TITLE:  Powers of Darkness: The Lost Version of Dracula

AUTHOR:  Bram Stoker

ADAPTED BY:  Valdimar Ásmundsson

TRANSLATED BY:  Hans De Roos
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DESCRIPTION:

"Powers of Darkness is an incredible literary discovery: In 1900, Icelandic publisher and writer Valdimar Ásmundsson set out to translate Bram Stoker’s world-famous 1897 novel Dracula. Called Makt Myrkranna (literally, “Powers of Darkness”), this Icelandic edition included an original preface written by Stoker himself. Makt Myrkranna was published in Iceland in 1901 but remained undiscovered outside of the country until 1986, when Dracula scholarship was astonished by the discovery of Stoker’s preface to the book. However, no one looked beyond the preface and deeper into Ásmundsson’s story.

In 2014, literary researcher Hans de Roos dove into the full text of Makt Myrkranna, only to discover that Ásmundsson hadn’t merely translated Dracula but had penned an entirely new version of the story, with all new characters and a totally re-worked plot. The resulting narrative is one that is shorter, punchier, more erotic, and perhaps even more suspenseful than Stoker’s Dracula. Incredibly, Makt Myrkranna has never been translated or even read outside of Iceland until now.

Powers of Darkness presents the first ever translation into English of Stoker and Ásmundsson’s Makt Myrkranna. With marginal annotations by de Roos providing readers with fascinating historical, cultural, and literary context; a foreword by Dacre Stoker, Bram Stoker’s great-grandnephew and bestselling author; and an afterword by Dracula scholar John Edgar Browning, Powers of Darkness will amaze and entertain legions of fans of Gothic literature, horror, and vampire fiction."

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REVIEW:

I loved the expanded and somewhat altered version of the events that transpire in Count Dracula's castle (more atmospheric, creepier, Dracula's female house guest gets more page time), but the London chapters came across as a hurried and truncated (compared to the original version) plot summary and were rather disappointing.  This lost version was, however, still entertaining.

by Bram Stoker

I have to wonder why I waited so long to read this Classic. It is wonderfully atmospheric and though in the form of journal entries, the story flows smoothly and lyrically and completely drew me in so much that I was seeking out other Bram Stoker writings by the time I got 4% in.

The plot is a well known one. Jonathan Harker is summoned to Castle Dracula to assist Count Dracula's intention to move to England. Along the way he meets several superstitious East Europeans who fear for him and speak of evil at the castle. By the time he arrives, he is already on edge. However, he is met by a most gracious host, and treated to the best of everything for his stay. This soon begins to take a sinister turn and Harker flees the castle to return home to England, but Dracula has what he needs to follow him there.

I loved the writing for the most part. The one exception is in some of Mina's entries where she is quoting characters with Northern accents. I've lived in Yorkshire and can understand the accents easily in real life, but in writing it doesn't come over well and I actually had to skim some of the dialogue without ever working out what they were saying.

On the plus side, each character had their own unique voice. Mina's entries are very different from Jonathan's and when other characters added to the narrative, they also had individual voices that fit their roles.

I've seen several movie versions of this story, but reading the original has given me a kind of pleasure I find difficult to describe. It's like I finally have the whole story for the first time and again, the writing is what has made this a Classic. I highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys classic fiction or scary vampire stories. It sets the bar for everything in the genre that comes after, apart from the ending which I thought was a little weak and rushed. I had expected a little more drama in the conclusion, probably because of movies that have raised expectations.

Interesting.  The novel starts off slowly, but starts getting good once Dracula makes an appearance.

Dracul was a wonderfully Gothic read that includes many of the elements that we know from Dracula, the original story and the adaptations. 

However, this re-assembling of the different elements of the Dracula story, unfortunately, did not work for me: the familiar elements somehow just felt old when in Dracula they felt novel. 

And the inclusion of Stoker himself and his family in the story of Dracul, just did not work for me, even  if there are some interesting twists with respect to the motivation of the "undead". 

I'd this is more a fault in this reader than it is of the book. I just have never done well with fiction that tries to hard to come across as "historical fiction", even less so with fiction that tries to come across as "faction". 

I also struggled with the writing itself, which at times felt gimmicky, overwrought, and not particularly of its time. I.e. if this was supposed to be a prequel to Dracula, I would have expected a closer resemblance to the language used in Dracula.  This is a minor quibble, tho. My main issue was that I was just bored for about 250 pages until the conclusion of the story.

I'm eager to finish this so I can move on.

It's not a favourite. As far as HW bingo reads go, it's certainly the right book for the game, but it's not the right book for me. 

I just have a low tolerance level for pastiche and info-dumping. And I have been bored for the last 200 pages.