Victorian England, as depicted in Bram Stoker’s Dracula was a much different time then the world that we live in today, this much should be obvious. The biggest difference, perhaps, is the one that is seen through the gender roles expressed in the novel. In Victorian England women were expected to maintain their chastity, at least until marriage or they would be shunned from society, or looked down upon. Once married they had “womanly duties” that were expected of them, duties that depended on them taking care of the home sphere of Victorian life. As could be imagined, men were expected to be chivalrous, “knights in shining armor,” who provided and protected for their families. But I feel as if in Dracula, the main characters experience a …show more content…
He makes an honest woman out of Mina and protects her from the dangers posed by Count Dracula, providing and protecting like the male hero he is depicted as. However, there is a part in the novel where this image of Harker being a typical Victorian Era male is shifted: and that is when he is the prisoner at the hand of Dracula’s wives. In many ways, Harker takes on the role of the “Damsel in Distress,” allowing the women to feed off of him without fighting back, and also being rescued from the female vampires by Count Dracula himself. Dracula even claims ownership over Harker, saying, "How dare you touch him, any of you? …This man belongs to me! …Yes, I too can love…I promise you that when I am done with him you shall kiss him at your will" (Stoker 46). In a way this puts Harker in a female position, in the sense that he belongs to Dracula. Following his escape from the castle, we see him questioning his sanity and his reality, going into fits of hysteria, “. . . In his delirium his ravings have been dreadful; of wolves and poison and blood; of ghosts and demons” (Stoker, 131-132). It wasn’t until after his medical recovery after six weeks that he is able to take on that role again, as a true Victorian man who marries and then saves Mina. So, yes, Harker is the image of what a Victorian man …show more content…
For one, he is a Vampire. In Victorian Society as I have previously, it was typical for a man to commit himself to one woman only and vice versa. However, the way that Dracula planned on creating his empire was by seducing several women and using them to turn men. As a vampire, he uses his powers of seduction to control people to do his bidding, and has the effect on both men and women. Because he seduces several women using deception in the cover of night, and drinks their blood so that he can turn them into the undead, he kind of takes on the role of a promiscuous man. Granted his intentions with these women are not the same as a typical man, because he wants to turn them into his vampire servants. But his actions are kind of “taboo” for the time, and may, in some way, show the hidden desires of men during this time period; desires that men couldn’t act on because of the connotation that these desires were associated with during the Victorian era. So Dracula, like many of the other characters in the novel, takes on characteristics that aren’t typically expressed in the particular genders of this time
...have a strong desire to maintain control within and outside of marriage, they also have the support of a male dominated society. Stoker displays this struggle in the main characters of Dracula. Lucy Westerna is the obtuse, innocent, fragile, yet sultry siren of male desire; her aggressive sexual power is threatening to the Victorian man, making her not quite pure enough of mind or strong enough of will to be saved. On the other hand, Mina Murray Harker is a clever, unadulterated, strong, yet motherly woman, the kind of woman all women should strive to be. Therefore she is deemed superlative and worthy of salvage.
“Dracula, in one aspect, is a novel about the types of Victorian women and the representation of them in Victorian English society” (Humphrey). Through Mina, Lucy and the daughters of Dracula, Stoker symbolizes three different types of woman: the pure, the tempted and the impure. “Although Mina and Lucy possess similar qualities there is striking difference between the two” (Humphrey). Mina is the ideal 19th century Victorian woman; she is chaste, loyal and intelligent. On the other hand, Lucy’s ideal Victorian characteristics began to fade as she transformed from human to vampire and eventually those characteristics disappeared altogether. Lucy no longer embodied the Victorian woman and instead, “the swe...
Stoker uses 5 women in total to portray the Women discourse. The first is Mina Murray, a sensible young woman engaged to the main protagonist of the novel, Johnathon Harker. Mina is a highly educated woman for her time and was very fortunate to have a job as a teacher. Ms Murray, as well as being in the women discourse, is also one half of another very important discourse by Stoker: East meets West, or in other words, Traditional vs. . Mina represents the West and the good side of Women, abiding by the laws of society. The East and the evil is represented by Dracula’s three brides.
