In Dracula, Russophobia informs Bram Stoker's choice of a villain and a locus of evil. Stoker is initially influenced in his youth by the generalized paranoia surrounding Russia during the Crimean War of 1854-1856. As an adult, Stoker comes under the sway of the virulent anti-Russian sentiments of his older brother George, a physician who had served with the Turkish Croissant Rouge during the Russo-Turkish War of 1876-1878. By assisting George in the writing, editing, and publishing of With the Unspeakables; or, Two Years' Campaigning in European and Asiatic Turkey, a travelogue recounting his peregrinations in Asia Minor and observations of the war, Bram Stoker encountered firsthand exceedingly prejudicial descriptions of the conduct of Russian troops and of the Russian character in general, descriptions that would some twenty years later find expression in his depictions of Count Dracula and Transylvania.
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