I've just read up to chapter 7 and I have just one word for my feelings: Dissapointed! I guess I'm just one of those action people but I really could not enjoy the girl gossip in letters between Mina and Lucy. While it must of course be vital to the book it seemed to me odd to have changed from Harker's description of peril to Mina and Lucy's description of love. While I am sure Stoker is trying to emphasize the difference between the two situations it seems clear that these two situations will become mingled together.
I do, from an acting point of view, enjoy Stoker's use of dramatic irony. When Mina describes her frustration with lack of news from Jonathan her assurance in his saftey due to his previous letters is very dramatic in the sense that the reader starts to feel almost guilty at their knowledge of an event that will be lifechanging for Mina but she doesn't yet know about. All in all though I have to say I didn't enjoy the couple of chapters as much as the first since it seemed to me a more descriptive based section while the opening was more active and more engaging, but I suppose this is the whole function of good novels- they grip you with action and suspense in the opening so as to get you to stick with the book and leave the more detailed explanations (less engaging) to later- I'll consider this for my coursework.
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Yes! I think you're right in regard to the irony built up - and I think this is really what Stoker is trying to set up. Also though - there is a need to link Jonathan's predicament to the 'modern' day of the novel, and therefore Mina and Lucy's correspondence would have portrayed a life very familiar to the readers. Try to look out for references to contemporary late Victorian life.
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