Course Blog

In his essay “Gender and Inversion in Dracula,” Christopher Craft discusses the inherent homoeroticism present in Dracula, which is constantly bubbling beneath the surface, yet never quite makes itself manifest: “(…) The sexual threat this novel first evokes, manipulates, sustains, but never fully represents is that Dracula will seduce, penetrate, drain another male.” (446) This “sexual threat” is evident in Jonathan Harker’s encounter with Dracula in his mansion, in which Jonathan cuts his throat while shaving. Dracula, rather than give into his desire to drink Jonathan’s blood, restrains himself:

“When the Count saw my face, his eyes blazed with a sort of demoniac fury, and he suddenly made a grab at my throat. I drew away, and his hand touched the string of beads which held the crucifix. It made an instant change in him, for the fury passed so quickly that I could hardly believe that it was there.” (33)

Why would Dracula stop short of drinking Jonathan’s blood? What is holding him back? This is a testament to Craft’s theory of the “sexual threat” – the act of drinking a person’s blood, a form of “penetration,” has clear sexual connotations. In the novel, this penetration only occurs between a male that penetrates and a female that is penetrated; although Dracula comes close to drinking Jonathan’s blood, with a “blaze” in his eyes that can clearly be read as sexual passion, he must restrain himself lest he disrupt the strict gender binaries on which the novel is constructed. In order to avoid this homoerotic penetration, Dracula has his three vampire women, which embody the masculine role of the “penetrator” – concealed, however, by a pronounced femininity. When the vampire women seduce Harker, the language surrounding the seduction takes on much greater freedom than the near-penetration occurring between Harker and Dracula (“moisture shining on the scarlet lips,” “langourous ecstasy” (45-46)), because the dilemma of the male-male penetration has been eradicated. Despite this, the women are still unable to penetrate Harker, because they would take on the role of penetrator, making Harker the one who is penetrated – a reversal of the heteronormative sexual norms. Thus, as Craft states:

“Here, the ‘two sharp teeth,’ just ‘touching’ and ‘pausing’ there, stop short of the transgression which would unsex Harker and toward which this text constantly aspires and then retreats: the actual penetration of the male.” (447)

Taking this into account, how, then, does one interpret the strange relationship between Renfield and Dracula? Though it is suggested that Dracula had some influence on Renfield, the matter never fully resolves itself, leaving behind only a misty understanding of what actually occurred between the two. After Van Helsing and Seward find Renfield lying on the floor of his room and covered in blood, Renfield tells them of Dracula’s regular visits: “I would’t ask him to come in at first, though I knew he wanted to – just as he had wanted all along. Then he began promising things – not in words but by doing them.” (297) Why does Dracula have a desire to enter Renfield’s room? What is it that Dracuala “does” when he is promising things? Renfield tells them that Dracula would give him “lives” in the form of rats – but why would Dracula do this? What interest does he have in Renfield? Renfield then recounts the moment when Dracula entered his room:

“(…) Before I knew what I was doing, I found myself opening the sash and saying to Him: ‘Come in, Lord and Master!’ The rats were all gone, but He slid into the room through the sash, though it was only open an inch wide – just as the Moon herself has often come in through the tiniest crack, and has stood before me in all her size and splendor.” (298)

Dracula, in this description, possesses a clearly feminine quality, as he is described as being like the Moon – a symbol of femininity. Also, Renfield describes Dracula’s appearance with a sense of awe and admiration (“stood before me in all her size and splendor” (298)), suggesting a sort of homoeroticism. Renfield continues, saying:

“When he slid in through the window, though it was shut, and did not even knock, I got mad with him. He sneered at me, and his white face looked out of the mist with his red eyes gleaming, and he went on as though he owned the whole place, and I was no one. He didn’t even smell the same as he went by me. I couldn’t hold him. I thought that, somehow, Mrs Harker had come into the room.” (298)

