Examples Of Duality In Dracula

Gothic fiction as a genre is mode of literature and film that combines elements of fiction, horror, death and romance into one. At heart, the bulk of Gothic romance stories are essentially about the human mind – specifically what remains hidden in the subconscious and dreams.

There are several important tropes that crop up continually in Gothic romances. Bram Stoker’s Dracula is considered to be a hallmark of Gothic horror in the sphere of literary tradition.

Moreover,

The way in which Stoker distinguishes a duality present in Lucy is through the shifting perspectives told by multiple characters, the structure of the novel is heavily based on intertextuality in this light. The structure of the multi-faceted narrative reveals how certain

characters are unable to cope with the duality present in Lucy.The male characters, specifically, project the idea of a duality in Lucy in order to comprehend how she so easily shifts states between being ‘the pure woman’ and ‘the fallen woman’ - terms first established in the Victorian era.

This projection is not only endorsed by the male figures in the book, but the character of Mina Harker as well confirms the notion, whom Stoker constructed of representing the ideal standard of women, a retrospective of ideologies concerning gender during the Victorian period. All things considered, this paper will focus on the way Stoker illustrates, in a subtle fashion, how the characters strip her of an identity to revoke her power and gain control of the state of affairs while she is conscious and appearing as her true self. The male authoritative figures, such as Abraham Van Helsing, Dr. John Seward and Arthur Holmwood, infantilize Lucy on numerous occasions, most notably by the way they address her with pet names and terms of endearment. The use pet names and terms of endearment are the male character’s method of gaining control over Lucy, for the reason that her new-found sexuality threatens the gender and species hierarchy, in the sphere of the Victorian bourgeois. The lengths that the characters go to gain control over Lucy

reinstate a belief system within themselves; illustrating how men should be and how women should be. Lucy’s sexually liberated state threatens the system that sets up gender roles as pillars that which sustain society as a whole. By stripping Lucy of her identity, it is their subconscious effort to strip Lucy of power. It is when Lucy’s condition becomes worse over the course of time, said characters begin to describe her as “not herself” and eventually refer to her as “The Thing”.

These journal entries showcase how the characters are unable to see Lucy the same way they did at the beginning of the novel. By extension, she is no longer perceived as human but some kind of creature. The intertextuality of the text displays how through the perspectives of multiple character view Lucy during these shifts, she reverts from personhood to ‘thinghood’ consistently throughout the collection of letters and journal entries that make up the novel. To put it simply, Lucy is like a ticking time-bomb due to her lack of control over her own consciousness, this essentially makes her vulnerable to the by dark supernatural evil invading England. It is up to the group of advisories to protect and rule over her. The group of advisories assumes responsibility over the situation, as Lucy’s condition worsens over time, solely because cultural relativism of the period leads them to believe that man is responsible for governing women. The way that the group of male advisories addresses Lucy, frame their relationships with her and even name her are methods used to cope with the changes that she embodies, as both a “New Woman” and as an emerging vampire. The

fears revolving around the idea of the “New Women” resonates with Van Helsing, Dr. Seward, Arthur and Mina - for their characterizations are a product of the past - 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. These points should be most carefully considered across an analysis of the intertextuality of the text, that will be explored throughout this paper.

For example, the way Mina Murray describes Lucy in her states of trance depict the idea that the matter in which characters perceive Lucy has shifted: “We were silent for a while, and suddenly Lucy murmured as if to herself: “His red eyes again! They are just the same,” It was such an odd expression, coming apropos of nothing, that it quite startled me. I slewed round a little, so as to see Lucy well without seeming to stare at her, and saw that she was in a half dreamy state, with an odd look on her face that I could not quite make out; so I said nothing, but followed her eyes. She appeared to be looking over at our own seat, whereon was a dark figure seated alone. I was quite a little startled myself, for it seemed for an instant as if the stranger had great eyes like burning flames, but a second look dispelled the illusion. The red sunlight was shining on the windows of St. Mary’s Church behind our seat, and as the sun dipped there was just sufficient change in the refraction and reflection to make it appear as if the light moved. I called Lucy’s attention to the peculiar effect, and she became herself with a start.” (129). Here, Stoker
uses specific vocabulary built to intensify the suspense of the scene. It is evident in this passage that Mina senses a shift in Lucy, such is represented in a symbolic fashion by her descriptions of the sunlight “moving”. Mina draws attention to a “sufficient change in the refraction and reflection to make it appeared as if the light moved”. It is by my summation that these descriptions reflect Lucy’s returning to her innocent and true self, that is attributed to sunlight for symbolic representation. It is interesting to note how the scene is a matter of high emotion that the author decides to handle gently. Correspondingly, Stoker subtly develops a dualism in Lucy present in character’s minds.

