Image: Dracula by Bram Stoker, first edition cover, Archibald Constable and Company [UK], May, 1897

Image: Dracula by Bram Stoker, Dutton, Adult, September 24, 2009 edition cover

This newly published edition has a note at the bottom of the front cover that reads: "Includes a first look at the sequel: Dracula the Un-Dead."

Image: Dracula the Un-Dead by Bram Stoker's great grand-nephew Dacre Stoker and Ian Holt, September 24, 2009 HarperCollins, UK

Before writing this novel, Dacre Stoker worked as a track and field coach. Ian Holt's previous writing experience was in DVDs. He was a direct-to-DVD horror screenwriter.

























Note from Mary Jo [3/10/10]
Title: Bram Stoker [And Surprises That Turned Up] Note: Bram Stoker is the author of Dracula that was published in England in 1897

***

Before I writing a note titled, "Alien Agenda, Part 2," I set out to assemble information about Bram Stoker [1847 - 1912] because he's rumored to have been connected to the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn.

Stoker is most known for his book, Dracula, published in London in 1987. The column at left includes the cover of the first edition and a very recent 2009 edition published by a division of HarperCollins.

Surprises During My Research
I found some surprises while researching Stoker. It turns out that J.R.R. Tolkien [Lord of the Rings series] and C.S. Lewis [The Chronicles of Narnia] were also rumored to have been connected to the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn.

The rumors about Stoker, Tolkien and Lewis are all based on their relationships with people who were known initiates of the Hermetic Order:

  • Charles Williams [1886-1945] - This British poet and novelist was a friend of Tolkien and Lewis. The three were members of an Oxford reading group called "The Inklings."

  • John William Brodie-Innis [1848 – 1923] - This attorney was a leading member of the Thoth-Hermes Temple of the Golden Dawn in Edinburgh, Scotland and a close friend of Bram Stoker's.

    John William Brodie-Innis wrote several novels on witchcraft and magic and is believed to have been Dion Fortune's occult teacher.

    [Note: Dion Fortune is a well known occult author who joined an arm of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn that split off as Alpha et Omega between 1903 and 1913. Alpha et Omega was formed by Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers after a scandal and legal battle that prompted a name change].

  • Pamela Colman Smith [1878-1951] - this artist, illustrator and writer joined the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn in 1903, met Arthur Edward Waite, and was hired to illustrate the Waite-Rider Tarot deck. Bram Stoker hired her as an artist at the Lyceum theater where he workd for Lyceum Theater business manager Henry Irving.

A Christian minister named Dr. Scott Johnson, is so upset about Tolkien's and Lewis' connection to the Golden Dawn, he recorded a sermon about these authors and made it available at YouTube.com.

Vampire Stories Have Hijacked Fiction
Several book reviewers are complaining that the modern "vampire heyday" has hijacked every genre of fiction.

There are so many new vampire titles that Sharon Fulton, a Ph.D. candidate in English literature at Columbia University, wrote "The Vampire Fan(g) Guide" for Open Letters Monthly - an Arts and Literature Review.

One publisher has even published a collection of vampire stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes [Skyhorse Publishing, 2009].

HarperCollins is so interested in vampire novels that they recently published a new book from Dacre Stoker, a track and field coach, called, Dracula the Un-Dead [September, 2009]. Dacre is Bram's great grand-nephew and he co-wrote the book with a DVD horror screenwriter named Ian Holt [See: book cover, left].

Thirty Years of Vampire Books and Movies
The reviewers at Boston's Open Letters Monthly, a site for monthly arts and literature reviews, say the public has been bombarded with vampire books for the last thirty years.

As J.K. Rowling was working on the second last book in her series called Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, author Stephenie Meyer was writing the first of a four-book teenage series about vampires called Twilight. Stephenie Meyer's novels, about a vampire family's teenage son [Edward] and his high school love interest [Bella], sold over 42 million copies worldwide with translations into 37 languages [See: photo].

The four Twilight books were also the biggest selling novels of 2008 on the USA Today Best-Selling Books list. Film adaptations of these best-selling books have also been drawing teens to movie theaters since November, 2001 and will continue to 2011, the same year that a film version [Part 2] of Rowling's last book will be released.

Twilight is a Re-Cycled Roswell [TV Series About Aliens]
It appears that stories about vampires and aliens are crowding out stories about humans. In a blog titled, "Twilight Vs. Roswell: Are aliens more romantic than vampires?" writer Mike Moody reports that from 1999 to 2002, The WB aired a TV series called Roswell with a plot that was almost identical to Twilight:

A sensitive girl is saved by a supernatural hunk who makes it his mission to protect her at all costs. The two fall in love, but the relationship is complicated by his other-worldly circumstances.

In Twilight, the young hunk is a vampire and in Roswell, the hunk is an alien. The two males are both biology lab partners of the female teenagers.

I'm not a blogger, so I don't know how common it is for the same copy to appear in separate blogs. Much of Mike Moody's copy appears in a second blog called, "A new Gen of Romantic Hero - Vampires & Aliens."

Desensitization to Aliens and Vampires?
Introducing aliens and vampires as romantic heroes is a clever way to desensitize teens about the existence of real aliens.

I don't think there are vampires that drink blood. I think that there are human alien hybrids that can occupy the 4th dimension and drain a person's energy. The vampire stories may be a fictional cover for what really takes place. I think aliens rob energy rather than blood. About a third of my energy attacks feel as though my energy is being siphoned off.

[Photos of vampires on this page: Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson in their roles as Bella Swan and Edward Cullen in the film adaptation of Twilight. Both play vampires although Kristin's character is not a vampire at the beginning of the film].

Defenses Against "Supernatural" Beings
When I'm bombarded with an invisible energy weapon, or my energy is siphoned off by an invisible being, my only defenses are Prayer and food chemistry. The Prayers do not work instantaneously because the requests are broad [and the aliens can re-invade].

The perpetrators are based far from Earth and they have invaded many other planets and stars. Broad requests are appropriate. Many more people are needed to say Prayers.

Mary Jo