Again, there is an element of homoeroticism present in the relationship between Dracula and Renfield – Renfield says that he “couldn’t hold him,” and that he didn’t “smell the same.” This suggests that there must have been some kind of physical contact between the two – otherwise, why would Renfield be saying this? Also, Dracula’s entering of Renfield’s room through the window takes on a form of “penetration” itself (“he slid into the room through the sash, though it was only an inch wide” (298). This penetration seems to resemble an act of rape in the passage above, where Renfield says: “he went on as though he owned the whole place, and I was no one.” (298) Am I reading too much into this, or is it possible that this seemingly homoerotic relationship between Dracula and Renfield is the fulfillment of a male-male sexual penetration to which, as Craft states, the novel “constantly aspires and then retreats”?

Throughout Dracula, religion and faith has proved to be greatly comforting to the “good” characters. The novel has been set up in such a way that the band of good Christians fighting Dracula employ civilized religion for their side, against the spooky mysticism of Dracula and Transylvania. In this way, “good versus evil” has also been ascribed to this binary, the idea that mysticism or superstition is something that needs to be defeated. By looking at the “Longman Anthology” text in comparison to Stoker’s Dracula, we can further analyze the role of religion in the text.

With any text, we can further understand the tensions between the pages of a story by studying the historical events going on at that time, and gain further insight into the author’s psychology. The “Longman Anthology” presents a sort of divide in the English Church in the Victorian age between “High Church” and “Low Church”. High Church consisted of the more mystical, not strictly Bible-based religious practices such as candle burning or incense burning. Low Church was an emerging oppositional faction within the Church of England that was “Anti-Catholic, Bible-oriented, concerned with humanitarian issues, and focused on the salvation of individual souls within a rigid framework of Christian conduct” (1056). This new faction was known as Evangelicalism; they disagreed with what they saw as frivolous Church practices in favor of frugality. “Gothic revival architecture, the burning of altar candles and incense, the resplendent vestments of the clergy— all these were aspects of a religious apprehension of sensuous beauty and mysticism that had not been seen in England since before the Reformation. This “High Church” aestheticism came into direct and ongoing conflict with “Low Church” sobriety” (1056). We can see Realism battle Mysticism when it comes to religion in Dracula.

Religion and faith are embodied in the forms of our Dracula-fighters, and we can imagine the picture of the “ideal Christian woman” being Mina Harker. She is constantly talking to and thanking God, dedicating her work to Him, and after she is turned, and the scar from the wafer seared into her forehead, it devastates her. “As he had placed the Wafer on Mina’s forehead, it had seared it— had burned into the flesh as though it has been a piece of white-hot metal. My poor darling’s brain told her the significance of the fact as quickly as her nerves received the pain of it” (Stoker, 316). It is the symbol of her rejection from God, who has always been the ultimate comfort for her. A tangible mark of being no longer pure, no longer even completely human, is the worst thing for Mina, worse even than the fact of being a vampire itself, and is supposed to be the biggest fear for any God-fearing good Christian woman. “Unclean! Unclean! Even the Almighty shuns my polluted flesh! I must bear this mark of shame upon my forehead until the Judgement Day” (Stoker, 316). Since Dracula’s attack of her was so reminiscent of a rape scene, this echoes of a woman’s rape causing her to lose her virginity, and in her eyes, her purity. No matter how good and pure the woman is, she could not help or prevent being attacked. “…so far as symbols went, she with all her goodness and purity and faith, was outcast from God” (328). However, at the end of this book, Dracula is killed and Mina’s purity is restored, something that cannot be done for rape survivors.

Looking at Sherlock Holmes through the lens of Dracula, he shares quite a few characteristics with the immortal blood-drinker.

At the very beginning of the first Sherlock Holmes story, his deductions are compared to supernatural powers: “You would certainly have been burned, had you lived a few centuries ago,” Watson declares (Doyle, 2). Immediately Sherlock is associated with the supernatural, his powers of deduction considered magical and witchlike. Dracula too is associated with the supernatural from the very beginning of the book (when he controls the wolves).

