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Women In Bram Stoker's Dracula

1281 Words6 Pages

The stories that are told about the shadow of Nosferatu a German name for Dracula were often gory and dark, but Bram Stokers Dracula brings a new dark and sensual look at the Victorian society. Showing the role of how women are treated and made almost into Stepford wives if possible. The novel Dracula by Bram Stoker shows the vast societal restrictions women can be put in. Sensual content any writer can put in their books, there by hiding it in very discreet ways to an unsuspecting reading crowd, Bram Stoker shows Victorian elements through the character diaries. Nevertheless, from the eyes of the distressed Mina, she exclaimed “The room was dark, so I could not see Lucy’s bed; I stole across and felt for her” (Stoker 97) described by Mina Murray, pointing to there views at women at that time, to what Lucy was even doing at that time of the day. Mina thinks to look downstairs because the logical thing would be Lucy became parched and just wanted a glass of water for Lucy to be anywhere else would be mad. A woman of her time was supposed to sleep through the night …show more content…

Seeing how woman of this time were out for change in their long oppression of being treated like incapable children. “Lucy is a traditional, upper class, Victorian young woman and is consciously unconcerned with feminist reform, where as Mina is aware of, and has strong affinities with the, new woman, but desires only recognition within a freely chosen marriage rather than radical sexual and social independence” (Weissman). Though Mina has these thoughts and is very against the corner that woman are shoved in. There is not much that she can because of her sexuality and therefore she strives for one thing that she has left and can somewhat control and that is her marriage. A swift marriage is held only because of the inconvenience of their situation. This takes every action she could’ve taken out of her

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285 Words | 2 Pages

Option 1: Social Norms Lucy is a character who in the beginning follows the social norms for women of her time. Lucy believes that when marrying, her future husband should have knowledge of events going on in her days. She proves this when she writes in a letter to Mina, “You will tell him, because I would, if I were in your place, certainly tell Arthur. A woman ought to tell her husband everything—don’t you think so, dear?”(61). Now that Lucy is a vampire, obviously her idea of social norms changes.

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778 Words | 4 Pages

According to the Victorian Web, a new and budding author named Bram Stoker entered the world in the year 1847, on the eighth of November. From a young age, Stoker loved to read about folklore, and later on in life he aspired to be an author. Although Stoker published several stories, only in the year 1897 did he publish his most well-known novel, Dracula. After this success, Stoker went on to write several other novels, and eventually died in the year 1912. (Scarborough)

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1008 Words | 5 Pages

She is a strong, independent, intelligent woman who breaks gender and societal barriers. Stoker’s writing begs the question, how does Mina break societal barriers, but at the same time possess many traditional abilities and behaviors? Based in the late 1800’s in Victorian England, women were not likely to be educated and independent, but rather submissive to their husbands. Stoker creates Mina’s “New Woman” persona to develop the novel into more than the audience of the time would expect. Mina occupies inspirational qualities such as loyalty and strength, as well as finding a balance between her independence and not overstepping societal boundaries.

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1461 Words | 6 Pages

Bram Stoker, describes one of the verbal taboos of the Victorian era, violence, through the representation of vampires as “monsters” through the point of view of their victims in his novel Dracula. Stoker portrays violence in three distinct categories- physical, visual and psychological. Each one of these categories is described by one of the antagonists in the Novel, with Count Dracula as the physical aspect of violence, his underlings, the female vampires as the visual and Renfield, the patient at Dr. Seward’s mental asylum, as the psychological aspect of violence. This essay looks at the portrayal of such Categorical violence as different renditions of a “monster” and considers why Stoker would segregate violence in such a manner.

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825 Words | 4 Pages

Slowly through the chapters Lucy’s tempting sexuality is more lightly brought up. In one of her may letters to Mina, Lucy tells her about the three proposal she got that day and asks her why they cannot:” […] let a girl marry three men, or as many as want her, and save all this trouble.” Through her liberal dealing with sexuality, Lucy is crossing mentally boundaries set up by the social convention of society as it was immoral and forbidden for women in

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785 Words | 4 Pages

In Bram Stoker’s gothic novel, Dracula, the overall and fundamental theme of the book is given away the further you read, expressing Stoker’s view of religion. The novel is an account of the paths taken by many different characters such as Count Dracula, Van Helsing, Jonathan Harker, Mina Murray and Lucy Westenra. Since this poem was written with ideas focused primarily on the concepts of evil, as it was viewed during an appearingly-conservative nineteenth and twentieth century society, the book can be seen as a parallel to Eliot’s and others’ own religious quests. While Bram Stoker attempts to acquaint the reader with a frightening tale on the accounts of a dreadful vampire named Count Dracula, he also expresses the goal of strengthening

