel a definitive date.

Let’s start with the dating of events. Whilst the original is an epistolary novel, all the dated entries had day and month but not year. If one takes the premise that it was a gathering of true accounts then the events could not have occurred later than 1890 – the final entry is seven years after the events and the novel was published in 1897. Stoker’s notes actually place the novel in 1893 (given that the dates match that year), however an alternate introduction for the novel was written by Stoker when it recieved a foriegn language publication. This can be found at the Dracula Research Centre - the Icelandic introduction – and sees Stoker tying the events loosely to the Jack the Ripper murders, in 1888. Emerson has taken this as the date and, whilst the Ripper aspect is not key, has added through the text authentic transcribes from newspapers reporting on the murders and offers hints of a connection.

By adding in characters and events that Stoker deleted Emerson has broadened the scope of the novel. Main new characters include ‘New Woman’ Kate Reed, a pupil of Mina’s and granddaughter of Mr Swales. Francis Aytown, a friend of Kate Reed, is a tortured artist who becomes obsessed with the Count. Alfred Singleton is an occult investigator who is contacted by Kate Reed and thus drawn into the events and Inspector Cotford is a policeman suspicious of the rather closely timed deaths of Lord Godalming (Arthur’s father), Lucy Westenra and Lucy’s mother.

More familiar characters have stronger roles. Renfield’s involvement is well rounded and thus more satisfying and Quincy Morris is less a two dimensional side character and his solo travels through Transylvania are a fascinating aside, especially with regards the Scholomance. Even Dracula himself seems fuller as a character; his activities in England are more varied. Dracula’s guest is added in, though modified, and a neat connection between the vampire Harker comes across in that segment, one of the three brides and Van Helsing’s past activities is nicely realised.

There is an additional piece of vampiric lore within the book that came straight from Stoker’s notes, “Painters cannot paint him – their likenesses always like someone else” and “Could not Kodak him – come out black or like skeleton corpse”. We are very aware of the reflection aspect of the lore but this additional visual lore actually leads directly to Aytown’s obsession as he cannot capture the Count’s likeness on canvas and his renditions look more and more corpse like. The intimation is that the painter is subconsciously painting that which the eye truly sees rather than the illusion that the brain interprets. This also leads me to wonder whether the growing younger and older that the Count seems to do is more tied to the illusion he projects to the observer. It is an interesting thought.

Not everything is as satisfying. Originally Stoker planned for the Count to come ashore in England in his box of Earth rather than as a wolf. Emerson has both events occurring and the answer to the conundrum of him being in the form of a corpse and a wolf at the same time, whilst tackled later in the book, didn’t satisfy – perhaps because I was looking for a definitive answer and two theorems are put forward. This is, however, one minor gripe in a book that offered much pleasurable reading. Another, very picky, gripe was in respect of the number of notes through which Emerson tells us, in detail, where the concepts came from. Don’t get me wrong, they were both interesting and essential – it is just that my flow of reading was interrupted as I couldn’t resist flicking to the back of the book to check the reference note.

To give Emerson his just dues, the writing throughout feels authentic and it was often only a long standing knowledge of the books that caused me to see where Stoker ended and Emerson began – he captured the original author’s style perfectly. Sometimes Emerson would adapt other parts of Stoker's writing and place it within and there is one scene that is borrowed from Stoker's own stage play of the novel.

So, is this the definitive version of Dracula? Patently not, that honour lies with the original. It is clear that Stoker must have had his reasons for any omission or deletion he made from his original notes. However this is a very worthwhile read, in fact I would go as far as to say essential, for any fan of the novel or student of the genre. An utterly fascinating and riveting retelling of a classic tale – 9 out of 10.