Doyle also makes a point of pointing out Sherlock’s more childish habits, such as when he “chuckled and wriggled on his chair, as was his habit when in high spirits” (22). This description is reminiscent of a few-month-old child wriggling on a high chair, or an excitable toddler who can’t sit still. In the BBC Sherlock TV show, you often see Sherlock throwing temper tantrums (such as this one or this one). Dracula is often compared to a child as well, with Dr. Van Helsing commenting “in some faculties of mind he has been, and is, an only child” (Stoker, 322) and often referring to Dracula’s “child-brain.”

Watson describes his time spent with Sherlock as one that “utterly submerged my mind” (Doyle, 91). His time as Sherlock’s companion consumed him, consumed his time and his thoughts almost completely – for all that he is married and should have a life outside of his adventures with Sherlock, his stories of Sherlock almost completely eclipse that part of his life and minimize any mention of his married life. In a similar fashion, Dracula can control the mind and actions of Mina when she is under his thrall; Dracula is described as a “controlling force subduing or restraining her, or inciting her to action” (Stoker, 350).

Despite the hopeless ending of “The Final Problem,” confirming Sherlock’s death, the release of the story “The Empty House” revived the detective, in a way granting him immortality. Even after his “death,” Sherlock Holmes never died in the minds and hearts of his fans – the publication of “The Empty House” simply made it official. The idea of Sherlock Holmes has never died, with countless reincarnations from print to movies to TV shows, from the 1800’s to the future. Dracula is an immortal being, as long as he continues to drink blood and avoids stakes to the heart, decapitation and sunlight. And he too, enjoys the immortality of multiple reincarnations across time and media.

Eating is not usually a priority for Sherlock, with work taking precedence: “We shall have time for a mouthful of dinner before we go” (Doyle, 95). This lack of eating is even more obvious in the BBC Sherlock (like when John and Sherlock are on their not-date and Sherlock puts aside the menu). Jonathan Harker notes that Dracula has a similar habit of not eating: “It is strange that as yet I have not seen the Count eat or drink” (Stoker, 33). Of course, the Count doesn’t eat or drink because he survives on blood; Sherlock doesn’t eat because “digestion slows [him] down.”

Watson describes Holmes as springing “like a tiger” (Doyle, 102), similarly to how Van Helsing describes Dracula: “‘But will not the Count take his rebuff wisely? Since he has been driven from England, will he not avoid it, as a tiger does the village from which he has been hunted?’… ‘This that we hunt from our village is a tiger, too, a man-eater, and he [will] never cease to prowl’ (Stoker, 341).

Sherlock himself, however, refers to himself as a tiger hunter and the criminal he is chasing as a tiger (Doyle, 103). In this comparison, Sherlock is the Van Helsing character who uses his knowledge and abilities to defend the status quo, rather than disrupt it like the criminals he reveals and punishes.

Despite his vampiric qualities, overall Sherlock Holmes’ motives align more with Van Helsing – they are both the bringers of justice, the knowledgeable outsiders who reinstate the status quo. The only reason British society admires and accepts these outsiders is that rather than defy the status quo, as vampires and criminals do, these outsiders focus on how to use their knowledge to defeat these disruptive influences and maintain the status quo – they are useful, and thus, they are accepted and revered.

Dracula’s assault on Mina Harker, as well as her reactions afterwards, represent a highly tangible moment of terror, anxiety, and the paranoia of reverse invasion. As the only surviving woman of the entire novel she alone possesses the promise of the continuation of the English bloodline. Her response and self-loathing after realizing what has happened came as a shock to me, primarily because none of the movies portray her in this manner. Especially in the Dracula adaptations of the last few decades there is the notion of the Count and Mina belonging together. In some productions and films (most notably Francis Ford Coppola’s 1992 movie) the two of them are actually an eternal couple, with Mina being the reincarnated wife of Dracula, who has lived through the centuries to find her again. However, this presents a dilemma of sorts. Does the new plotline give Mina more agency in choosing to let Dracula turn her into a vampire, or does it sweep her assault under the rug?

