Google doodles for author of Dracula on his 165th birthday

Google’s doodle for today commemorates the birth anniversary of Abraham ‘Bram’ Stoker, or Bram Stoker, as he is still known. Born on this day in 1847, Stoker, an Irish novelist and a short story writer, is best known for his Gothic novel Dracula (1897). Stoker was born in Clontarf, on the northside of Dublin, Ireland, to Abraham Stoker and Charlotte Mathilda Blake Thomley. 

Google’s doodle for today is in line with Stoker’s celebrated work, Dracula. It is complete with the crescent moon hanging in the sky, appearing right behind the castle on the Carpathian Mountains. The doodle features all the other characters of the novel, and has a cloaked Dracula flanking them - the perfect recipe for eeriness. 

Although suffering from a bout of long illness early on in his life, Stoker later faced no major complications and even did well as an athlete. His early career saw a stint with theatre, wherein he became the theatre critic for the Dublin Evening Mail. He soon came in contact with Henry Irving, after he gave a positive review of the latter's Hamlet at the Theatre Royal in Dublin. 

The doodle is the perfect representation of Stoker's best work

It was around in 1897 that Stoker's celebrated work, Dracula, came into being. During this time, Stoker was with the literary staff of the London Daily Telegraph. Around this time, he is known to have written several other fiction novels, including the The Lady of the Shroud (1909) in the horror genre. Dracula may have born out of Stoker's meeting with Armin Vambery, a Hungarian writer and traveller. It is believed that the plot may have been out of his tales. Stoker backed Dracula with several years of research on the European folklore and other mythological stories of vampires. 

Stoker breathed his last on April 20, 1912, the cause of which is said to be overwork. 

Google never ceases to surprise us with its doodles. No wonder then there is so much buzz about the search giant’s annual Doodle4Google contest that is currently underway. Google India has announced the names of 12 finalists from across the nation, who will now present their best doodles to Indian netizens. Voting for the best doodle out of the 12 shortlisted started on November 5 and ends on November 10. You can vote at www.google.co.in/doodle4google. 

The theme for this year’s contest is Unity in Diversity. “Bring alive the things you think are uniquely different and diverse, yet unite India and make it into a doodle,” as Google puts it. 

Giving a glimpse into the competition thus far, Google shares that this year’s D4G participants were grouped into three categories: Group 1 comprising students from class 1 to 3; Group 2 with students from class 4 to 6; and Group 3 with students from class 7 to 10. Google received over 2 lakh entries, initially that went through a round of preliminary judging by film and theatre actor Boman Irani and political cartoonist Ajit Ninan.