The passage depicts the unnatural occurrence of the female’s sexual advances, and establishes the link between vampirism and sex that is seen throughout the novel: unlike Mina and Lucy, who are idyllically virtuous and pure, these un-dead women are insatiable and dominant. Stoker takes the fantastic image of the sexual woman to its most extreme manifestation, and suggests that Harker would not only lose his reputation by indulging in these sexual acts, but also his life. The three vampires that Harker encounters in Dracula’s castle are embodiments of the ‘beautiful nightmare’ of the male Victorians; they are representations of everything that the Victorian society states that women should not be – they are sexually aggressive, ‘voluptuous’, and seductive. This sexual proficiency, though appealing, is rebuked and seen to undermine the male dominancy within the patriarchal society, and therefore must be destroyed. The notion that a woman can be both attractive and repulsive is also presented by Angela Carter in The Lady of the House of Love. The character of the countess is presented as both the predator and the prey – the victim and the vixen. Just as the female vampire in Dracula is described as “thrilling and repulsive”, the countess is described as “beautiful and ghastly”. Despite her beauty and “fragility”, the countess
A ‘new woman’ was both determined and independent; it was the start of the breakaway from unequal gender norms and values that we have almost fully established today. Mina was seen as a ‘new woman’ by the other male characters in the novel which was evident in the way she was described. “Ah, that wonderful Madam Mina! She has man’s brain-a brain that a man should have were he much gifted-and a woman’s heart. The good God fashioned her for a purpose, believe me, when He made that so good a combination” (Stoker, 201). Even though this is essentially a sexist comment by today’s standards, this was a compliment of the highest regard given to a woman in the Victorian era. Mina was used by Stoker to represent the changing standards for women. Mina had the job of a school teacher so she had already broken traditional gender roles as other women like her would have been stay-at-home parents and caregivers. She was fully involved in the plans to defeat Count Dracula and her opinion was held in high regard by the male characters in the novel. These qualities were what made her a ‘new woman’. However, she was also representative of the traditional Victorian woman in the things she said and her values on marriage; it was representative of the changing views on male
In Bram Stoker’s novel Dracula, Stoker’s use of inverted gender roles allows readers to grasp the sense of obscureness throughout, eventually leading to the reader’s realization that these characters are rather similar to the “monster” which they call Dracula. Despite being in the Victorian era, Stoker’s use of sexuality in the novel contributes to the reasoning of obscureness going against the Victorian morals and values. Throughout the novel the stereotypical roles of the Victorian man and woman are inverted to draw attention to the similarities between Dracula and the characters. Vague to a majority of readers, Bram Stoker uses Dracula as a negative connotation on society being that the values of the Victorian culture are inverted amongst the sexes of characters, thus pointing out the similarities of the characters and the so called “monster” which they call Dracula.
Each one overcomes the vampire’s temptation of sexual actions to the best of their abilities. Whenever Jonathan Harker is faced with the temptation of the three vampires, he overcomes the seduction long enough for Dracula to stop it, “How dare you cast eyes on him when I had forbidden it? Back I tell you all! He is mine!” (Stoker 44). Although it seems Dracula is trying to be good in saving him, he is just stopping the three female vampires so that he can have Mr. Harker all to himself. So, even though he was almost being “kissed” by the vampires, he overcomes it. Mina, on the other hand, does unwillingly become a vampire; however; even though she tried as
... To push even further, Van Helsing knows that such characteristics and qualities in a woman have no place in the classical Victorian era, so he presumes to commit his murderous act despite her radiance and beauty. A woman that challenges the Victorian ideals is seen as a threat to society and is deemed unfit. This scene illuminates and magnifies upon addressing his strong character by nature, which in many ways contrasts upon Harkers character in the novel. Conclusively, while Bram Stokers novel Dracula is seen as a gothic and horror story, I argue that it is a novel that seeks to address female sexuality directly.