Christopher Craft delves into the ideas of sexual and societal upheaval in his essay “’Kiss Me with Those Red Lips’: Gender and Inversion in Bram Stoker’s Dracula”, focusing on the antagonist as a trigger of sexual perversion and a confusion of gender roles. He notes that Mina’s drinking of the blood possesses a double meaning, a “symbolic act of enforced fellation and a lurid nursing. That this is a scene of enforces fellation is made even clearer by Mina’s own description of the scene a few pages later; she adds the graphic detail of the ‘spurt’.” (Craft 457-458) There is also her sorrow and feelings of self-hatred and impurity following the assault “Unclean, unclean! I must touch him or kiss him no more. Oh that it should be that it is I who am now his worst enemy, and whom he may have most cause to fear.” (Stoker 302)

The Coppola film shows none of this, and even has Mina try to stop the men from attacking Dracula as he flees the room. Later on in the film she also tries to seduce Van Helsing and kill him, and tries to thwart the men’s efforts to kill the count. Whether this is due to the vampire’s influence or her own nature as his apparent soul mate (or both) no one can say. In any case there is still a clear ignoring of Mina being raped. This primarily has to do with the male gaze and turning sexual assault into a horrid display of “passion.”

Another distinction between the film and the novel is that Mina ends up killing Dracula and setting his soul free. Through her true (pure?) love the Count is freed from his curse of demonic immortality and allowed to pass onto heaven. This creates an interesting shift of agency from a band of men (Crew of Light as Craft calls them) to a single woman taking power from her rapist and using it to ultimately end the threat to England herself. There is a fine line here, but it also makes Mina more than just an observer and victim. To me it would have been a better decision to actually keep the assault the way it was in Stoker’s novel, but then have Mina use the newfound powers herself to bring Dracula down rather than be passive and constantly hypnotized by Van Helsing. In any case there is bound to be another Dracula adaptation in the next twenty years, and perhaps the soul mate part will be omitted. However I would like to see Mina be given more agency, especially if she is the true protagonist.

Below is the scene from the Francis Ford Coppola version of Dracula when the Count assaults Mina. (It’s not violent but can be very uncomfortable for some people)

“The narrators insist that they are agents to God and are able to ignore their similarity to the vampire because their commitment to social values . . . enables them to conceal their violence and their sexual desires from each other and even from themselves. Stoker, however, reveals that these characteristics are merely masked by social convention. Instead of being eliminated, violence and sexuality emerge in particularly perverted forms.” (Senf 430)

The central fear at the heart of Dracula is not of “the other” in any of its forms – foreignness, exoticism, difference – nor of Dracula himself as the ultimate “othered” figure, fearful as these things are in the context of the novel. Rather, the most potent anxiety is the fear of our own selves: human nature, the human potential for evil, humanity’s weaknesses. Lucy in her vampirized state is the subject of more description, more repulsion, and more emotion than Count Dracula; similarly, the three vampire women, who appear in Dracula’s castle and again in their coffins being killed by Van Helsing, are feared not only for their own power but for their power to create evil in others.

The first experience with the desire for evil comes to Jonathan Harker half-asleep in Dracula’s castle. The three vampire women hover over him: “all three had brilliant white teeth, that shone like pearls against the ruby of their lips. There was something about them that made me uneasy, some longing and at the same time some deadly fear. I felt in my heart a wicked, burning desire that they would kiss me with those red lips” (Stoker 45)

Here, desire and fear – and perhaps fear of the desire – are mixed. The women are entirely artificial: their teeth are “brilliant white,” their mouths are like jewels rather than human mouths, and “something” makes Jonathan uncomfortable – their desirability. Yet Jonathan feels the effect of their attractiveness; their beauty influences him, giving him a new emotion – sexual desire – which falls far outside accepted English emotions. Part of Jonathan’s fear is of his own desire for the women; he feels a “wicked, burning desire” which evokes sin and images of hell. The wickedness is his own, as the desire is his own. Jonathan fears not only the women but himself – his own desires.

