Whitby Sights

Bram Stoker (The Author)

Abraham (Bram) Stoker was the son of a civil servant born in Dublin in 1847.  He entered the Irish civil service after graduating from Trinity College in 1870 as an Inspector of Petty Sessions.  His spare-time activities as a theatre critic with the ‘Dublin Mail' allowed him to meet the actor Sir Henry Irving.  Stoker joined him as business and general manager in 1878 at the Irving company at the Lyceum Theatre in London.  He continued to work here until Irving's death in 1905.

Bram Stoker had a very busy career but found time to write a dozen books, short stories and numerous articles.  Some of his best-known novels include The Mystery of the Sea, The Lair of the White Worm, The Lady of the Shroud and The Jewel of the Seven Seas.  Dracula was undoubtedly his most successful work, which was first published in 1897 and was the fruits of a lifelong interest in the supernatural.  During Stoker's life, the book Dracula was a huge success, it built up a huge public interest worldwide.  His book has seldom been out of print since his death in 1912. 

Dracula was dramatised for the first time in 1924 but since then there have been stage versions and even a musical.  The book has been made for film seven times (not counting sequels) and forged the screen careers of Bela Lugosi and more recently Christopher Lee.  Bram Stoker's character Dracula has taken a slice of the film industry and made it its own domain of vampires and immortal figures, which earned worldwide recognition.

Whitby is the setting for only three chapters in Bram Stoker's book Dracula.  His descriptions of Whitby form a powerful view of a Victorian resort.  The fantastic photographs taken by Frank Meadow Sutcliffe of Whitby are a snapshot of that precise period in time.  Stoker never visited Transylvania, so he obtained the background information he needed from reading.  He obviously knew Whitby very well and clearly loved the place.