The story of Dracula begins with journey of an english solicitor, Jonathan Harker, to Transylvania on behalf of his mentor to inform Count Dracula of his latest purchase, an estate in london. During his stay at Castle Dracula Jonathan notice some odd behavior of the Count, but ignores his seemingly unfounded fears--until he discovers he has become a prisoner in the Castle and escape is futile. Meanwhile thousands of miles away in England Mina murray awaits the return of her fiance, Harker, from his business trip. She is staying at the home of her dearest friend Lucy Westenra; however, Mina observes odd occurrence at the home, Lucy begins to experience several episodes of sleepwalking, lethargy, even after a great deal of sleep, and have odd puncture wounds on her neck. Lucy steadily worsen and a friend of a friend is …show more content…
Van Helsing, Morris, Seward, Holmwood, Harker and Mina all align with side of Good; while the Count and his horde of vampiric women . On the side of evil, Stoker characterizes vampire as sinful beings who look and act in sexaully explicit ways, the acts of vampirism such as sucking blood and it’s transformation are paralleled with sexual acts, and in accordance with time period where “sexaul reppression and evasion”(Wolf, 392) were societal standards, Dracula and his debauched women represent evil in all its immorality. Van Helsing and co. wield christian and catholic holy items to defeat their immoral opposition in their righteous crusade, “Thus are we ministers of God's own wish: that the world, and men for whom His Son die, will not be given over to monsters, whose very existence would defame Him” (294). Stoker has the group constantly referencing scripture and re-asserting their belief that this is their holy mission and Van Helsing compares it to christians in the past and them partaking in
In the infamous novel, Frankenstein or the Modern Prometheus, by Mary Shelley, there have been a variety of recurring themes throughout the book, one of them being good versus evil. Good versus evil is a popular theme that appears in several movies, TV shows, as well as literature itself. According to Wikipedia.com, it means: “[...] the battle between ideologies, with one side Good, and the other Evil. Another variation is the inner struggle in characters (and by extension, humans in reality) between good and evil.” This theme is specifically crucial to the plot because it ultimately asks the readers what it means to be “human.” Shelley supports her representation by manipulating society’s behavior, questioning the limits of humans, and
Van Helsing takes great care and delicacy in proving that the vampire threat is real to his companions, taking a group of men to see for themselves that Lucy had turned into evil undead. To prove to the men that vampires are real, Van Helsing forces the men to see Lucy, whose eyes are “unclean and full of hell-fire” causing Dr. Seward to feel “the remnant of [his] love [pass] into pure hate and loathing” (Stoker 181). Van Helsing is truly brilliant, because after seeing Lucy in her state of ‘un-death’, the men are all ready to listen to him and act against the vampire threat. Van Helsing himself even admits that “at the first [he] was the sceptic” but learned to accept and deal with vampires “through long years [of training himself] to keep an open mind” (Stoker 203). Van Helsing is explaining how he is not insane, but rather more experienced and open minded.
Many gothic novels have tried to create an unsettling feeling within their audiences. None have achieved this quite as well as Dracula. The jarring transitions of action, and the sharp cliffhangers create many moments of suspense and unease. Using epistolary format is also a way of creating nervousness in the readers, as it not only make the story “believable”, but introduces many stories woven into one large mystery. However, the transitions of story is not the only factor creating the feeling of apprehension within the book. To create these feelings to his greatest potential, in Dracula, Bram Stoker uses symbolism to reinforce the uneasy atmosphere.
Good versus Evil is an important concept. Evil sometimes overcomes our good but never exceeds good. The difference between evil and good is that good is an ability to have empathy and compassion towards other people. Evil is people who are selfish, self-absorbed and don’t have empathy towards others. Literature plays a vital role in developing concepts of good and evil and effectively portrays the morals of its time period. In the novels Dracula and The Strange Case of Dr.Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the authors explore the human nature of good and evil in men from different perspectives of Dracula, Mr. Hyde and Dr. Jekyll.
The book describes how Lucy Westerna is a nice young woman and her best friend is Mina Murray. She is the first one to fall under Dracula’s spell. She is a good character because even though she got transformed into a Vampire she still tried to do everything that she could to help the others stop Dracula while she was not under Draculas spell, she was really cooperative with Dr. Van Helsing when he tried to hypnotize her to find out where Dracula was and that was a very important part in helping to stop Dracula because it was able to show them were Dracula was and helps them find out what he is trying to do at the time and she was not truly evil at heart like Dracula is. Eventually Lucy’s body returns back to normal with the help of Dr. Van Helsing and the others when they defeated Dracula.