Stoker uses phenomenal imagery to produce a late nineteenth century setting, located somewhere within eastern Europe. Transylvania, the infamous home to Dracula himself, is described in great detail in Harker’s journal. There, Stoker purposely and meticulously outlines Dracula’s castle and the surrounding town. Stoker manages to do this with a very gothic tone, immediately lowering the societal status of women. In conjunction with Dracula’s gothic tone comes the understanding of male and female traditional roles of the era. The reader sees that there is no hesitation differentiating between the two, as Stoker “ cast[s] men as rational, strong, protective and decisive…[and] women as emotional (irrational), weak, nurturing and submissive.” (Tyson, 82).
In reading Bram Stoker's Dracula, I find the treatment of the two main female characters-- Lucy Westenra and Mina Harker-- especially intriguing. These two women are two opposite archetypes created by a society of threatened men trying to protect themselves.
The Victorian England setting and culture of “Dracula” by: Bram Stoker attributes to many stylistic components and character behaviours in the novel. One of which is the behaviour and actions characters express that are a result of sexual repression. In Dracula, sexual repression is best expressed by the character’s desire to create. This desire is exemplified by the way Dracula creates other vampires, Lucy’s sexual desires, and the men’s expression of aggression. The creation of other Vampires is evident through events including Dracula’s aggressive encounters with Lucy and Mina, and the fact the Dracula is building up a Vampire army. Lucy’s sexual desires are exemplified through her longing to have sex with multiple men and how she compares
Despite popular culture today with shows like The Vampire Diaries where vampires are often continuing their daily lives as if they are human and being the heroes to their friends and/or family, Dracula is a depiction of how vampires have, for centuries, been exposed as bloodthirsty, supernatural beings with sexual appeal. The way women are portrayed in Bram Stoker’s, Dracula, is a result of the Victorian ideals. Once Dracula begins to feed on the women, they become bloodthirsty temptresses which are exactly what society fears and try to prevent. In Dracula, Stoker makes sexuality directly linked to the vampirism in the novel. This is seen through the change of Lucy’s somewhat modest behavior into a temptress, the blood-sharing between characters in the novel, and the description of the way Lucy was killed.
Bram Stoker's novel Dracula, published in 1897, explores various sexual erotic possibilities in the vampire's embrace, as discussed by Leonard Wolf. The novel confronts Victorian fears of homosexuality; that were current at the time due to the trial of playwright Oscar Wilde. The vampire's embrace could also be interpreted as an illustration of Victorian fears of the changing role of women. Therefore it is important to consider: the historical context of the novel; the Victorian notion of the `New Woman' specifically the character of Lucy Westenra; the inversion of gender roles; notions of sexuality; and the emasculation of men, by lessening their power over women; in the novel Dracula. In doing this I will be able to explore the effects of the vampire's embrace in depth, and achieve a wider understanding of the variety of erotic undercurrents Stoker incorporated into the novel.
As the saying goes, “Women can do everything Men can do.” In the Gothic Novel Dracula by Bram Stoker, there is a constant theme of sexuality, from both male and females in society. In the Victorian era, the roles of male and females have caused a lot of tension. After reading Dracula, some would argue the roles men and women hold in society. As mentioned in Dr. Seward’s Dairy from Val Halsing., “Ah, that wonderful Madam Mina! She has man’s brain—a brain that a man should have were he much gifted—and a woman’s heart. The good God fashioned her for a purpose, believe me, when He made that so good combination” (Stoker and Hindle, 2003 250). A women’s mind is not the always the first thing on a males mind. Some would overlook what a woman really has to offer.
In Bram Stokers Dracula, the Count Dracula represents a homosexual figure, which in Victorian times was seen as an inversion of the “typical” male figure. Diana Kindron states the Victorian idea of a homosexual was one of a male body being fused with a female soul. This is just what Count Dracula represents in Bram Stoker’s novel, Dracula.