Dracula
Texts such as the novel Dracula, and the film Interview with the Vampire, are often shaped by the values and attitudes within society at the particular time in which it was created. As a result, the context plays a major role in the construction of a text.
In Dracula, a novel in epistolary format set and published in 1897 by Bram Stoker, not only do the concepts of sexuality, religion, family, technology, class and gender roles reflect the way they were viewed in the Victorian era, but the actual form of the text itself, a long novel in a book form, mirrors the style of Victorian texts due to the limited technology available.
Similarly, in the film Interview with the Vampire directed by Neil Jordan, the different and changing concepts of religion, sexuality, class, family and gender roles from the four different contexts; the 1791 slave period, the 1870s in France, the 1980s in America and the 1994 context, are reflected in the film in a DVD format.
In Dracula, the representation of woman as belittled and with limited roles mirrors the rigid expectations of the Victorian era. During the 1800s, women were confined to narrow gender roles, as represented by the virgin/whore dichotomy substantiated through two of Dracula’s key characters, Mina and Lucy. The figure of Mina displays the innocence, loyalty and purity expected from women of the time: “she is one of Gods women...” (P.226), whilst Lucy’s character illustrated the non-virtuous figure as she appears as flirtatious: “you will think me a horrid flirt...” (P.70), and gives us the subtle impression that she has a hidden desire to break out of the social constraints of the Victorian period: “why can’t they let a girl marry three men, or as many as want her, and save all the trouble?”(P.70). Due to Lucy’s desire to break out, she must be punished in order to restore Victorian standards: “Arthur took the stake and the hammer...then he struck with all his might...there, in the coffin lay no longer the foul
In Dracula, a novel in epistolary format set and published in 1897 by Bram Stoker, not only do the concepts of sexuality, religion, family, technology, class and gender roles reflect the way they were viewed in the Victorian era, but the actual form of the text itself, a long novel in a book form, mirrors the style of Victorian texts due to the limited technology available.
Similarly, in the film Interview with the Vampire directed by Neil Jordan, the different and changing concepts of religion, sexuality, class, family and gender roles from the four different contexts; the 1791 slave period, the 1870s in France, the 1980s in America and the 1994 context, are reflected in the film in a DVD format.
In Dracula, the representation of woman as belittled and with limited roles mirrors the rigid expectations of the Victorian era. During the 1800s, women were confined to narrow gender roles, as represented by the virgin/whore dichotomy substantiated through two of Dracula’s key characters, Mina and Lucy. The figure of Mina displays the innocence, loyalty and purity expected from women of the time: “she is one of Gods women...” (P.226), whilst Lucy’s character illustrated the non-virtuous figure as she appears as flirtatious: “you will think me a horrid flirt...” (P.70), and gives us the subtle impression that she has a hidden desire to break out of the social constraints of the Victorian period: “why can’t they let a girl marry three men, or as many as want her, and save all the trouble?”(P.70). Due to Lucy’s desire to break out, she must be punished in order to restore Victorian standards: “Arthur took the stake and the hammer...then he struck with all his might...there, in the coffin lay no longer the foul