![]() We know that Stoker was born in Dublin, studied at Trinity College while working in the bureaucracy of Dublin Castle, moonlighted as a drama critic for an evening paper, moved to London in 1878 with his new wife, Florence Balcombe – Oscar Wilde's ex – and became an excellent administrator of the Irving Company at the Lyceum theatre in London. One problem is the paucity of primary sources. But none of them, it seems to me, gets near the inner man. So biographies of Stoker – and there are four of them – all emphasise his most famous book and interpret the man through the prism of his work. Since the rise of the movies, Dracula has become one of the most widely known books in all world fiction, and the most filmed character in the history of cinema ( Sherlock Holmes comes in second). ![]() ![]() W hen Bram Stoker died, 100 years ago, his obituaries, such as they were, emphasised his geniality, his long-term friendship with the actor Henry Irving, his association with the power-brokers of the day – and, only in asides, the 19 books he wrote. ![]()
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