Batman beats the Joker. Spiderman banishes the Green Goblin. For centuries story tellers have used the basic idea of good beats bad to guide their tales. Stories of blood sucking, human possessions and other tales have been passed down generations and vary between cultures. Among the creators of the famous protagonists is, Bram Stoker, the creator of Dracula. This fictional character was soon to be famous, and modified for years to come into movie characters or even into cereal commercials. But the original will never be forgotten; a story of a group of friends all with the same mission, to destroy Dracula. The Count has scared many people, from critics to mere children, but if one reads betweens the line, Stoker’s true message can be
These women have strong sexual powers, to which they use to their advantage in dangering men with their reasoning. Nearing the end of Dracula the three brides are brought back into focus. When even Van Helsing, the strong doctor and picturesque example of what a Victorian male was expected to be, hesitates because “She was so fair to look on, so radiantly beautiful, so exquisitely voluptuous, that the very instinct of man in me, which calls some of my sex to love and to protect one of hers, made my head whirl with new emotion.” This heightens the danger over the women’s control and influence over men as even the knowledgeable and powerful
Dracula is a novel written by Bram Stoker during the late 1800’s. The book starts out with Jonathan Harker, who is a smart young business man, who wants to travel to Count Dracula for a business ordeal. Many locals from the European area warned Jonathan about Count Dracula, and would offer him crosses and other trinkets to help fend against him. Mina, who is at the time Jonathans soon to be wife, visits to catch up with an old friend named Lucy Westenra. Lucy gives Mina an update on her love life telling her how she’s been proposed to by three different men. The men are introduced as Dr. Seward, Arthur Holmwood, and Quincey Morris. Unfortunately for her she will need to reject two of the men, and Lucy ends up choosing to marry Holmwood. Later on after Mina visits Lucy, Lucy starts to sleep walk, becomes sick, and then finds out she has bite marks on her throat. Due to this incident, another new character is introduced who happens to be Van Helsing. As the novel progresses, lady vampires are introduced and Lucy is eventually turned into one of the lady vampires as well. With the introduction of female vampires, the novel Dracula turns into a sexual and sensational novel by Bram Stoker. The female characters in the book are overly sexualized to where we can compare it to how women are viewed from back then in history to today’s world.
Dracula is a signet classic novel written by Bram Stoker. This novel is portrayed by an antagonist character known as Count Dracula. He has been dead for centuries yet he may never die. He has a peculiar power of hypnotic fascination but he is weak in god’s daylight. He is immortal as long as he is able to drink blood from the living. He can change his form into a wolf, a bat or a puff of smoke. Dracula get in touch with Jonathan Harker through a real estate transaction. He went to Dracula’s castle through a carriage as were planned. After a few days, he felt as if he were prisoned in the castle as his movements were restricted. Meanwhile, Harker has a fiancée named Mina
A recurring theme in the book Dracula by Bram Stoker is the ever famous theme of good vs evil. The two are personified in the form of the protagonist Jonathan Harker and the antagonist Dracula. Jon Harker being the protagonist and representing good in the novel, is given sweet and naive traits. Whereas Dracula, representing evil, is depicted in a decrepit but still charismatic manner.
Bram Stoker’s use of characterization and imagery to convey one of his many themes in the book Dracula. In Bram Stoker’s Dracula, the author uses characterization and imagery to convey the theme, Follow your instincts.
Evil is a concept that humanity has difficulty grasping and it is something that is expressed in a variety of forms. Logically speaking, evil can be called the absence of good. But there are times when the “absence of good” is not enough to describe something; when there is an even more sinister force hiding in the complete and utter darkness. Monsters are found in this darkness, and they truly do contain evil. Monster is a word used to describe someone or something that society fears and despises at the most primitive level. A monster will dwell in the darkest parts of the human psych and is something that is the total opposite of human; when a human becomes a monster,
Dracula written by Bram stoker is a Novel that many people enjoyed. It talks about the good and evil. It was a Novel about suspense horror and mystery. In the novel Dracula Bram Stoker tell us the story of a vampire known as count Dracula who is known by the people of Transavia to be completely evil. I will be analysis the novel to see why Stoker wrote the book, who he wrote it for, the good people in the story, and some other analysis. First I will beginning with the reason Stoker choose to write about Dracula.
“He speaks in perfect English and welcomes Harker inside, shaking his hand with an ice-cold, vice-like grip” (Dracula, 55). Dracula explains to him that he will no be able to make the trip to London, but one of his trusted servants will be going along with Harker back to London. After supper Jonathan analyzes Dracula and notices one very strange feature, his mouth is thick and white; they cover sharp white teeth, which stick out over his lip. What Jonathan does not know is that those teeth are canine teeth only found in animals. There are exceptions, for instance, vampires have these teeth so they can puncture the human’s carotid vessel in their neck and suck their blood. The first time that Jonathan sees Dracula’s cannibal teeth grow is when Harker starts shaving. He accidentally cuts himself and Dracula leaps for his throat so he can suck his blood. Harker touches his crucifix and Dracula’s “demonic fury” vanishes. The strangest event that Harker notices in Dracula’s castle is “Dracula emerge from his room on the floor below, slither out, head downward, in lizard fashion, with his cloak spread out around him like great wings” (Dracula, 179). This shows that “Dracula is not a person. He is a presence, an absence that requires concealing” (Wolf, 368). This tells Harker that something is very wrong with this man. He recalls how the peasants behaved
Consider as well how the four men in the story risk their lives for that of Mina's. Bram Stoker reveals his attitude towards the nature of Victorian society by making the evil side in this novel very seductive. Even though the side of good is well aware of the harm the evil side can cause, the seductiveness of the evil side tempts our protagonists on many occasions. For example when Van Helsing has trouble bringing himself to stake the three women because of their physical beauty and when Jonathan Harker nearly allows himself to be bitten by one of the women because of how physically attracted he is to her. "I felt in my heart some wicked, burning desire that they would kiss me with those red lips."# Stoker comments on the nature of Victorian society by showing how unacceptable it was to give in to those primal desires. This relates to the struggle between good and evil between our heroes of Victorian society and the devilish vampires. Vampires are in control of those evil, primal desires in the story and good people like Jonathan Harker and Van Helsing must fight off these desires lest they lose their clean and pure Victorian existences.