I Am Convinced That Dracula Has Long Distance Telepathy, Though Some Aspects Of My Theory Don't Really

I am convinced that Dracula has long distance telepathy, though some aspects of my theory don't really work. I've never read the book so please don't comment either way if you know the story. Here's my thinking. It stands to reason that Jonathan told Dracula all about Mina and absolutely convinced Drac that Mina is the best woman in England (and the world as far as Jon's concerned). Dracula is not immune to such advertising and send his telepathic mind tentacles out to find her. Here's where my theory gets shaky. Why did he start playing with (his food) Lucy first? Was she sitting near Mina and his mind-tentacle bumped into her first? And then there's Renfield. I suspect Renfield was always ND. But the eat-living-creatures thing must be a Drac influence. Drac setting up a little helper for when he arrives. Or just playing with his food again, who knows. But I doubt Jon has ever heard of Renfield? Unless he mentioned Seward and the mental hospital and that intrigued Drac. Maybe he was looking for Seward and his tentacle bumped Ren instead. Imagine Dracula having, like, imprecise aim! Seward would be a much more useful helper, after all, as a respectable medical man. Think of the access to helpless food Seward could provide. Come to think of it, if Drac has long distance telepathy he'd have close proximity telepathy too. Maybe he plucked Lucy out of Jon's brain. Maybe out of his dreams. Maybe Drac just liked her looks; everyone seems to. But that still doesn't explain him going after Renfield. Unless Jon met Renfield once, somehow? Could have been in passing, before Ren went to Seward's hospital. Maybe Ren acted memorably enough for Jon to have dreamt of him, and put him on Dracula's radar? Anyone new to this novel have thoughts about it?

I may be in the minority but I think it's pretty smooth of Stoker to have casually dropped the little story about the suicide's grave like he did. It's all part of the larger tapestry of spooky details at the time so it didn't feel like An Important Detail For Later. He was telling us, though: "Pay no attention to the grave marker, readers, this spot is unconsecrated." So now Dracula hiding in that grave makes sense.

So we all agree that Whitby's freak storm was Dracula having a temper tantrum on the Demeter, right?

Lucy! 😭

The sad part of the poor captain’s determination to make it to England is that, in a way, it would be better if he didn’t.  Because he’s bringing a vampire to a place with a lot more prey than one ship can provide.

And he doesn’t know that!  He has no idea what’s killing his men, or that it would be a bad idea to let it get on shore.  The captain is doing his very best to be brave and honorable in a terrifying situation, and that’s part of why it’s so tragic.

Anyway, in an AU version of this story, this would be Dracula: