Written in 1897 by Bram Stoker, Dracula tells the story of a battle between a small group men and Dracula who attempts to move from Transylvania to England in search of fresh blood. On the other hand, Heart of Darkness, written in 1899 by Joseph Conrad, expresses Marlow’s obsession with the remarkable and eloquent Kurtz while he travels down the Congo River in Africa. Both novels share a lack of an omniscient narrator who tells us what to think and both have accessibility through the people who have witnessed certain events. Therefore, Dracula and Heart of Darkness showcase the theme of absence in the structure of the novels using an epistolary or frame narrative to provide a limited perspective to the reader. One of the most interesting characteristics that creates absence in Dracula is Stoker’s narration. The table of contents shows that the novel includes journal…show more content… It states that “All matters have been eliminated, so that a history almost at variance with the possibilities of later-day belief may stand forth as simple fact.” Harker concludes the narration saying “It was almost impossible to believe that the things which we had seen with our own eyes and heard with our own ears were living truths. Every trace of all that had been was blotted out.” (402) He reinforces its implausibility by making the reference that in their story “there is hardly one authentic document; nothing but a mass of type-writing” (402) Because of the fragmented narration, readers question the truth even though numerous accounts swear of its validity. Immersed in mystery and absence, readers must solve it on their own terms especially when the narrators do not understand what they encounter or when they start to question their own sanity because they are in contact with individuals they would characterize as monstrous and