Abraham Stoker was an Irish author who wrote the 1897 Gothic horror novel Dracula. During his life, he was better known as the personal assistant of actor Sir Henry Irving and business manager of the West End's Lyceum Theatre, which Irving owned.
Dracula is a 1897 Gothic horror novel by Irish author Bram Stoker. An epistolary novel, the narrative is related through letters, diary entries, and newspaper articles. It has no single protagonist and opens with solicitor Jonathan Harker taking a business trip to stay at the castle of a Transylvanian nobleman, Count Dracula. Harker escapes the castle after discovering that Dracula is a vampire, and the Count moves to England and plagues the seaside town of Whitby. A small group, led by Abraham Van Helsing, attempt to kill him.
Henri René Albert Guy de Maupassant was a 19th-century French author, celebrated as a master of the short story, as well as a representative of the naturalist school, depicting human lives, destinies and social forces in disillusioned and often pessimistic terms.
Syphilis is a sexually transmitted infection caused by the bacterium Treponema pallidum subspecies pallidum. The signs and symptoms depend on the stage it presents: primary, secondary, latent or tertiary. The primary stage classically presents with a single chancre, though there may be multiple sores. In secondary syphilis, a diffuse rash occurs, which frequently involves the palms of the hands and soles of the feet. There may also be sores in the mouth or vagina. Latent syphilis has no symptoms and can last years. In tertiary syphilis, there are gummas, neurological problems, or heart symptoms. Syphilis has been known as "the great imitator", because it may cause symptoms similar to many other diseases.
Eliza Rosanna Gilbert, Countess of Landsfeld, better known by the stage name Lola Montez, was an Irish dancer and actress who became famous as a Spanish dancer, courtesan, and mistress of King Ludwig I of Bavaria, who made her Gräfin von Landsfeld. At the start of the Revolutions of 1848 in the German states, she was forced to flee. She proceeded to the United States via Austria, Switzerland, France and London, to return to her work as an entertainer and lecturer.
Comte Henri Marie Raymond de Toulouse-Lautrec-Monfa, known as Toulouse-Lautrec, was a French painter, printmaker, draughtsman, caricaturist, and illustrator whose immersion in the colourful and theatrical life of Paris in the late 19th century allowed him to produce a collection of enticing, elegant, and provocative images of the sometimes decadent affairs of those times.
John Hunter was a Scottish surgeon, one of the most distinguished scientists and surgeons of his day. He was an early advocate of careful observation and scientific methods in medicine. He was a teacher of, and collaborator with, Edward Jenner, pioneer of the smallpox vaccine. He paid for the stolen body of Charles Byrne, and proceeded to study and exhibit it against the deceased's explicit wishes. His wife, Anne Hunter (née Home), was a poet, some of whose poems were set to music by Joseph Haydn.
Professor Abraham Van Helsing is a fictional character from the 1897 gothic horror novel Dracula written by Bram Stoker. Van Helsing is a Dutch polymath doctor with a wide range of interests and accomplishments, partly attested by the string of letters that follows his name: "MD, D.Ph., D.Litt., etc.", indicating a wealth of experience, education and expertise. He is a doctor, professor, lawyer, philosopher, scientist, and metaphysician. The character is best known through many adaptations of the story as a vampire slayer, monster hunter and the arch-nemesis of Count Dracula, and the prototypical and the archetypal parapsychologist in subsequent works of paranormal fiction. Some later works tell new stories about Van Helsing, while others, such as Dracula (2020) and I Woke Up a Vampire (2023) have characters that are his descendants.
Theodorus van Gogh was a Dutch art dealer and the younger brother of Vincent van Gogh. Known as Theo, his support of his older brother's artistic ambitions and well-being allowed Vincent to devote himself entirely to painting. As an art dealer, Theo van Gogh played a crucial role in introducing contemporary French art to the public.
The health of Adolf Hitler, dictator of Germany from 1933 to 1945, has long been a subject of popular controversy. Both his physical and mental health have come under scrutiny.
Caitlín Rebekah Kiernan is an Irish-born American paleontologist and writer of science fiction and dark fantasy works, including 10 novels, series of comic books, and more than 250 published short stories, novellas, and vignettes. Kiernan is a two-time recipient of both the World Fantasy and Bram Stoker awards.
