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Blood symbolism in dracula
Blood symbolism in dracula
The history of vampires short essay
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Renfield is not yet a vampire, but he longs to be one. So much so that he begins to eat organisms, starting with flies, spiders, and birds. This obsession with vampirism drives him to be seen as mentally insane, which shows that Dracula is not only physically strong, but also mentally manipulative. Since Dracula has the power to convert Renfield into a vampire, there is a bond created that will exist until the conversion happens. By remaining in the human form, Renfield serves as a link between humans and the supernatural world. Renfield is also important due to the fact that he provides insight into Dracula’s whereabouts. Without Renfield, this connection would be lost and the quest for Dracula’s death would become much more difficult for …show more content…
In Dracula, sleep represents the susceptibility to vampirism. A person is most vulnerable in his or her sleep. Physically they are in a tranquil state of being. Mentally, people are in another state of mind (dreaming). This is why Lucy has someone who stays in her room while she sleeps. Since she is unable to protect herself against forces of evil while sleeping, she requires assistance from an able-bodied guard. Jonathan’s closest coming to death occurs when he is at Dracula’s castle. The Count warns him by saying “should you leave these rooms you will not by any chance go to sleep in any other part of the castle” (Stoker 38). The one time that Jonathan does accidentally fall asleep in another room, he is almost bitten by the three brides of Dracula. Also, Lucy is bitten while she is sleep walking. This is because she is unable to defend herself because she is not aware of what is going on around her.
3. Blood represents life as well as the transfer of life from one person to another. This is particularly seen in two instances. Renfield yells out “the blood is the life! The blood is the life” (155). This is in response to him cutting open Seward’s wrist and licking up the blood from the floor. Renfield attempts to live as a vampire until his time comes to be one. The whole objective of spreading vampirism is asserting one’s dominance over another. Essentially, vampires take a person’s life in order to provide eternal life to
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Arthur is Lucy’s true love and says “my life is hers, and I would give the last drop of blood in my body for her” (134). Not only is he speaking symbolically of his life, but also literally in the sense that he would give up all of his blood, which would take his life and give it to her. After the blood transfusions, Lucy has “the blood of four strong men” inside of her (165). This also displays the superiority of men over women, meaning that the blood (life) of a woman is not of equal value to that of a man.
4. During this time period, fin de siècle brought upon fears of the unknown dealing with the turn of the century. Many of these fears were due to the unfamiliarity that was to come. Technology also began to modernize which can be seen throughout the entire novel. Blood transfusions were a medical breakthrough that had not been very common at the time. Also, many people switched to using telegrams rather than writing hand written letters. However, technology, past and present, has a tendency to falter. This caused some of the telegrams to delay, which slightly altered some of the events in the
Dracula can turn humans into the Undead. An example is the three women whom he has turned into vampires, creatures of the night. Renfield desires to be made into a creature of the night. He views Dracula as his master and seeks only to serve him. Lucy is made into a vampire by Dracula. However, the most memorable person he has given birth t...
In All the Pretty Horses, Cormac McCarthy uses blood as a unifying concept allowing it to flow within the body of the text; the reader gets a sense that the novel is giving life to someone while simultaneously bringing upon its death. The reality of John Grady exists within the use of blood, connecting his life to the natural beauty and animals through which his character emerges. Blood is essential for the human race; we need it to live, once having bled we learn and if we lose it all, we die. Nonetheless, blood associates us to the world around us; its flow so similar to the flowing waters, its color so alive and “nothing can be proven except that it is made bleed.” (p.230)
To begin, the author incorporates the act of Religion to parish off the malicious Dracula. When Jonathan Harker is shaving, Dracula emerges behind him without seeing his reflection in Jonathan 's mirror. stunned, Jonathan ends up cutting his face. Dracula replies: “When the Count saw my face, his eyes blazed with a sort of demoniac fury, and he suddenly made a grab at my throat. I drew
The late nineteenth century Irish novelist, Bram Stoker is most famous for creating Dracula, one of the most popular and well-known vampire stories ever written. Dracula is a gothic, “horror novel about a vampire named Count Dracula who is looking to move from his native country of Transylvania to England” (Shmoop Editorial Team). Unbeknownst of Dracula’s plans, Jonathan Harker, a young English lawyer, traveled to Castle Dracula to help the count with his plans and talk to him about all his options. At first Jonathan was surprised by the Count’s knowledge, politeness, and overall hospitality. However, the longer Jonathan remained in the castle the more uneasy and suspicious he became as he began to realize just how strange and different Dracula was. As the story unfolded, Jonathan realized he is not just a guest, but a prisoner as well. The horror in the novel not only focuses on the “vampiric nature” (Soyokaze), but also on the fear and threat of female sexual expression and aggression in such a conservative Victorian society.
