Dracula Daily (Kirkland, 2021) is an excellent example of a recontextualised or digitised literary text (Lysaught, 2022a). Kirkland has updated Stoker’s original 1897 Dracula for modern readers by recontextualising it as a narrative delivered episodically via a free email subscription. Dracula Daily conforms to many definitions of digitised works (Strickland, n.d.; Hayles, 2007, para.10; Bourchardon & Heckman, 2012, p1; Heckman & O’Sullivan, 2018, para.4), since Stoker’s original was conceived for the print medium. It might also be designated as a ‘paper-under-glass’ text (Allan, 2017, p.22). However, Kirkland’s recontextualisation cleverly utilises many features of the digital environment to enhance readers’ understanding, which is a key consideration when evaluating digital literature (Lysaught, 2022b) and not unique to ‘born digital’ texts.

Firstly, the novel’s content is largely unchanged, but Kirkland enhances the original’s epistolary form by delivering the narrative gradually to subscribers’ inboxes on the date each event occurred (Kirkland, 2022, para.1), helping readers build a sense of time. In the original, it feels like the characters speed through the plot. Dracula Daily is delivered in instalments from May to November, allowing readers to gain a sense of just how much time passes. This also builds on the original’s suspense – a key element of the Gothic genre, since readers must await the next instalment instead of reading ahead. Although this chronological delivery loses some of the original’s dramatic irony, footnotes in misordered entries remind readers of key plot points while the reader’s anticipation of the next portion emulates the characters’ anticipation as they put together the clues about Dracula. While not technically an interactive feature – an element important to digital literature (Lysaught, 2022b) – this digitised recontextualisation allows readers to form a closer vicarious connection to the characters and events than the original. 

Secondly, innovative use of email technology evokes the optimistic modernity present in Stoker’s novel. One of the key tensions in the original is the dichotomy between the modern and the traditional. By updating Stoker’s printed text to a digital environment, Kirkland has recaptured the sense of technological innovation that Mina, Jonathan and the others champion through their use of now-outdated communicative developments such as short-hand, phonographs, typewriters, and telegraphs.

Finally, Kirkland’s daily delivery and recontextualisation of Dracula in a digital format allows the expansion of the novel into other adjacent digital spaces. Towndrow and Kogut (2020, p.14, 148) argue that “digital storytelling is fundamentally an active social process” while Leu et al. (2011, p.6-8) posit that collaborative, social practices are one key difference between online and offline reading experiences. Likewise, Valenza and Stephens (2012, p.75-77) assert the relationship between author, reader, and text is evolving alongside the reading experience due to the rise of socially connected digital communities; Skaines agrees (2010, p.96, 102). Dracula Daily is popular on social media sites such as Twitter and Tumblr, with discussions expanding into new digital spaces and offering readers opportunities to connect with the text and other readers in ways Stoker could never have imagined. Stepanic (2022, p.2) notes Dracula Daily’s social media popularity taps into modern snark and meme culture. In an age of on-demand entertainment consumption, Dracula Daily harkens back to the days of ‘appointment viewing’ and allows for a flourishing “ecosystem” (Stepanic, 2022, p.2) of online content to develop, further enhancing readers’ engagement and interaction with the text in new contexts. It also democratises Stoker’s classic text, opening it up for interpretation and engagement with new audiences on new platforms.

However, this expansion into adjacent online spaces raises further questions around how we define and categorise digital texts. While I categorise Dracula Daily as a recontextualised or digitised literary text due to Kirkland’s transformation of the printed original to a digital environment, Kitson defines electronically augmented texts as ones where online resources expand opportunities for commentary, interpretation, and engagement  (2017, p.59). Dracula Daily could arguably be an electronically augmented text, highlighting the difficulty around defining nebulous digital literature. 

This text is certainly not without criticism. The email format and associated substack archive of past episodes is difficult to navigate, lacking the ability to move easily between posts. Kirkland’s digital reworking of Stoker’s original removes many peritextual elements which enhanced verisimilitude, such as the note explaining that all documents were truthful reflections of actual events. However, new peritextual features are added; each episode features funny captions which encourage the cynical, irreverent tone of the aforementioned online discussions and maintain the narrative’s relevance for modern audiences. 

Dracula Daily could potentially use more features offered by its new digital format, such as interactive maps, images, and sounds which could further enhance readers’ engagement and understanding. However, anecdotal discussions with students in my Year 11 English Extension class reveal it’s an engaging way to explore the original; recently I’ve enjoyed having my students run up excitedly to discuss the latest instalment. Dracula Daily could be a meaningful resource to study alongside Stoker’s Dracula, and can inspire similar recontextualisations with other texts as a learning activity to explore how we value literature and how responses to texts change over time.

 

 

814 words.

Reference list:

Allan, C. (2017). Digital fiction: ‘Unruly object’ or literary artefact? English in Australia, 52(2), 21-27.

Bourchardon, S., & Heckman, D. (2012). Digital manipulability and digital literature. Electronic Book Review.

Hayles, K. (2007). Electronic literature: What is it? https://www.eliterature.org/pad/elp.html

Heckman, D., O’Sullivan, J. (2018). Electronic literature: contexts and poetics. Literary Studies in the Digital Age: An Evolving Anthology.

Kirkland, M. (2021). Archive. Dracula Daily. https://draculadaily.substack.com/archive

Kirkland, M. (2022). About. Dracula Daily. https://draculadaily.substack.com/about

Kitson, L. (2017). Exploring opportunities for literary literacy with e-literature: To infinity and beyond. Australian Literacy Educators’ Association. Literacy Learning, 23(2), 58-68.

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Lysaught, D. (2022b, August 14). ETL533 Evaluating digital literature: Deeper considerations. All You Read Is Love. https://thinkspace.csu.edu.au/allyoureadislove/2022/08/14/etl533-evaluating-digital-literature-deeper-considerations/

Skaines, R. L. (2010). The shifting author-reader dynamic: online novel communities as a bridge from print to digital literature. Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies, 16(1), 95–111.

Stepanic, S. (2022, May 20). ‘Dracula Daily’ reanimates the classic vampire novel for the age of memes and snark. The Conversation.

Strickland, S. (n.d.). Born digital. Poetry Foundation. https://www.poetryfoundation.org/articles/69224/born-digital

Towndrow, P. A., & Kogut, G. (2020). Digital storytelling for educative purposes: providing an evidence-base for classroom practice. Studies in Singapore Education: Research Innovation & Practice 1. Singapore: Springer.

Valenza, J. K., & Stephens, W. (2012). Reading remixed. Educational Leadership, 69(6), 75-78.