Dracula An Introduction

Context In order to begin to approach understanding the novel, we must look at the context in which the novel was written. For our purposes, we will be looking at two areas that will provide this context: The late Victorian period in England The genre that the book was written in: The Gothic

Victorian England The Victorian period in England refers to the period of the reign of Queen Victoria: 1837-1901. For our purposes, we will need to look at the following aspects of Victorian England: Colonization/Britain as Empire Gender Norms Views toward Sexuality Views toward Mental Health

Colonization and the Idea of Empire During the Victorian period, England ruled many colonies in foreign lands such as India, Kenya (known then as British East Africa), the Cook Islands, Australia, and Fiji. In fact, the colonies were so widespread that Scottish writer John Wilson is famously quoted as saying “The sun never set on the British Empire,” meaning that the there were colonies in so many places in the world that it was always daylight in at least one of them.

Colonization and the Idea of Empire England colonized these places primarily for financial reasons such as trade and control of resources. England also had this notion that colonizing these places would help “civilize” them. Therefore, British society during this time sought to model “civilized” behavior for those in its colonies to follow. This then often branded anything in these colonies that was not “civilized British behavior” as “uncivilized.”

Gender Norms In Victorian England, men and women were expected to embody certain qualities and behaviors. In fact, each gender was expected to be centered in a particular social “sphere.”

Gender norms The Female “Sphere” During this period, women were thought to be, by their very nature, both physically weaker than and morally superior to men. Therefore, they were relegated to domestic duties inside the house. They weren’t expected to hold down most jobs, especially those that were seen as physically laborious or highly intellectual. Women were expected, however, to raise and instruct children (since they were supposedly morally suited to this). Women often were lumped into three social categories: Daughter, Wife and Mother, or Social Outcast (such as a prostitute).

Gender Norms The Female “Sphere” cont. Women, therefore, were expected to marry early (although they could not be too obvious in their attempts to marry for fear of being seen as “too forward”) and their educations were geared toward finding a husband and preparing to raise children. Women frequently married in their mid 20s and their groom was usually at least five years older than they were. Also, women were expected to be sexually chaste until marriage and in marriage were expected to always be compliant their husbands. Women were also thought to have few if any sexual desires and exhibiting strong sexuality was seen as unnatural for women.

Gender Norms The Male “Sphere” In Victorian England, men were thought to be physically and intellectually superior to women but were thought to be morally inferior to them. This governed the expectations that men had and put them often in positions that held power over women. Since men were seen as physically and intellectually stronger, they were expected to take on professions that reflected these qualities and were expected to take on professions that allowed them to support a family. In marriage, a man was expected to show to his fiancée’s father that he had means enough to be able to support both of them and future children before being allowed to marry. This sometimes caused engagements to last decades while the man went about this.

Gender Norms The Male “Sphere” cont. Strong sexuality was expected in men, but it was still morally pious for men to try and remain chaste until marriage. However, many men managed to remain respectable even if they did not remain chaste. In fact, many resorted to prostitutes before marriage and unknowingly passed on sexually transmitted diseases to their wives after being married. In addition, men were expected to be gentlemen and behave with manners and be couth in public.

Views toward sexuality For both genders there were also sexual taboos to be observed. At the time, both adultery and homosexuality were seen as scandalous, with homosexuality being illegal. Although sexuality was very controlled by convention in Victorian England, it does not mean that it was not thought or written about or that sexual taboos were not broken.

Views toward Mental Health Victorian England attempted to address mental illness but with limited success. For the most part, its biggest achievement was separating the mentally ill from the rest of society through the use of insane asylums. In fact, England instituted the “Asylums’ Act” in 1845 that said each community must have an asylum that would treat “paupers.”

Views toward Mental Health Patients in the asylums were treated with what was called “moral treatment.” This sort of treatment focused on trying to instill in the patient socially acceptable “moral” behavior. While this was better than simply locking patients away with little to no treatment, it often focused on socially acceptable behavior by arbitrary standards rather than actually treating the underlying mental illness. Many doctors were generally interested in their patients getting well and understanding them so they could facilitate this, but the treatments were not particularly effective since the numbers of inmates in asylums continued to grow rather than decrease.

Genre: The Gothic Gothic stories are stories that develop an atmosphere of terror and dread. Stories told in this genre of literature often contain at least some of the following elements: An ancient ruined structure, possibly a castle Various smaller sinister ruined buildings Elaborate catacombs or secret passages Extreme landscapes like rugged mountains or thick forests or icy wastes Ancient curses Various other elements of the supernatural A passion-driven villain or villain-hero A heroine with a curious constant need to be rescued

Gothic psychological elements Often gothic literature is effective because it taps into psychological elements. Here are some that are seen in Dracula: The return of the repressed The abject The ambivalent The sublime

Gothic psychological elements The return of the repressed is the return of an idea or memory that a person has repressed out of their conscious thinking. In Gothic literature, this manifests in the trope of things coming back from the dead like ghosts or vampires and these ghosts or vampires represent or embody ideas that the characters (or even the general populace at the time the story was written) have repressed or desire to repress such as social taboos (regarding things like gender roles and sex) or unresolved problems from the past.

Gothic psychological elements The concept of the abject comes from a work by Julia Kristeva. According to Julia Kristeva in the Powers of Horror, the abject refers to the human reaction (horror, vomit) to a threatened breakdown in meaning caused by the loss of the distinction between subject and object or between self and other. The primary example for what causes such a reaction is the corpse (which traumatically reminds us of our own materiality). In Gothic literature, the abject is often used to arouse horror. For example, by making monsters such as vampires look similar in many ways to ordinary people and by making vampires blur the line between the living and the dead, a form of horror can arise in the reader that he or she is similar to something linked to a corpse or something that embodies taboo desires.

Gothic psychological elements The ambivalent, in psychological terms, can be defined as of or relating to the coexistence within an individual of positive and negative feelings toward the same person, object, or action, simultaneously drawing him or her in opposite directions. So in essence, in this sense, ambivalence means simultaneous attraction to and repulsion by something. In the Gothic, this means creating characters or situations that attract the reader on one level but cause repulsion for the reader on another, thus the reader being horrified by his or her own attractions. For example, a vampire can be portrayed as sexually desirable but at the same time deadly and something to be avoided.

Gothic psychological elements The concept of the sublime which is used in Gothic literature comes from a philosopher named Edmund Burke. According to Burke, the sublime is a quality of art or experience that "excites the ideas of pain and danger" that produces "the strongest emotion that the mind is capable of feeling" and that causes "astonishment...horror, terror;...the inferior effects are admiration, reverence, and respect." Burke describes landscapes or whether conditions that overwhelm us and make us feel small and insignificant as sublime. These landscapes are often used in Gothic literature.