“Let Me Entreat You, Dr. Seward, Oh, Let Me Implore You, To Let Me Out Of This House At Once. Send

“Let me entreat you, Dr. Seward, oh, let me implore you, to let me out of this house at once. Send me away how you will and where you will; send keepers with me with whips and chains; let them take me in a strait-waistcoat, manacled and leg-ironed, even to a gaol; but let me go out of this. You don’t know what you do by keeping me here. I am speaking from the depths of my heart—of my very soul. You don’t know whom you wrong, or how; and I may not tell. Woe is me! I may not tell. By all you hold sacred—by all you hold dear—by your love that is lost—by your hope that lives—for the sake of the Almighty, take me out of this and save my soul from guilt! Can’t you hear me, man? Can’t you understand? Will you never learn? Don’t you know that I am sane and earnest now; that I am no lunatic in a mad fit, but a sane man fighting for his soul? Oh, hear me! hear me! Let me go! let me go! let me go!” I thought that the longer this went on the wilder he would get, and so would bring on a fit; so I took him by the hand and raised him up. “Come,” I said sternly, “no more of this; we have had quite enough already. Get to your bed and try to behave more discreetly.”

I cannot understate how hard this scene fucks with me.

Renfield knows he needs to be let out, taken somewhere else. And he’s willing to be taken in any way possible, as long as he’s not here. And you can say that maybe he should have lead with that, and not tried to pin the argument on the basis of his sanity. But here’s the thing: He had to do that.

Because he knows they won’t listen to him any other way. He puts fucking effort into sucking up to these guys, appearing like a respectable gentleman, reminding them he used to be a high status rich guy who knew Arthur’s dad, showing he has knowledge of politics and scientific theories. Because that is the only way they will listen to him.

He sees how Seward treats him, he knows that in every interaction Seward sees him as an animal to be prodded at to get certain reactions. He knows he need to appear in a way that fits their narrow definition of “human” if he wants to get anywhere with them.

And it doesn’t work. He can’t make it work. To them he is still a madman in a cell, not truly human. Renfield can try, but he will never be able to fit their standards. And when the break comes, when he sees they still won’t listen and just starts screaming and begging at them, to take him away under any circumstances, Seward tells him to shut up an be more discreet.

And outside, when they wonder if that really was the right decision, they’re still talking about it in terms of if Renfield is sane or not.