The Scholomance was a fabled school of black magic in Romania, especially in the region of Transylvania. Folkloric accounts state that it was run by the Devil himself. The school enrolled about ten students to become the Solomonari. Courses taught included the speech of animals and magic spells. One of the graduates was chosen by the Devil to be the Weathermaker and tasked with riding a dragon to control the weather.
There is no consensus on Vincent van Gogh's health. His death in 1890 is generally accepted to have been a suicide. Many competing hypotheses have been advanced as to possible medical conditions that he may have had. These include epilepsy, bipolar disorder, borderline personality disorder, sunstroke, acute intermittent porphyria, lead poisoning, Ménière's disease, schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder, substance use disorder, non-suicidal self-injury disorder ("self-harm"), and a possible anxiety disorder.
The legacy of absinthe as a mysterious, addictive, and mind-altering drink continues to this day. Though its psychoactive effects and chemical makeup are contested, its cultural impact is not. Absinthe has played a notable role in the fine art movements of Impressionism, Post-Impressionism, Surrealism, Modernism, Cubism and in the corresponding literary movements. The legendary drink has more recently appeared in movies, video, television, music, and contemporary literature. The modern absinthe revival has had a notable effect on its portrayal. It is often shown as an unnaturally glowing green liquid demonstrating the influence of contemporary marketing efforts.
Anno Dracula: The Bloody Red Baron, or simply The Bloody Red Baron, is a 1995 alternate history/horror novel by British author Kim Newman. It is the second book in the Anno Dracula series and takes place during the Great War, 30 years after the first novel.
Abraham Lincoln's health has been the subject of both contemporaneous commentary and subsequent hypotheses by historians and scholars. Until middle age, his health was fairly good for the time. He contracted malaria in 1830 and 1835; the latter was the worse of the two cases. He contracted smallpox in 1863 during an 1863 to 1864 epidemic in Washington, D.C.
The first recorded outbreak of syphilis in Europe occurred in 1494/1495 in Naples, Italy, during a French invasion. Because it was spread geographically by French troops returning from that campaign, the disease was known as "French disease", and it was not until 1530 that the term "syphilis" was first applied by the Italian physician and poet Girolamo Fracastoro. The causative organism, Treponema pallidum, was first identified by Fritz Schaudinn and Erich Hoffmann in 1905 at the Charité Clinic in Berlin. The first effective treatment, Salvarsan, was developed in 1910 by Sahachiro Hata in the laboratory of Paul Ehrlich. It was followed by the introduction of penicillin in 1943.
Prostitution in Impressionist painting was a common subject in the art of the period. Prostitution was a very widespread phenomenon in nineteenth-century Paris and although an accepted practice among the nineteenth century bourgeoisie, it was nevertheless a topic that remained largely taboo in polite society. As a result, Impressionist works depicting the prostitute often became the subject of scandal, and particularly venomous criticism. Some works showed her with considerable sympathy, while others attempted to impart an agency to her; likewise some work showed high-class courtesans, and others prostitutes awaiting clients on the streets. In addition to the sexual revulsion/attraction the figure of the prostitute stirred, she functioned as a sign of modernity, a clear sign of the entanglement of sex, class, power and money.
Powers of Darkness is an anonymous 1899 Swedish version of Bram Stoker's 1897 novel Dracula, serialised in the newspaper Dagen and credited only to Bram Stoker and the still-unidentified "A—e."
The Hangover (Suzanne Valadon) (French: Gueule de Bois), also known as The Drinker (French: La Buveuse), is a late 1880s, oil-on-canvas painting by French artist Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. The painting was created just before he became successful as an artist. It depicts a drunken woman drinking alone in a club, reflecting the counterculture of Montmartre and the spectre of alcoholism among French women during the Belle Époque. The model in The Hangover is artist Suzanne Valadon, Lautrec's lover. In the early 1880s, after falling from a circus trapeze at the age of 15 and suffering a back injury, Valadon began working as an art model in Montmartre. She had been drawing all her life, but now she pursued a career as an artist, becoming the first woman painter admitted to the Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts.
