R. M. Renfield

R. M. Renfield is a patient who's recently been brought into Dr. Seward's care. Renfield displays an unusual madness, obsessed with the consumption of life. He seems to believe he can draw strength from this, and that the more lives he can consume, the more strength he'll gain. To this end, he keeps animals – flies, which he feeds to spiders, which he feeds to sparrows, which he would like, more than anything, to feed to a cat. He would like very much for Dr. Seward to get him a cat.

In many movie adaptations, Renfield got this way through contact with the Count – he was sent to Transylvania before Jonathan, and came back like this. In the book, it isn't revealed why he has these obsessions. Dracula's arrival drives him further into his madness, and the Count uses the poor man to his own ends.

Renfield's lucidity shifts back and forth unpredictably. Sometimes, he's calm, and much like what he must have been before being brought to the asylum – he's not an idiot. Sometimes, he's violent and manic, and sometimes he's hysterical. Even without Dracula's influence, he's not sane, but he's trying.

Renfield's a rat for a number of reasons. First, it just seemed to match his personality, and invokes a number of little ratty mannerisms which are fun to draw. I've had pet rats, and they're wonderful animals to watch. In the story, Renfield becomes a gage for Dracula's own activity, which is a very archetypally rattish thing to be - sailors watch for rats fleeing their ship, and scientists watch rats for medical research. A lab rat – and Renfield is Jack's lab rat - doesn't benefit from this scrutiny. Despite all the forced service lab rats have done for humankind, they're still seen as disgusting, disease carrying vermin. Even wild rats, though they can carry disease, and do gladly take whatever they want from us, are more than what they seem, if anyone bothers to look.