Vlad the Impaler: In Search of the Real Dracula [Hardcover]

M. J Trow (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 25, 2003

Layers of myth and history are peeled back to reveal the real Vlad the Impaler.

Editorial Reviews

Review

The Count Dracula of legend is revealed to be based on a 15th century Romanian warlord called Vlad Tepes who favoured fearsome night attacks on the Turks and torturing his captors by driving stakes through their bodies in this grimly fascinating piece of historical detective work. If there is such a beast as a 'Draculanorak', then this is the book they've been waiting for. Among fascinating snippets unearthed are the fact that Christopher Lee wore red contact lenses for those blood-red eyeballs in the Hammer films, and the former dictator Nicolae Ceaucescu once said smugly to his health visitor: "A man like me comes along only once every five hundred years". The author, a crime novelist and historian, wonders: "Was his predecessor, five hundred years earlier, Vlad Dracula, the Impaler?"

About the Author

M.J. Trow is a crime novelist and historian. He teaches history at a school on the Isle of Wight. His novels include the Lestrade series for Macmillan/Constable and the Maxwell series for Hodder. His non-fiction includes Who Killed Kit Marlowe? (Sutton,2000).

Product Details

• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: The History Press (June 25, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0750929650
• ISBN-13: 978-0750929653
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.4 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 2.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,596,915 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

38 of 38 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars This book could use better editing, December 5, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Vlad the Impaler: In Search of the Real Dracula (Hardcover)

I am no expert on Dracula but my historical sensibilities have been offended by several serious errors in the text. Here are just two examples: on pages 9-10 Mr. Trow writes:

"...Oliver Cromwell, whose head ... may or may not have been separated from his body..."

It is a well-known fact that Cromwell's head definitely had been separated from his body, and found its lonely grave only in 1960.

On page 123 we find the following fragment about Jan Zizka:

"...he had fought for the Teutonic Order against the Poles...
Losing an eye at Tannenberg in 1410 fighting for Wenceslas..."

These two incomplete sentences contain four mistakes. First, Zizka fought FOR the Poles AGAINST the Teutonic Order. Second, he did so at the battle of Tannenberg in 1410, therefore he couldn't fight there for Wenceslas. Third, the unnamed battle from the first sentence and the battle of Tannenberg/Grunwald are one and the same event. Fourth, Zizka lost an eye in his adolescence.

In short, this book could really benefit from knowledgeable editing.

31 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars A major disappointment, November 6, 2003

By 

Dr Elizabeth Miller (Toronto, Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Vlad the Impaler: In Search of the Real Dracula (Hardcover)

I was very disappointed in this book. While the history sections are reasonably solid, the author falls into the usual traps whenever he tries to make links between the historical Vlad and the Dracula of Bram Stoker's novel. Numerous times he states speculation as if it were fact. Worse, he makes statements that any reader of the novel "Dracula" would know are ludicrous: for example, that at the end of the story, Count Dracula has a stake driven through his heart; or that Dracula is unable to function during the day. To be fair to the author, I plan to write him directly and elaborate on all the flaws I found in the book. Maybe in a second edition (if there is one) they can be corrected. In the meantime, if you are looking for a reliable book on Vlad without all the nonsense about his being the inspiration for Stoker's novel, stick with "Vlad III Dracula" by Kurt Treptow.

Dr. Elizabeth Miller
www.ucs.mun.ca/~emiller [Dracula's homepage]

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Vampirism and the Real Dracula, February 19, 2005

By 

J. N. W. Bos "Joan" (Utrecht, The Netherlands) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Vlad the Impaler: In Search of the Real Dracula (Paperback)

Although the book has several chapters about vampirism and Bram Stoker's Dracula, the remaining chapters about Vlad Tepes are very detailed and a good read. Vlad surely was one of the most cruel tyrants ever and his atrocities are described with much detail. Contemporaries wrote about the "untold abuses, sad murders and mutilations by the cruel tyrant Dracula" and the author discusses the sources and their reliability by their level of interest in blackening Vlad. According to Trow, many of Vlad Dracula's acts can be interpreted as efforts to enforce his own moral code upon his country and to strengthen and modernise the central government at the expense of the nobility, because they had repeatedly undermined the power of the Wallachia's rulers (and buried alive his elder brother).
An interesting section describes the `usual' way of impalement and the most likely way used by Vlad in the case of mass impalements or when a mother was impaled together with her baby.