Kathryn Goers ENG 346: Virtue and Vice in Gothic Literature Dr. Timothy Decker 5 November 2012 Sexuality? Predator vs. Victim Women in several known horror narratives, stories, and films, are highly sexualized. They aren't always seen as human, and are treated as victims. In his novel, Dracula, Bram Stoker is no different from other horror writers.
If Dracula succeeds in turning the ladies into vampires, this will fully release their sexuality and its expressions. This is shown as an evil in the novel perhaps because a woman that embraces her sexuality has obtained power. In Dracula, female vampires represent women’s sexuality and vampirism; merely masks man’s forbidden fantasies. Though Dracula makes up the horror aspect of the novel the true “terror” lies in the awakening of
The settings presented are also dark and eeire, and Dracula himself lives in solitude with no other companion. The film adaptation of Bram Stoker’s ‘Dracula’ is just as reliant on the conventions of Gothic fiction (a genre that was extremely popular in the early nineteenth century when the book was written) as the novel, making it not only follow nicely in the novel’s footsteps but also proving to be a chilling delight for the viewing audience. Gothic fiction traditionally includes elements such as wild landscapes, eerie castles, darkness, and decay, isolation, security, the supernatural and innocent maidens threatened by unspeakable evil. Stoker has utilized all of the above and consequently, as does this film adaptation. An example of this would be in the theme of isolation as Dracula’s castle is hidden in the recesses of Transylvania, kept away from civilization of any description.
mankind’s experience of evil, experience of guilt and separation. • Psychological study of typically romantic characters, e.g. Victor, Walton, Clerval… • The ‘monster’ himself has been studied in connection with Rousseau’s theory of man’s natural goodness perverted by a hostile environment. • A sociological approach to the novel stresses its importance as a social document, giving evidence of a woman’s role /family ties/ education, etc.. in the first decades of the 19th century. • Feminist critics are especially interested in issues concerning women’s culture.
Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu's Carmilla, is the original vampire story to which Stoker's Dracula serves as a response. Carmilla - the first vampire tale whose protagonist is a powerful female vampire - marks the growing concern surrounding the power of female homosocial and homosexual relationships in the nineteenth century. His creation of a female vampire anticipates the shift toward the end of the century to predominantly female vampires. Carmilla is the vampire tale that most readily defies the established patriarchal systems of kinship and that most provokingly challenges nineteenth century notions of the "contamination of lesbianism" and the female "psychic sponge.” Le Fanu’s Carmilla is a prime example of how fearful men were of the rising surge of powerful females. In many ways, Carmilla can be seen by feminists as a heroine in an antagonist’s role because the story is written by a man.
Why Dracula is a Gothic Novel The horror story Dracula, written by Bram Stoker, is a thrilling novel about the notorious vampire, Dracula, and about a group of men and women who suffered from his evil and fought back. This novel, written in 1897, is one of the most famous gothic novels, and one of the most famous pieces of literature still to this day. The setting of the novel, the terminology, and the deep emotion that Stoker used allows the reader, and literary critics, to classify Dracula as Gothic Literature. The elements that Dracula contains to make it gothic include the setting of a castle, a suspenseful atmosphere, dreams and visions, inexplicable events, overwhelming emotions, distressed women, metonymy of horror, and of course gothic vocabulary. For a novel to be considered gothic, it must contain certain elements; Dracula reflects many of these unique principles.
Page 1 Gothic Themes of Frankenstein JacquelynWilliams-Eid English Literature Tue-Thu 10:30-11:45 Page 2 Mary Shelley is a British writer who is best known for her Gothic novel Frankenstein. Frankenstein was written in the eighteen hundreds and is now one of the most best known novels of the time period. When Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein she used a gothic theme throughout the novel. The term gothic refers to a genre or elements that came about in the eighteenth century. In a gothic novel there are elements of horror, mystery and suspense.
The Weird Sister -The three mistress vampires -encountered in Dracula’s castle represent all the qualities of how a woman should not be; voluptuous and sexually aggressive IV. Forward Women A. - “The fair girl went on her knees and bent over me, fairly gloating. There was a deliberate voluptuousness which was both thrilling and repulsive, and as she arched her neck, she actually licked her lips like an animal, till I could see in the moonlight the moisture shining on the scarlet lips and on the red tongue as it lapped the white, sharp, teeth” (Stoker 50). -mixed feelings men had towards forward women
Human Sexuality in Bram Stokers “Dracula” July 27, 2009 Human Sexuality in Bram Stoker’s Dracula In the novel Dracula by Bram Stoker, we experience the traditional ways of the nineteenth century. There are strict gender roles for the Victorian man and woman. Through the acts of romanticism, sexuality, and seduction, Stoker introduces the idea of the ‘New Woman’ and its effects on men by lessening their ability to control their craving of forthcoming women and he portrays a man who yearns for the pure love that only a wife can give. Thus, it is important to consider the notion of the ‘New Woman’ and its effect on the Victorian man. The roles of women during Victorian times were considered to be constricted.
Christina Rossetti's Goblin Market: The female body and its different meanings. Goblin Market is Christina Rossetti's most famous work, well-loved by the critics and subject of different interpetrations.The poem, written in 1859 is the ideal field for contrasting perspectives: the woman body can be seen as a conduit to God and at the same time like herald of female sexuality in Gothic fiction. Stressed by Rossetti's good use of language, both perceptions are widely accepted even if one should consider them completely divergent. As Humphries says in his “The uncertainty of Goblin Market”: 'Rossetti's writing repeatedly pivots upon contradictions and obscurity'[1]. The composition is about two sisters 'one who falls and the other who saves'[2].