Character List
Dracula He is the vampire who has been "Un-Dead" for several hundred years and keeps his vitality by sucking blood from live victims. He is the Transylvanian Count for whom the book is named. Despite the fact that he is actually seen on only a few of the approximately four hundred pages of the novel, his presence constantly pervades the entire work; of note is the fact that his desire to move from the barren and desolate Transylvania, which is sparsely populated, to the more populous England, is the initiating point of the novel since someone from England must make the trip to Castle Dracula to complete the transactions. In appearance, Count Dracula is described as being a "tall old man, clean shaven, save for a long white mustache and clad in black from head to foot, without a single speck of color about him anywhere." Contrary to popular understanding, Stoker has his Dracula sporting a large, bushy Victorian mustache and having a profuse head of dense, curly hair, massive eyebrows, and peculiarly sharp white teeth, especially the canine teeth. Dracula also possesses astonishing vitality, as is witnessed every time that he appears in a difficult situation.
Jonathan Harker The young London solicitor who is sent to Transylvania to finalize the transfer of real estate in England to Count Dracula. His journals record the essential facts of his journey from Bistritz to the Borgo Pass, where he is met by Count Dracula's carriage, as well as recording the facts of his arrival and stay at the Castle Dracula. Harker is engaged to a young schoolmistress named Mina Murray.
Miss Mina (Wilhelmina) Murray The fiancée of Jonathan Harker; she will become a "persecuted maiden" during the latter part of the story. She is quite young, and her job is that of an assistant schoolmistress. She is also an orphan. She will later become Mina Harker and will assist in tracking down Count Dracula.
Miss Lucy Westenra Mina Murray's closest friend. She is a young woman of nineteen who becomes engaged to Arthur Holmwood. Her penchant for sleepwalking allows her to become Dracula's first victim, and after her "death," she will become one of the "Un-Dead."
Mrs. Westenra Lucy's mother, who is dying of a heart ailment; she becomes another victim of the vampire.
Arthur Holmwood A vigorous man, twenty-nine years old, the only son of Lord Godalming; Holmwood will later inherit this title after the death of his father. His engagement to Lucy and the necessity of driving a stake through Lucy's heart after she is one of the "Un-Dead" motivates Holmwood to join in tracking down and exterminating Dracula.
Dr. John Seward The head of a lunatic asylum, Seward is roughly the same age as Holmwood and is one of Lucy Westenra's suitors. He is an intelligent and determined man.
Quincey P. Morris Another of Lucy's suitors. Morris is an American from Texas. His great wealth allows him to pay many of the expenses incurred in tracking down Dracula.
Dr. Abraham Van Helsing An M.D., a Ph.D., and a D.Litt., as well as an attorney. He is a lonely, unmarried old bachelor who is both kindly and fatherly. He is from Amsterdam, and his profound knowledge of medicine, folklore, and the occult allows him to take complete charge of Lucy's illness, which he identifies immediately as vampirism. He is also chiefly in charge of the strategy of tracking down Count Dracula.
R. M. Renfield A huge, lumbering, fifty-nine-year-old madman who is a patient of Dr. Seward; he also comes under the influence of Dracula.
Mr. Swales An old man who befriends Lucy and Mina at Whitby, site of the landing of Count Dracula's ship. He is an archetypal figure, the one person who senses and articulates the approaching horror of Dracula, but, Cassandra-like, he is not believed.