When was Dracula written?
1897
Who wrote Dracula?
Bram Stoker
What type of novel is Dracula?
Epistolary novel - type of text comprised of letters, newspapers, journals etc
Gothic elements in Dracula
- Conventional gothic setting: ruined castle in the the foreign land of Transylvania
- Reversed gender roles: Harker is the one trapped rather than a damsel in distress; Harker almost dies at the hands of three female vampires - which highlights the novel’s anxieties about the threat of female sexuality.
- Lucy and Mina: embodiment of moral goodness - classical Gothic heroines - Mina has the resourcefulness of a heroine
- Supernatural threats: wolves, vampires (Dracula crawling on the walls)
- Stoker moves back to “familiarity” - but heroes face vampirism in the own home - suggesting vulnerability: highlighting the novel’s anxieties about immigration
Themes in Dracula
- Modernity + science vs supernatural
- Consequences of modernity
- Threat of female sexuality
- Promise of Christian salvation
- Madness
- Fear of Outsiders
- Money
Characters
- Dracula
- Johnathon Harker
- Mina Harker
- Lucy Holmwood
- Dr Seward
- Van Helsing
- Arthur Holmwood
- Renfield
- Three female vampires
- Mr Swales
- Quincey Morris
Summary
Harker, as a solicitor, goes to Dracula’s castle in TRANSYLVANIA to help him buy a house in England. Dracula gets Harker to send letters to Mina. IMPORTANT: the mirror, Harker shaving, not seeing Dracula - sees red eyes. Harker is about to hit Dracula when he wakes, and hits Dracula in the head instead. Creating a gash
Mina’s journal next: Lucy had 3 marriage proposals in one day. Lucy engages to Arthur - They are in WHITBY.
Log of the Demeter. Spooky techniques. Lucy gets infected by Dracula - blood transfusions (science). Van Helsing arrives. Lucy dies, she becomes the Bloofer Lady/the undead - rationality is finally lost in characters to be able to understand vampires exist. She almost kills Arthur.
Focus goes to Mina, but especially Dr Seward with RENFIELD, because Renfield is acting stranger. Mina becomes the captain, the motherly figure who is later a victim in the book. Harker spots a younger Dracula in London.
Mina drinks his blood, she starts having hallucinations, it’s then a clock - if they don’t get to Dracula’s castle they will never get him.
Dracula has strange people who work for him.
Harker kills Dracula.
Empire + Upper class
W/the discovery of other cultures + overwhelming interest in the world twinned w/development of technology (sail and train) - upper class members of the British homeland began
Epistolary novel definition
Dracula is an epistolary novel as it’s a combination of dairies, newspapers, letter, articles etc.
Rationality + science
Late Victorian era = expansive scientific technology
Sigmund Freud = id, ego + superego - unconscious desires, fainting couches
Influence on Dracula
Novel takes for granted audiences acceptance of these novelties: blood transfusions, hypnosis, advances in medicine
- It also explores weakness of modern science + technology e.g. Harker’s belief in scientific supremacy = unable to understand/accept superstitions of Transylvania - unprepared for Dracula.
- Dr Seward = cutting edge of psychiatry - writes off Lucy’s illness
Freud
Superego = moral conscience
Ego = realistic
Id = primitive, instinctual part of the mind: contains sexual + aggressive desires
Sexuality + Desire
Victorians obsessed w/female sexuality
- Fear of sexual promiscuity - especailly against young unmarried women.
- Fear of sexual impulse = STIs
Women
Mina = symbol of purity, she is to the standard men rally to - Van Helsing: “God’s woman”
Lucy = depicted as promiscuous, unfit for Victorian society
- Suffragettes campaigned for greater equality
- Adam + Eve = Eve disobeying God, shows that women’s actions serve as a consequence to man - Van Helsing calling Mina “God’s woman” suggests she supports men
Homodiegetic narrative meaning
One person perspective
Different types of deixis
Spatial, temporal + personal
Personal deixis
The who? “I”, “you”, “she”
Spatial deixis
The where? “Here”, “There”
Temporal deixis
The when? “Now”, “then”, “later”, “before”
Epistemic modality
Modal verbs that suggest the certainty/likelihood of a claim being true. “Peter WILL be at the shop”, “It MIGHT rain tomorrow”, “You may open that box (in this case it could be deontic modality)
Dynamic modality
Modal verbs that suggest the capacity of an action “You CAN jump”
Deontic modality
Granting permission + social norms “You may open that box” - “You can go outside”
Volitive modality
Modal verbs that express the speakers’ desire “I wish to go outside”
Haptics
Movement in relation to someone else/touching another person or thing
