Zagorath @ Zagorath @aussie.zone

Formerly /u/Zagorath on the alien site.

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Not a lot here, and tomorrow is blank entirely as Mina awaits Lucy's reply. Mostly just a functional introduction to the two women, with some hints about their personalities (and the excuse for the conceit of the epistolary format), and a little more exploration of the modern technology theme.

It seems fair to compare Taiwan to Austria pre-1938, IMO. Not a perfect parallel for a variety of reasons, but a few obvious similarities exist.

Fundamentalist protestants hate Catholics almost as much as they hate Jews and Muslims.

Inb4 conservatives blame the Greens…somehow.

Well, today's is a little chunky, though much shorter than this one. But tomorrow is very short, and then there's none on the 10th, and another short one on the 11th. So it's definitely viable to get caught up before the end of the week.

Ah, the shaving scene. This really is a classic. I doubt there's an adaptation of Dracula that doesn't try to do either this scene exactly or something like it. And it's no wonder, because Stoker's writing here is so amazingly vivid and evocative.

A possibly useful note from the endnotes Maurice provides in my copy is that in Norse myth, berserkers were thought to transform into bears or wolves, similar to werewolves. (Technically, I believe, that would be berserkers and ulfsarks, but the idea is there.)

Dracula's monologue at the end here feels like it might have been an addition made quite late in the game, after Stoker decided to tie his novel into the real-world historical figure of Vlad III.

one of my own race who as Voivode crossed the Danube and beat the Turk on his own ground...his own unworthy brother, when he had fallen, sold his people to the Turk and brought the shame of slavery on them

Pretty damn specific stuff about the events of Vlad's life.

It'll be a while now before we see Jonathan again. But don't worry, because tomorrow is the first time we break from book order and we get introduced to Mina and Lucy!

Connections
Puzzle #697
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Skill 99/99
Uniqueness 1 in 181

and strangers will frequently “fill in the blanks” with their own assumptions

Yes, but a large number of strangers with different life experiences can help cancel out any one person's personal baggage.

Read as in, with their eyes? Or how to ingest it into some other app/script? Cos I'm vaguely aware that awk can be used in some way for this, but wouldn't have a clue how.

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The best formatting is to add two spaces at the end of each line. Other options include to "enters" to put a blank line in between, or putting a triple backtick before and after it. But both of those other options don't look as good.

Connections
Puzzle #696
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Skill 98/99
Uniqueness 1 in 83

Just think of it as having extra time to deal with this entry before 8 May goes up.

♪ Transylvania is not England. Our ways are not your ways. ♫ Indeed, a huge amount of that song is lifted pretty directly from this passage. "How few days...make up a century", "I seek not...mirth", "the winds breath through the casements and the battlements are broken". But earlier in the 7 May entry seems to be referenced by Fresh Blood, though that song takes place mostly later. "I am master and Boyar", and the overall theme of needing to move to England where he can blend in and be unknown. I think the extent to which Frank Wildhorn is able to lift nearly word for word from Stoker's text is a testament to the poetic quality of Stoker's writing, and fits well especially when it's Dracula whose dialogue is in this poetic style, given his age and nobility.

Ah, and again a reference to the importance of modern technology. Dracula reads a Bradshaw's Guide, a list of train timetables.

Purfleet, for reference, is in eastern London.

The song Solitary Man might reference how Dracula says he "seeks not mirth", but I think his claim not to seek "much sunshine" and "sparkling waters" is probably more relevant here, as hints as to his nature.

Yup, exactly. I'm trying to put them up at a variety of times so people who are active at different times are more likely to see it.

Posted at about 5 am AEST.

Connections
Puzzle #695
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Skill 88/99
Uniqueness 1 in 10,753

Had to change the time zone on my PC to complete this.

Yeah the blue flames are interesting and there are a fair few discussions online about what's going on with them.

I think this answer on a question technically about a film adaptation, but which mostly tries to answer from the book's perspective, is the best I've found. With the exception that the answer doesn't acknowledge that in all likelihood the driver is Dracula.

Wait, what happens in Acre?

Oh, I see. That seems...very non-obvious, given it only refers to "ICE vehicles", and a certain subset of ICE vehicles are a popular target for vandalism because of their association with the kind of person likely to be a fan of the ICE government department (and because of their even greater overall societal harm than regular vehicles).