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506 Words | 3 Pages

It was a time when almost everything was seen as either black or white, with no grey in between, and Victorian ideologies regarding women were not excluded from that notion. I believe that the fears revolving around the idea of the “New Women” resonates with Van Helsing, Dr. Seward, Arthur and Mina, as they are characterizations of the times they were composed. In order to combat against those fears, they treat Lucy in a way that revokes her personhood, to gain control over her and simultaneously make sense of her shifting personas, such will be explored at length throughout the

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696 Words | 3 Pages

The major theme in the novel Dracula by Bram Stoker is the threat of female sexual expression. During this time period, female sexual behavior was frowned upon. Women were said to have to be either a virgin or a wife and mother. Social standards were very strict during this time, making it unheard of for women to show sexual expressions. In is era, the main concern was the role women had in society.

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1830 Words | 8 Pages

Feminist Reading: Dracula between Beauvoir’s and Roth’s Ideas In her article, “Suddenly Sexual Women in Bram Stoker’s Dracula” Phyllis Roth argues that Dracula is a misogynistic novel which is obvious in the system of power in which men are dominant and active figures whereas women are just followers and obedient to their system. She draws on Simon de Beauvoir’s idea that “ambivalence as an intrinsic quality of Eternal Feminine”, in order to show that women are victims to men powers. In her chapter, “Myth and Reality”, Beauvoir discusses the way that anybody in the society, specially men, doesn’t do their job in taking a step towards the oppressed women, but to act just like what the system of myth impose them to act.

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1350 Words | 6 Pages

At first glance, the novel Dracula by Bram Stoker appears to be a typical gothic horror novel set in the late 1890s that gives readers an exciting look into the fight between good and evil. Upon closer inspection, it becomes apparent that Dracula is a statement piece about gender roles and expectations for men and women during the Victorian age. Looking at the personalities, actions, and character development of each of the characters in Dracula bring to light startling revelations about Victorian society and how Stoker viewed the roles of men and women during this time period. To really understand Dracula, it is important to note that this novel was written during a time “of political and social upheaval, with anxieties not just about the

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1433 Words | 6 Pages

Dracula “[...] represents late Victorian society’s anxiety” (Bundrick 25). This is the reason readers related to the novel so much because it resonates with their anxieties. The impact that the Victorian era had from this book is immense. It changed the way women were looked at by giving them entitlement and gave a new light to homosexuality by making it more masculine. This is a huge step towards the next time period, Modern World era, in the

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1253 Words | 6 Pages

Gothic horror novel Dracula, the title character makes only several relatively short appearances, some of which are while in disguise. Throughout the novel, Stoker keeps Count Dracula in the shadows, both literally and figuratively. This essay will describe these appearances and analyze Stoker’s use of them to determine what effect they might have on the impression of the character and the novel overall. It will be claimed that by keeping his title character hidden for much of the novel, Stoker’s Dracula is made much more frightening to the reader. Human beings tend to fear the unknown, and by leaving Dracula to the imagination,

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1495 Words | 6 Pages

What would it be like to be a vampire? What would it be like to have a vampire in one’s life? What were the vampires of folklore like? These topics will be reviewed throughout this essay by comparing four of the vampire books and movies. All the vampire movies have some similarities and differences but four literature pieces in particular will be gone through in this comparison.

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1072 Words | 5 Pages

In the novel Dracula, author Bram Stoker creates a peculiar situation that pushes the main characters to decipher the supernatural from reality. Originally thought of as a myth, Dracula quickly becomes something more than the supernatural. By slowly building the conflict of Dracula himself, Stoker depicts all stages of the change from believing that Dracula is a fictitious character to being face to face with Dracula himself. As he terrorizes the lives of the characters in the novel, they soon come to the realization that Dracula is more than what they formerly believed, and in actuality he is their harsh reality.

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1384 Words | 6 Pages

Dracula is a household name; however, the actual meaning is not as well known. The novel Dracula by Bram Stoker contains a unique story, one which due to the structure of the book there are multiple main characters. The book is written in the form of letters, allowing the focus to be on many different people and viewpoints. Dracula starts out with Jonathan Harker an, Englishman, who takes a trip to Transylvania to meet Count Dracula. On his way to the castle he is warned of the dangers of Dracula, however, Jonathan chooses to persist.

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