Dracula 15

Study Guide Questions for Ch. 15 "Dr. Seward's Diary (Continued)"

If you are looking for the beginning of the study of Bram Stoker’s Dracula then you can go HERE for a brief introduction. At the bottom of the introduction you will find the links to each section of the study guide as it becomes available. If you would like to see the growing list of available book studies available for free on this site you can go HERE. Enjoy!

Virtues/Vices/Great Ideas: (Find them in the Text)

Truth, Doubt, Prudence, Euchatastrophe, Duty

Grammar Questions: (The Information of the Text)

1. What was Dr. Seward’s initial reaction to Van Helsing’s proclamation that Lucy was responsible for harming the children?

2. Where did Van Helsing take Dr. Seward first in order to investigate his claim that Lucy was to blame for the attacks on children?

3. What did Dr. Seward refer to as a “delicious irony?”

4. What did Van Helsing and Dr. Seward find when they opened Lucy’s coffin?

5. What was Dr. Seward’s attitude (disposition) towards what he was seeing and being told by Van Helsing? 

6. What did Dr. Seward and Van Helsing find in the cemetery?

7. What did Dr. Seward and Van Helsing find the next day, during daylight hours, in Lucy’s coffin?

8. What did Professor Van Helsing tell Dr. Seward he intended to do with Lucy’s body?

9. Whose additional involvement did Van Helsing decide to enlist before doing anything further with Lucy?

10. What did Van Helsing do in order to prevent Lucy from leaving her tomb at the present?

11. What one thing did Van Helsing have some fear of during his overnight vigil in the cemetery?

12. Under what two conditions did Arthur agree to promise “in the dark” to do whatever Van Helsing asked of him?

Logic Questions: (Interpreting, Comparing/Contrasting, Reasoning)

1. What did Van Helsing mean when he said, “It is so hard to accept at once any abstract truth, that we may doubt such to be possible when we have always believed the ‘no’ of it?”

2. Upon entering Lucy’s tomb Van Helsing took pains to ascertain “that the lock was a falling, and not a spring, one.” Why was this so important?

3. Dr. Seward wrote in his diary, “Once more, argumentative hostility woke within me.” Why was Dr. Seward, in particular, so hard to convince about the reality of the situation?

4. Dr. Seward asked, “Is it possible that love is all subjective, or all objective?” What did he mean by asking this question? What is the correct answer to his question?

5. Van Helsing, speaking of spending the night in the graveyard, said, “For Miss Lucy or from her, I have no fear, but that other to whom is there that she is UnDead, he have now the power to seek her tomb and find shelter.” What should we infer about Dracula from this statement?

6. Why did Van Helsing decide to delay dealing with Lucy until Arthur could be involved?

Rhetoric Questions: (The Analysis of Ideas in the Text)

1. In the previous chapter Jonathan was pulled back from doubt and feeling insane by coming to grips with the truth. Now, in this chapter, Professor Van Helsing stated “Madness were easy to bear compared with truth like this.” Should we always prefer to know the truth or are there times where we are truly better off not knowing the truth? If it’s always better to know what is true, why? If it is sometimes better not to know the truth, what is an example of a situation where it is better not to know?

2. Van Helsing believes that it is their duty (his and the small group that knows something of Dracula) to “find this great UnDead, and cut off his head and burn his heart or drive a stake through it, so that the world may rest from him.” Do you believe that with the increase of knowledge there also comes an obligation to act in a certain way? Does, for instance, merely knowing about the existence of Dracula and his nefarious plan make it incumbent upon this small band to act? What might be a similar real-world scenario where knowledge might obligate someone or some group to act in a certain way? Explain your thoughts carefully.

3. Arthur was not willing to promise to do whatever Van Helsing might say while being completely “in the dark” without some qualifications. Do you think he was right or wrong to set the qualifications he did? Is there any situation in which we ought to blindly follow someone else? If not, why not? If so, what kind of situation might call for this?

Theological Analysis: (Sola Scriptura)

1. Read Matthew 28. Pay close attention to verse 17. Why would some people, like Dr. Seward in this story, doubt even the things they see for themselves? What does this teach us about the nature of doubt and unbelief?

2. Read Matthew 11:20-24. How might this passage relate to the second Rhetoric question above?