Another example of a dualism presented in Lucy can be uncovered in Mina Murray’s journal as she describes Lucy recollecting her dream about the vampire, however, it does not sound like much of a dream at all, but her point of view of the encounter: “Then she began to laugh. It seemed a little uncanny to me, and I listened to her breathlessly. I did not quite like it, and thought it better not to keep her mind on the subject, so we drifted on to other subjects, and Lucy was like her old self again.” Once more, Stoker’s audience can see that Mina has set up a division in Lucy’s identity as a means to disassociate her with all of the horrific peculiarities going on with her. Jennifer A. Swartz-Levine’s pens an essay on the novel in which she critically investigates how Stoker used female sexuality and depicted it in a monstrous way to outline the fears Victorian society held regarding women: “When Stoker sets up feminine sexuality as diametrically opposed to femininity and does so in terms of insanity and monstrosity, he draws from a heritage that long reveres the idea of chaste, modest, non-sexual beings as the standard for Englishwomen and deviations from this norm as grotesque.” (2). Levine’s analysis of the novel shows that Stoker deliberately intended to use Lucy’s dualism as a point of thematic significance. Levine goes on to say: “Stoker does not ascribe sexual traits to women without either turning them into the Un-Dead or fragmenting them into disembodied physical features. Sexuality, then, is not associated with real women, but rather with debased aberrations of the category of woman.” (3). We can see evidence of this when characters begin to stop calling Lucy by her name and start calling her “Thing.” Levine picks up on this shift: “Lucy is dehumanized. She becomes a “Thing,” with a capital T; she loses her proper name but gains a new one, of sorts.” (6).

Another scholarly commentator on the novel, Eric Kwan-Wai Yu, also recognized dehumanizing implications behind the name “Thing” in his essay on Dracula: “The perception of Lucy's "voluptuousness," thus, may be interpreted as the men's projection of their repressed desire: it is not we who want her, it is she who tempts us.' The guilt of illicit desire has cunningly turned into shameless aggression, and the very act of murdering the "devil temptress" can be further rationalized as an honorable duty. Lucy's human identity is most vehemently denied in the symptomatic expression: "The Thing" (192). Eroticized and dehumanized, she is sacrificed to consolidate the male bonding. Only then can the former rivals in love transform their desire for Lucy into a firm, selfless friendship and into the love of ascetic hard work as a team, or as what Daly calls it, the "male, professional, homosocial order" (198). The description of Lucy's face after the staking as "of unequalled sweetness and purity" reassures the male "professionals" that the murder is not only necessary but merciful.” (9). By implying that Lucy is the problem for tempting them, it goes to show how the dualism is used to rid characters of guilt and transgression.

examine how the male authoritative figures of the text cope with Lucy’s dualism aroused by their fear of female sexuality. Very covertly in the structure of the narrative, Stoker expounds the numerous of ways characters perceive a present dualism in her character. For example, when Dr. Abraham Van Helsing first comes to visit Lucy Westenra upon Dr. John Seward’s request, we can see how these two perform carefully to bring up Lucy’s condition in her presence, they begin by beating around the bush in order to approach the situation gently, all for her supposed sake. Van Helsing feels that it is necessary to reassure Lucy, she is very much loved by everyone and addresses her as “My Dear Young Miss” (149). Instead of using her name, identifying her by these terms of endearment sets up Lucy to fall into the damsel in distress trope, a common female archetype character that regularly resurfaces countless times throughout gothic horror. The damsel in distress trope is a role typically played by the Gothic heroine of the work in which they must go against patriarchal ideals of feminine perfection, so that they could release themselves from the passive role of the victimized woman. Here, Van Helsing is essentially sweet-talking her into submission. The pet names and terms of endearment the men in the novel use to address Lucy infantilize her as a method to reaffirm her position in the pecking order of the world. It may appear affectionate on the surface, but the way he refers to Lucy as ‘my dear girl’ is his way of infantilizing her. He takes the position of the dominant role between the two. She leaves no other choice than to take up the role of the submissive.