The Longman Anthology briefly discusses the history of England in Southeast Europe and the Middle East. I don’t know if they were ever directly involved in Romania, but they did participate in the Crimean War of 1854. This conflict cost England many soldiers, “but made little change in the European balance of power” (1064). Considering England’s ambiguous success and control here, I think it makes total sense that this area is a source of interest and fear. Harker’s journal entries from the first few days of his travel are filled with comparisons to England––the environment, the ethnic groups, the religion, the superstitions, the clothing, the food. Dracula himself says, “‘We are in Transylvania; and Transylvania is not England. Our ways are not your ways, and there shall be to you many strange things.’” (28). It’s strange enough to be fascinating to Harker. However, the problem comes with Dracula’s interest in England.
The second chapter emphasizes the obsession Dracula has with Great Britain. Harker is shocked to find books on every subject, “all relating to England and English life and customs and manners” in the semi-ruined castle of the Transylvanian count (26). He repeats several different iterations of “your great England” or “your mighty London” (27). Dracula embodies the 19th century fear of “reverse invasion,” much like many of the villains in the Sherlock Holmes stories. The thieves, temptresses, and murders are always foreign or somehow associated with a foreign country. There was a fear that some outsider could disrupt English society and culture, corrupt it and manipulate it. Many Gothic novels from the late 18th century (like Frankenstein, The Mysteries of Udolpho, The Monk, and Vathek) take place in Italy or France or somewhere else in Europe or Asia. They almost never take place in England, because the crimes were too horrifying, the villains too barbaric, and the people too superstitious. These things could never happen in the polite, civilized society of England. (Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey makes fun of this idea). In The Island of Dr. Moreau, part of what disturbs Prendick after returning to England is that he can no longer distinguish between his fellow Brits and the beasts. The screen that holds England apart from the rest of the world has been torn down. Count Dracula is bringing the horror to England. That’s much scarier than reading about a ghostly figure in some ruined mansion in the French Alps. Jonathan Harker and his employer, Hawkins, personally found a house for Dracula in England. Not only is Dracula invading England, he’s doing it with the help of two Englishmen.