Later, when the men visit Lucy’s tomb, she advances on them.

“She still advanced, however, and with a languorous, voluptuous grace, said: –

‘Come to me, Arthur. Leave these others and come to me. My arms are hungry for you. Come, and we can rest together. Come, my husband, come!”

There was something diabolically sweet in her tones – something of the tingling of glass when struck – which rang through the brains of us who heard the words addressed to another. As for Arthur, he seemed under a spell; moving his hands from his face, he opened wide his arms. She was leaping for them, when Van Helsing sprang forward and held between them his little golden crucifix. She recoiled from it” (Stoker 226).

The apex of this scene is not Lucy’s appearance but Arthur’s attempt to go to her – to become like her. He is tempted by evil to become evil, and the fear here is not only of Lucy’s evil but of Arthur’s temptation. Lucy’s voice is “diabolical,” yet also “sweet” – it holds appeal for the listeners, and this is what makes them believe it diabolical. Their attraction to it creates their repulsion from it. Arthur’s attempt to give in to Lucy’s addresses, although “under a spell” and not of his own volition, echoes Jonathan’s desire to be kissed by the vampire women. Their own desire for the vampires, not the vampires themselves, creates fear; the men fear their own capacity for desire and yielding and possibly their own hidden stores of evil.

As Senf describes, the characters’ violence, sexuality, and behavior outside societal conventions is simply hidden by their own societally-driven claims about themselves. They claim to be moral, well-intentioned, intrinsically “good” (and godly) people – but their desires, which the vampires play on, tell a different story. “Stoker implies that the only difference between Dracula and his opponents is the narrators’ ability to state individual desire in terms of what they believe is a common good” (Senf 427). They believe Dracula is selfish, while they are selfless. Senf’s parallels between good and evil illuminate the central fear of the novel: our own flawed, possibly corrupted humanity.

The moment in chapter 14 when Van Helsing is speaking to Mina about her health and happiness caught my attention for several reasons. Van Helsing states to Mina on page 198, “Now you must eat. You are overwrought and perhaps over-anxious. Husband Jonathan would not like to see you so pale; and what he like not where he love, is not to his good. Therefore, for his sake you must eat and smile”.
I found this passage particularly striking because it is employing the use of Mina’s body in different ways. It also shows a significance surrounding the importance of consumption. As Van Helsing speaks to Mina one can see how her body is portrayed as a kind of consumptive remedy for her husband Jonathan. Mina’s health is something that is clearly important to her husband as she is described “overwrought and perhaps over-anxious” something that “is not to his good”. Therefore, Van Helsing tells Mina that she must “eat and smile” in order to be in good health for her husband’s “sake”. Rather than being in good health for Mina’s own personal benefit, here the stress for Mina to achieve her health back is expressed as something that needs to be done for Jonathan. Once Mina’s body is back to health no longer “so pale” she will then bring Jonathan happiness. Jonathan’s needs within this passage can be identified as the top priority through Van Helsing’s words as he dictates Mina what to do. It is also interesting that just as Mina is able to give happiness to Jonathan by being a healthy body to him, she can only become “healthy” through consuming food herself. Van Helsing tells Mina to “eat” which brings her back to health. In this sense Mina can be viewed as a kind of consumption material to her husband. However, while not being able to literally consume Mina like food, her body still creates a remedying effect upon her husband. To the Count however, Mina is able to embody literal food. Therefore, her body serves as a purpose to be consumed both literally and figuratively depending upon whomever is viewing her. This idea reminded me of the expression that is used today, “looked at like a piece of meat” often times used in order to describe the ways in which men stare at women. To be “looked at” like a piece of “meat” would be exactly how the count stares at Mina within the book as literal food to be consumed. Today we know that there is no such thing as vampire’s yet, we still use this idea more similarly to how Jonathan figuratively consumes Mina. This whole consumptive idea, whether figurative or literal is still existing today despite this book being written within the 19th century. The handout in class from Walter Pater’s The Rennaissance surrounding the Monet Lisa cements the idea surrounding this consumptive view of the female that is seen today as well as in the Victorian Era. Lisa is described within the last line as an “embodiment of the old fancy” yet still “the symbol of the modern idea” however, in this context the “modern idea” or modern female can still be viewed often times as a consumptive. I feel saddened to think that the ideas surrounding the female body as a consumptive are both old and current just as the article states, “The fancy of a perpetual life, sweeping together ten thousand experiences, Is an old one;” Is there ever a way to rid the past? Why is it that the female is still described as a piece of meat? Or could we see a possible empowerment within the fact that without Mina’s healthy body Jonathan would then not be “happy” does that empower her body?

