Paternalism in Bram Stoker's Dracula
Paternalism is the domination of a society by a male or parental figure that leads or governs much like the way a father would direct his family. In Victorian society, the idea of paternalism was prevalent. The idea was also frequently used as a motif in western literature. Bram Stoker's novel Dracula, published in 1897, depicts a paternalistic society through a repression of the female sex and a continuous exaltation of the domineering male sex. Stoker communicates this idea through an abundant use of prominent male characters, the presence of merely two women, who are each extremely suppressed, either sexually or intellectually, and the constant exaltation of the male sex over the female sex.
In a paternalistic society, men are acclaimed as the foundation and the pillar of the social order. Stoker illustrates this facet of paternalism through the use of affluent and prominent male characters. Out of the characters in Dracula that play a major role in the plot development, only two are women with the remainder consisting of influential male members of civilization, all holding high occupations and being well-esteemed by members of society. Through the illustration of a paternalistic society in both the eastern Carpathian and western Britain setting, Stoker illustrates the idea that paternalism was prevalent in all areas during that era.
The aristocratic Dracula's portrayal as the paternal figure of his society, eastern Carpathia, through his relations with the townspeople, especially the gypsies, develops the concept that males in society are domineering and have more influence than females. Dracula directs the peasants and m...
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...racters both to contrast the scant representation of the female sex and to illustrate the repressed traits of females in a male dominated and largely paternal society.
In conclusion, the novel Dracula is an accurate representation of a paternalistic society with symbols and other representations to transition the development of gender politics and female repression that are inherent to that form of social structure.
Works Cited and Consulted:
Birge, Barbara. "Bram Stoker's DRACULA: The Quest for Female Potency in Transgressive Relationships", Psychological Perspectives. 29. 22-36, 1994
Gutjahr, Paul. "Stoker's Dracula-Criticism and Interpretation." Explicator. Fall 1993. 36-40.
Keats, P. "Stoker's Dracula." Explicator. Fall 1991. 26-29.
Stoker, Bram. Dracula. Tom Doherty Associates: New York, 1988.
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Moers, Ellen. "Female Gothic: The Monster's Mother." Reprinted in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Norton Critical Edition. 1976; New York: W. W. Norton, 1996. 214-224.
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