Have you ever celebrated World Dracula Day? Did you even know there was one? If you’re wondering if this is another one of those dates listed on the Weird Holidays & Observances page, yep. Nailed it!
But when is World Dracula Day and why? Basically, what’s its origin story?
Since we’ve never done it yet, let’s take a look at what World Dracula Day is all about and how it came to be. But brace yourself, even though we don’t know a lot about it, there are some interesting discoveries ahead nonetheless…
When is World Dracula Day?
It’s celebrated every year on May 26.
When did it start and why?
World Dracula Day honors the date that Bram Stoker’s Gothic horror novel, Dracula, was first published, which was May 26, 1897.
Whoever created the day is unknown, though, and so is their reason for starting it. Was it a group of the book’s fans or just one person?
As I always do when I run into mysterious —or completely absent— weird day origin stories like this, all I can say is that I’ll keep digging. If I turn anything up, I’ll be sure to share what I find out.
Similarly, I welcome clues, so if you have any insight or info, leave a comment below!
However, as I also often do when searching for clues about when the first time a weird day was started, I turned to the newspapers to see what might reveal itself. I didn’t find anything about World Dracula Day, but when it came to Bram Stoker’s book? Oh yeah, I found a few pretty interesting articles! Let’s check them out.
3 Dracula Newspaper Articles
1. The first Dracula review?
Dracula was first published in the U.K. by Archibald Constable and Company. It didn’t reach American audiences until almost two years later, though. And only by way of a handful of copies to begin with.
I stumbled upon what may be one of the first U.S. reviews of Bram Stoker’s book in a column called “Book Ways and Worldy Ways.” I don’t see a byline so I don’t know who wrote it, but it sounded like the critic was not only well aware of Stoker but may have even met him from the description the critic includes of the author.
But what really floored me was this assessment of the work: “…hardly a book that will become popular…”
Naw, it was hardly popular at all. It wasn’t the first vampire novel, but it was the first to become wildly popular and set the benchmark for all vampires that would follow in fiction and film.
I broke the clip up into two parts because it was awkward to digitally clip it otherwise and made it less reader-friendly.
2. Dracula as a serial. (The non-killer kind.)
Did you know that Dracula was first published as a serial in the U.S.? I didn’t.
The first installment of Dracula appeared in The Inter Ocean. It ran in 28 consecutive issues from Sunday, May 7, 1899, to Sunday, June 4.
That was an interesting thing to discover, but even more interesting —and thrilling—was finding that very first installment to clip. At least the headline part of it.
3. Resurrecting Dracula tourism with a Dracula congress.
This article from The Morning Call blew me away. Once upon a time (under communism), Romania “shrugged off its reputation as the land of vampires.”
However, in their defense, Bran Castle, now best known as Dracula’s castle, really had nothing to do with vampires. While Stoker based his Count Dracula in part on Prince Vlad Tepes, a.k.a. Vlad the Impaler, Vlad had never really lived in the Romanian castle tourists went in search of because of Stoker’s book. Well, Vlad hadn’t lived there for more than a few days anyway. And he was never considered a vampire. Ruthless maybe and scary, but not the living undead.
And while there were vampire myths in Romanian culture, they never considered Vlad a vampire. So they didn’t embrace Stoker’s Dracula the same way that those who read the book did.
Of course, now they do since they realize paranormal tourism can be lucrative, so as the article says, “…when tourists started showing up in the 1970s, Communist officials grudgingly put together a Dracula tour that promoted the fallacy by including the 14th-century fortress” as part of their Dracula tourism campaign.
There was also a “Dracula congress” (party) that drew academics and foreign journalists to Bucharest, where they debated “subjects ranging from the arcane (‘Dracula’s role in Gothic literature’) to the bizarre (‘Psychic Vampire: America’s First Vampire Holiday’). The group then went to Transylvania for a mock witch trial and a masked ball at Bistrita Castle, all of which was concocted in an effort to try a different way of embracing Dracula tourism.
As the tourism minister at that time said, “If tourists want hands rising out of coffins…we’ll give it to them.”
Celebrate World Dracula Day with the Book or Movie
You can find both Dracula the book and the classic movie based on it starring Bela Lugosi on Amazon.
Read the Book
Watch the Movie
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Have you ever read Bram Stoker’s Dracula?
Courtney Mroch is a globe-trotting restless spirit who’s both possessed by wanderlust and the spirit of adventure, and obsessed with true crime, horror, the paranormal, and weird days. Perhaps it has something to do with her genes? She is related to occult royalty, after all. Marie Laveau, the famous Voodoo practitioner of New Orleans, is one of her ancestors. (Yes, really! As explained here.) That could also explain her infatuation with skeletons.
Speaking of mystical, to learn how Courtney channeled her battle with cancer to conjure up this site, check out HJ’s Origin Story.
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