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Roles of women in Dracula and Frankenstein
Feminist theory in dracula
Roles of women in Dracula and Frankenstein
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This book I think shows a very c lear and obvious theme of femininty throughout the novel. It
shows women as innocent, quiete, and having high morals. Then they are sucked into the evil that is
Dracula. The women are shown as whores to us the readers, and they even have a parallel to the Siren
creatures - especialy Dracula's brides. They lure in men, and use their sexuality to do what they want with them.
They are described as having very thick and juicy lips and Harker even gets sexually turned on by this.
Van Helsing and even Dracula are presented to us the readers as intelligent. They can be good or bad,
but they are not judged upon harshly like the women. The women through the book go through a very
sad transformation for the worse, from being ladies of purtity to being a whore.There's not a lot of
women in Dracula, but Stroker puts them in several types of specific ways.
I believe that Stoker puts the very few women of Dracula in the Madonna and Whore situation. Mina,
who is a shy and soft spoken type of girl. She spends days and nights waiting to hear what's happening
with her love Jonathon. The fact that Mina is so pure, it's supposed to be the total opposite to what
Dracula bride's said at the beginning of the book, who try ruin Harkers plan of saving himself for
marriage. The word “whore” is used to describe the women that suck the blood and that are plain evil.
Women like this are usually called Sirens, like those out at sea, trying to trick men into seducing them
so they can do evil acts with them.
Mina in the novel “Dracula”, is considered to be the ideal symbol of femininity in “Dracula”.
She submits to her husband in the same way that Dracula's brides and Lucy's three admirer...
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...d just submit to him. She even starts to suck the blood of kids, who in normal situations she
Page 4 would've protected. This shows us, the reader, how powerful Dracula is and how much he can control
women to the point that he top their maternal instincts. Dracula tell us that the ideal women is someone
that is pure, kind, loving, protective and of high morality. This story also tells us the the type of woman
who is controlled, manipulated, abused, and suffers her loss of innocence and purity. The biggest of all
is falling from God's grace. Femininity in this book is very simple and to the point. You're either on
the good side, which is being pure, good, virtuous, and maternal – or those who have joined the evil
side and have become women of sexual promiscuity, to use men through sexual ways and to go
through life without the grace of God himself.
Bram Stoker’s “Dracula,” came to print in 1897, at the height of Nineteenth century Victorian life in Europe, a progressively modern era that saw much medical and technological advancement. This era brought with it the contentious idea of an empowered woman, the “New Woman,” a woman who aspires to be educated as well as sexually and economically independent. Stoker gives a contrasting view of this notion in “Dracula.” While the main characters, Lucy and Mina, are clearly opposite in personality, they are both portrayed as unequal, defenseless objects that are to be protected and desired. However, one woman’s fate is determined by her weakness, while the other is determined by her strength.
“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.
In Dracula, Bram Stoker explores the fantastic image of a sexually dominant woman within a patriarchal society. The battle between good and evil within the novel very much hinges upon feminine sexuality: Lucy and Nina are embodiments of the Victorian virtues, which Dracula threatens to corrupt,
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.
Stoker chooses to lay some clues out for the readers in order to help them interpret Dracula. The distinct warning presented on the page before the introduction saying the narrators wrote to the best of their knowledge the facts that they witnessed. Next is the chapter where Jonathan Harker openly questions the group’s interpretations of the unsettling events that occur from meeting Dracula, and the sanity of the whole. Several characters could be considered emotionally unstable. Senf suggests that Stoker made the central normal characters hunting Dracula ill-equipped to judge the extraordinary events with which they were faced. The central characters were made two dimensional and had no distinguishing characteristics other then the...
Similar to almost every piece of literature ever created, Dracula by Bram Stoker has been interpreted many different ways, being torn at from every angle possible. Just as one might find interest in interpreting novels differently, he or she might also find interest in the plot, prose, or theme, all of which ultimately lead to the novels overall tone. Throughout the novel, it becomes blatant that the novel contains an underlying theme of female incompetence and inferiority. Through a true feminist’s eyes, this analysis can clearly be understood by highlighting the actions of Mina and Lucy, the obvious inferior females in the book. Through Stoker’s complete and utter manipulation of Mina and Lucy, he practically forces the reader to analyze the co-existence of dominant males and inferior females in society and to simultaneously accept the fact that the actual text of Dracula is reinforcing the typical female stereotypes that have developed throughout the ages.
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.
...sitive depiction of their sexual relationship. For Mina, however, renunciation of Dracula's evil must include the renunciation of her own physical needs and desires. The roles played by social mores and conceptions of gender and sexuality are, in the end, more than incidental. Indeed, the difference between Victorian England and 1990s America causes the subtle -- but significant -- valuation of the connections between good and evil and women and sexuality in two in many ways similar texts.
In the book, Dracula by Bram Stoker there are many characters that display qualities of good verse evil. The Count Dracula is a mysterious character who appears as an odd gentleman but the longer the story goes on Dracula shows his true self. Dracula started infiltrating the lives of anyone who crossed his path and he was not stopping his destruction of others’ lives. Many people were affect by Dracula’s actions but there were two people that Dracula caused an impact on during his rampage. Dracula is an evil, cunning, and selfish character who harms the life of a young man and ruins the future of an innocent woman.
They had the roles of wives and mothers (Abrams 6). Motherhood was an affirmation of a woman's femininity (Abrams 6). She may have been a wife before but her duty as a woman was only fulfilled when she had a child to care for (Abrams 6). Women who were not able to conceive were pitied and seen as a failure (Abrams 6). Childless women were often urged into the role of governess or nursery maid to make up for their loss (Abrams 6). Motherhood as seen as an innate urge of women is also remarked upon by Mina Harker in Dracula when she comforts Arthur Holmwood after his fiancée, Lucy Westenra, dies: "We women have something of the mother in us that makes us rise above smaller matters when the mother-spirit is invoked; I felt this big, sorrowing man's head resting on me, as though it were that of the baby that some day may lie on my bosom, and I stroked his hair as though he were my own child" (Stoker
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.
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.
The connection is made when Dracula sees a picture of Mina while Jonathan is held up in Dracula’s castle in Transylvania. With Jonathan trapped Dracula and Mina become quite close and go as far as to fall in love with each other. Throughout the novel, there is no love connection between Dracula and Mina and the only relation they encounter is as he attempts to seduce her to her death in spite of the men meddling with his plans of destruction. In the novel Mina resented Dracula for what he had done to her good friend Lucy Westenra. (Stoker Dracula) (Coppola "Bram Stoker 's Dracula")
...f Dracula’s birth into the world of the undead lays the foundation for the love affair between Dracula and Mina. However, the love story changes the characters of Dracula and Mina drastically from the novel. In the film, Dracula is a character with whom the viewer sympathizes while in the novel he is feared. Mina’s character is strong willed in the novel while in the film she is weak and pathetic. Coppola’s adaptation destroys the characterization of the novel, taking away from Stoker’s image for the novel. The movie, instead of being titled Bram Stoker’s Dracula, should have been titled "Francis Ford Coppola’s Dracula".