The Dracula Society

In April 2012, at the centenary of his great-granduncle's death, Dacre, joined by Elizabeth Miller, met with Dracula Society's Chairperson Julia Kruk, Tony Lee, Sir Christopher Frayling and with the Lyceum Theatre's Suko Akuln, to raise a toast to the author of Dracula. In 2013, the Society celebrated its 40th birthday.

In October 1973, it was founded by actors Bernard Davies and Bruce Wightman, originally with the intention to facilitate excursions to Transylvania, still behind the "Iron Curtain" at that time. Over the past decades, the Society has largely broadened its interests and its activities, but still pays a good deal of attention to Bram's novel and the vampire cult it triggered. Important details of our Guide Book's London chapter, like the location of Count De Ville's Piccadilly house, are based on research by Bernard Davies.

The Society is based in London and meets five times per year in the city's centre; it organises lectures, library evenings, auctions, film and video screenings, discussions and pre-Christmas gatherings. At least once a year, there is a trip away from London. In 2003 and 2009, members engaged in Romanian trips, visiting Bistritz, Hotel Castel Dracula, Sighişoara, Tārgovişte, Poenari and Bela Lugosi's birth place in Lugoj, among others. Due to these shared interests and its international contacts with scholars, writers and filmmakers, the Dracula Society has a prominent place in our alliance.

www.thedraculasociety.org.uk