What would it be like to be a vampire? What would it be like to have a vampire in one’s life? What were the vampires of folklore like? These topics will be reviewed throughout this essay by comparing four of the vampire books and movies. All the vampire movies have some similarities and differences but four literature pieces in particular will be gone through in this comparison. The four pieces of literature to be compared in this comparison are Dracula by Bram Stoker, Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992) by Francis Ford Coppola, Nosferatu (1922) by F.W. Murnau, and Dracula (1931) by Tod Browning. In these works of fiction, there are answers to what it would have felt like to be a vampire, what it would have felt like to have a vampire in one’s life,
Dracula is about vampires in general, the myth, the mystery and the horror. Even though Dracula wasn’t the first vampire story, it was the first really popular one. Throughout the novel, the author, Bram Stoker, portrays many different aspects of women's roles in the 19th century. With the use of imagery and symbolism, the theme of sexuality and gender roles has an enormous presence in the novel. Social gender roles of women and men during the Victorian Era were very strict and looked upon differently than any other time period. One of the many characteristic features of the Victorian culture was its patriarchal ideas about women. This culture looked upon sexual activity as a negative matter amongst women. The theme of sexuality is very significant
Try to think of a very famous vampire. Chances are the first vampire anyone would think of is some version of Dracula. This famous vampire was originally conceived in the mind of Bram Stoker in his novel Dracula, published in 1897. In Bram Stoker’s famous novel Dracula, many elements of the Victorian Era and his own life are prevalent such as the Victorians’ ideas of sexuality, the struggle between science and religion and the time period being the height of jingoism or extreme patriotism, commercial and military expansion, and the time period’s medical practices. Also, the novel contains an element of Stoker’s personal life-his relationship with his good friend Henry
Vampires have been seen throughout history as bloodsucking, evil monsters who come out at night to prey upon the innocent by piercing their flesh with their fangs. While this is true, there are more than just this type of literal vampires in literature. In Thomas C. Foster’s How to Read Literature Like a Professor, he describes vampires as any older figure that represents corrupt values who violates young women and leaves them helpless followers in his sin. Although characters in Toni Morrison’s Beloved and Harriet Jacob’s Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl did not suck anyone’s blood or run away at a glimpse of sunlight, they are still vampires. Slave owners in these novels are vampires as they exploit young women and strip them of their
Truth and Progress: Reconciling Religion and Rationalism to Defeat Dracula Bram Stoker's 1897 novel Dracula deals heavily with the theme of religion and faith, and, framed in the context of a fantastic struggle against an evil vampire, explores a controversy about religion which dominated its contemporary Victorian period—the debate between Christian religion and modern rationalism, an ideology fuelled by recent scientific advancements which provoked religious doubt. Literary critics tend to attempt to fit Dracula to one side or the other of this Victorian debate, but the novel’s position is difficult to discern, as instances of faith versus reason are not presented in binary opposition—neither side is marked as discernibly good or bad. What
Everybody knows the classic tale of Bram Stoker’s Dracula. It is most famous for its introduction of the character of Count Dracula into both deep-rooted and contemporary literature and media. One critic claimed,” Bram Stoker set the ground rules for what a vampire should be.” It follows the story of Jonathan Harker, an English solicitor who visits Count Dracula in his castle in Transylvania – soon realising that he is being kept as a prisoner. Dracula forms a liking to the character of Lucy which ultimately leads to her death.
His novel, Dracula, tells the tale of five people who encounter and have to deal with the evil undead vampire Count Dracula, who terrorizes them and even causes two out of the five to become undead like himself. Thankfully, the group eventually discovers a way to eventually vanquish Dracula once and for all, and by the end of the book they destroy him, preventing him from terrorizing the people of Europe once and for all. Stoker explores several significant themes in this book, including the theme of deception. In Dracula, Stoker uses the theme of deception with the characterization of Dracula,
Although the vampires in Stoker and Meyer display the same amount of vampiric principle they also have a great deal of differences in how they appear to others and how they react to their appearances, in their behavior and actions and the fact that they do not seem to have the same amount of abilities as the other has. Firstly, Count Dracula and Edward Cullen appearances are drastically different from one another; the difference in appearance enlists different reactions from other characters within the story. Count Dracula, is seen as a pale, hairy man with fang like teeth. This soon becomes the traditional look of a vampire. “… The mouth, so far as I could see it under the heavy moustache, was fixed and rather cruel-looking, with peculiarly sharp white teeth; these protruded over the lips…
The essay I chose to compare Dracula with was “Kiss Me With Those Red Lips: Gender and Inversion in Bram Stoker’s Dracula” by Christopher Craft. The essay explains the sexuality in Dracula, desire, gender, and even homosexuality. Craft mentions his essay gives an account of Stoker’s “vampire metaphor” (Craft 108). He highlights certain and very valid points in the story of Dracula that breaks the Victorian gender role, writing, “a pivotal anxiety of late Victorian culture.” (Craft 108).
Twilight novel shows more differences than similarities from the old vampire literature. In Twilight, the main characters are good vampires. They have several human qualities and a conscience that sets them apart from the traditional vampires than were more supernatural beings than humans and with no conscience. Meyer has created vampire characters that make the main vampires more like humans by passing on human characteristics into their life of vampires. Consequently, there is a thin line between the world of the vampires and the real world.
During the Victorian period in which Dracula was written, morals and ethics were often strictly enforced. Some of the morals that were upheld had to do with personal duty, hard work, honesty, as well as sexual proprietary. It was very important during this period that one was proper in their sexual behaviors and conventional in whom they had sexual relations with. However, during this period, many authors sought to challenge the ‘norm’ with ideas of reform and change and Bram Stoker was no exception to this. In his novel, Dracula, Stoker provides a critique of this rigidity in his portrayal of Dracula and Dracula’s relationship with Jonathan Harker. Though he could not be explicit in his representation of homosexuality or queerness, in the
One of the most common as well as interesting types of legends is about vampires. Vampires have changed through the time from the myth, the legendary feared creatures, to those that are easily seen in the world nowadays
Moreover, Stoker’s novel placed in motion an entire vampire culture during the 20th and 21th century, which eventually established an enduring place myth around Transylvania, and implicitly Romania, as the home of vampires
The horror genre of Bram Stoker’s Dracula, combined with mild eroticism is able to draw in readers due to the fact that Stoker is able to intricately weave suspenseful sexual scenes/scenes of desire throughout the novel—making it clear that
The first mention of vampires in literature seeped through from European folklore. In the mid-1700s, a vampire panic swept the Serbian countryside. Victims reported being visited in the night by their recently deceased relatives or neighbors, who throttled the life from them. Those struck by these visions died within days.