Why is the count pale and cold?

[kev67]

I am about a third a way through the book. One thing I find a bit strange is Edmond Dantes strange transmogrification from pleasant young man to a sort of vampire. He's described as having a pale pallor and a cold, clammy touch. You have prison pallor when you first come out of prison, but it goes away when you've been in the sun a bit. I don't know why he'd be cold to touch. Never mind, it's only fiction.

[Pompey Bum]

Dantes was cold to the touch due to his days aboard the Le Pharaon. He was particularly clammy at low tide.

[kev67]

I thought Monté Cristo sounded somewhat vampirish even before the characters started comparing him to one. Monté Cristo takes it in good part. There's a Comtess G_ who calls him Lord Ruthven. The Count hears about it but is not upset. I like Comtess G_. There's no doubting she is an open character.

I think I read of a Lord Ruthven in a book called Anno Dracula. Wikipedia says Lord Ruthven was a vampire from a John William Polidori story. He originated in the same horror story competition in which Mary Shelly thought up Frankenstein. I think until Count Dracula came along, Lord Ruthven was the world's foremost vampire, unless it was my namesake, Varney the Vampire.