While Cullen chose the path of compassion and became a doctor (Meyers, 2005; pp. 339), the Count planned to invade the British empire (Stoker, 1897/2001; pp. 328). Healing or invading, both can get lonely with time. Cullen, as a physician had decided to turn a human into vampires only if he could save them from death. All the humans that Cullen changed, he called them as his family. They were part of his coven and moved with him wherever he went (Meyer, 2005). On the other hand, count Dracula took by force and against the will of his victims. He possessed the power to hypnotize and control his victims, as he controlled Mina when he forced her to drink his blood (Stoker, 1897/2001). He lives with three beautiful female vampires in his castle, but their relationship to the Count is not clarified in the book. In chapter 3, when they are scolded by the Count for attacking Harker, they taunt him that he does not love, Dracula responds that “Yes, I too can love; you yourselves can tell it from the past” (Stoker 1897/2001; pp. 39). Although they exist in the castle and are fed by the count as noted in Jonathan’s diary entry, Dracula has no apparent interest in them. Similarly, after he changes Lucy Westenra to a vampire he stops visiting her. He feels no need to connect or form relationships with the humans he changes. As immortals, both Cullen and Count Dracula are destined to
This begins with Jonathan Harker's journal, in which he records his adventures in the Carpathians. This is important, because his journal is an important clue in finally determining what exactly is happening. His fiancé, and later wife, Mina transcribes the journal, and then shows it to Dr. Van Helsing, a noted physician, attorney, philosopher, and metaphysicist. Through the journal, Van Helsing is able to determine what exactly happened to Lucy, who earlier in the novel was a victim of The Count. The phonographic journal of Dr. Seward was useful in observing Mr. Renfield, also a victim of Dracula, who the protagonists used in order to locate The Count's London abode.
That morning he is to leave, a crowd is awaiting him and muttering strange things. Harker says, "I could hear a lot of words often repeated, queer words" (Stoker 6) to address his confusion about what was going on around him. He Count Dracula, a hermit who lives on a cliff, detached from society, strikes at night to find anyone alone--whom he considers easy prey. A prime example of one of these victims is Lucy Westenra, who ends up outside in the middle of the night after she sleeps walks to the town square. When Mina Murray finds her, she describes the discovery, “There was undoubtedly something, long and black, bending over the half-reclining white figure.”
Dracula's foreign nature and supernatural presence proceeds his perception as other, being a vampire from Transylvania seeking to invade England.In conversation with Jonathan Harker, Dracula emphasizes his abnormal ways professing his foreign identity. “‘Our ways are not your ways, and there shall be to you many strange things. Nay, from what you have told me of your experiences already, you know something of what strange things there may be.’”(Stoker 42) Dracula not only confesses to his strange nature he owns it while confirming with Harker from his early experience traveling to the castle. This statement by Dracula indicates his foreign nature
His main victims, Lucy and Mina, are the best examples of how he expresses these desires. Lucy Westenra is the first victim and the first point of emphasis for Dracula's desire to create in the novel. Once Dracula arrives in Whitby a mysteriousness comes about Lucy. She is sleep walking and seems like she has someplace to go or someone to get to. Mina observes this unusual sleepwalking “Strangely enough, Lucy did not wake; but she got up twice and dressed herself” (Stoker 74). The notion of sleepwalking describes the fact that Dracula is somehow trying to draw Lucy to give in and execute his creative desires. Eventually, Lucy escapes from her room, not seen by Mina and is later found in the middle of a graveyard. This is where Dracula executes his desires and makes Lucy his victim: “There was undoubtedly something, long and black, bending over the half-reclining white figure….I could see a white face and red, gleaming eyes” (79). This mysterious figure is Dracula and his making of vampire Lucy was marked with two hole punctures in her neck. These punctures are made from a bite. This action of biting someone's neck is both aggressive and sexual. A pleasure spot on a human beings body is the neck, it is sensitive to the touch of fingers/lips. It is an arousal technique and it just so happens that this is the common method for Dracula to create his vampires. This is a direct evidence to the unleashing of Dracula`s sexual repressions. Dracula’s desire to create and releasing of sexual repressions is also evident when he victimizes Mina. After Lucy’s death, Dracula goes after Mina and the first major event evident to this is when he makes her drink his blood through his chest. “Her white nightdress was smeared with blood, and a thin stream trickled down the man’s bare breast which was shown by his torn open dress” (242). The notion of blood and Mina being victimized by having to suck
