but GOD. this last entry. Yeah; I wasn’t expecting things to get any better for jonathan, but dracula telling him he’s free to go? and then threatening to send the wolves after him if he leaves? forcing jonathan to say he wants to to stay in the castle??
it’s a frighteningly realistic portrayal of an abusive relationship. jonathan can leave if he wants; the door is unlocked. but the second he sets foot outside the door, dracula warns there will be consequences, because he controls the wolves. and so jonathan chooses to stay, despite the fact he knows dracula is slowly killing him. and just like everything else dracula has done so far, he shifts the blame of jonathan’s own suffering to jonathan himself- because jonathan entered the castle of his own free will. and now, he says he wants to stay.
It’s so fucking insidious, and so rage inducing. Has he not done enough to Jonathan? Dracula has taken away so much from him since may. Jonathan’s boundaries, his dignity as a human being, his safety, his mind, his sense of time. Every single thing that Jonathan brought from England, all of his excitment and ambition for his FIRST JOB.
YET STILL, Dracula keeps playing. He keeps dangling that desired freedom in front of Jonathan like a cruel person waves a piece of meat at a starving animal. It’s horrifying to feel all of this rage, and know that Jonathan is still trapped in that castle because that is the only safe place for him at the moment.
That dying castle, containing unspeakable horrors is the safest place for Jonathan thanks to the Count.
His defiance, and sudden demand to Dracula’s game didn’t matter. What awaits Jonathan at the other side of that door is wolves, and the Count’s self satisfied smile.
Not to continue to harp on a theme, but when Jonathan says
I sat down and simply cried
The remarkable thing is that’s all he says. He doesn’t hedge, he’s not embarrassed or ashamed, he doesn’t gender it or chastise himself for being overly emotional or womanly. He just says that he cries.
I think this is the only point in the book where someone cries with zero judgment or editorializing from anyone. It’s even more remarkable when compared to other Victorian literature. In this one moment, Jonathan is allowed to simply cry.