When Van Helsing figured out what was happening to Lucy he told Dr. Seward and after Lucy passed away the men went to where she was buried and it had been weeks and her body. The sight they saw was “more radiant and beautiful than ever; and I could not believe that she was dead. The lips were red maybe redder than before” (Stoker 171). This line should that Lucy turned into a vampire because Dracula had been sucking her blood. Jonathan Harker was also a victim of Dracula’s games but he fought through his mental trauma with the help of his Wife, Mina. The rein of Dracula’s evil ways came to an end and although Lucy lost her future, all of her friends were finally safe from
Renfield is presented to the audience as a dapper young man who wears a suit and carries a cane. The cane is especially important because it is a symbol of power that is later taken by Dracula, making Renfield subservient to him. Another example of the subordination of Renfield to Dracula occurs when Renfield enters Dracula’s castle. The camera angle portrays Renfield as a small figure in comparison to the vast space of the castle, thus reducing his power relative to that of Dracula as the novel showed. Overall, although Renfield becomes more important to the film by replacing Johnathan at the beginning, he remains a servant of Dracula in both the novel and
Dracula is “un-dead”, once human before his vampire state and clearly separate from human form, establishing his frightening allure. His fangs, hands and sharp nails are horrifying up close. He is not corpse at first look, mysteriously resisting the decay of death. Dr. Seward comments, “she was, if possible, more radiantly beautiful than ever; and I could not believe she was dead” on Lucy’s vampire state (Stoker 200). At several points in the novel Dracula is life like, “simply gorged with blood; he lay like a leech, exhausted with his repletion” (Stoker 52). The monstrous life in death is an “essential gift of Stoker’s vampires to the twentieth century; a reminder, not of the dreadfulness of death, but the innate horror of vitality” ( Auerbach 95). Edward is opposite in appearance to Dracula. The venom from the bite that transforms human into vampire freezes their appearance forever. Edward was bitten at 17, and never labeled as horrifying.
Stoker has rendered the reader to see the Count as physically strong and powerful, through Jonathan Harker and his confinement and Lucy Westenra and her failing health. Although the reader does not understand all the omniscient powers and control that Count Dracula possesses over people, they are brought to light through Dr Steward’s accounts of his patient R.M. Renfield. The ‘strange and sudden change’ (Stoker, 86), that has happened in Renfield evokes the reader to contemplate the Count’s influence over people. Dr Steward suggests it is as though a ‘religious mania has seized’ Renfield (Stoker, 87), and is controlling him. The reader is aware that Renfield can feel the Counts presence and that there is a connection between them. This eventually leads Van Helsing to recognize the bond between Mina Harker and the Count, which helps them to find Dracula and finally kill him. Dracula’s invasion over Renfield also reveals a weakness in the Counts power. Renfield, an obedient servant of Dracula, claims he is ‘here to do Your bidding, Master. I am Your slave’ (Stoker, 88). Renfield’s devotion is quickly reversed when he sees that the Count is taking life from Mina. It is his care for her that causes him to turn against Dracula and try to fight for her. Again Renfield’s actions mimic that of the other men as it becomes their goal to save Mina from the invasion running through her body. The key to this invasion is the blood.
‘Dracula’ is a novel that probes deeply into people’s superstitions, fears and beliefs of the supernatural. The creature Dracula is an evil being with no concern for others, he kills for his own ends and cannot be stopped, and this is what makes ‘Dracula’ truly frightening.
Symbols are present in every person’s daily life. Symbols are seen everywhere, whether it is through art, religion, culture, or road signs, they are all around. Blood is a symbol that is seen in art, religion, literature and many other visual forms. Its direct connection to the human body is a significant aspect of its symbolism. People in the medieval period, which was right before Shakespeare’s time, thought that the blood was a person’s life force, and to some extent they were right. Literature uses blood to represent a variety of things such as a character’s desires, emotions and conscience. In the play “Macbeth,” by William Shakespeare, blood symbolizes many things, however, the most significant