Count Dracula is presented in Dracula as a foreboding, aristocratic character whose main goal is to feed off of the human characters, such as Lucy and Mina, and gain an unquenchable desire for strength – both over the characters as they become dependent on him, and strength from the blood he takes from them. Franco Moretti talks to this point, describing Dracula as “a metaphor for capital” (433) who “sets out on the irreversible road of concentration and monopoly” (433). Dracula’s character represents a motif for capitalism, and the struggle to maintain authority over other capitalist societies.

This battle was a distinct feature of the Fin De Siècle, which was the mark of the “collision between the old and the new” (Luckhurst x) and the consequent panic that resulted from this new, unknown turn of the century and all of the changes that came with it.

Luckhurst goes on in talking about the Fin De Siècle, stating, “it was an age of very real decline, in which Britain’s primacy as global economic power was rivaled by Germany and America” (x). For the first time in many years, Britain was losing it’s power to other hegemonic forces, and was fearing the possibility of another country taking over its monopolizing power.

Moretti discusses these growing fears in Britain through his analysis of Dracula, specifically in the character of Morris. Moretti discusses Morris’s association with vampires, and the significance of this connection, stating, “Morris is connected with vampires – because America will end up subjugating Britain in reality and Britain is […] afraid of it” (436). The character of Morris is not only a direct challenge of Britain’s economic power, but also represents “a contrast by product of Western civilization, just as America is a rib of Britain and American capitalism a consequence of British capitalism” (436).

Just as Luckhurst referred to in his article, Britain is currently very concerned with their position in the economic world, and how their old monopolistic control is starting to crumble at the turn of the century. This explains why Stoker decides to kill off Morris, the American character, in hopes of stifling this increasing fear of American power over Britain. Moretti describes this choice, stating, “for the good of Britain, Morris must be sacrificed […] at the moment Morris dies, the threat disappears” (436).

Moretti points out the importance of Morris as a character, and the need for him to be killed off in the end due to his threat to Britain’s power in the world. Luckhurst exemplifies this need for reassurance during the dramatic period, known as the Fin De Siècle, when Britain’s authority is being threatened and the British society is experiencing much unrest.

We discussed how the trust placed in Van Helsing is rather unusual given the fact that he is foreign, Catholic, and educated about vampires. He fits the description of a Victorian villain but Stoker’s English characters never seem to doubt him. I think another feature that could be added to that list is his knowledge and use of blood transfusions.

The first transfusions were between animals in the 1650s, usually between dogs, and resulted in the death of the donor dog. Richard Lower, who led many of these experiments, described the painful procedure in detail (Lower). He performed the first successful xenotransfusions in the 1660s. Obviously, there was still a lot unknown about blood at this time. Scientists were curious about what was actually transferred in a blood transfusion. Many thought there would be psychological as well as physical effects. To test this, a mentally ill patient was used as the subject. It was thought that his illness could be cured through transfusion. The blood of a mellow and gentle sheep would be used to “cool” the patient’s temperament (Yale). However, the results were mixed. Public mockery, dissent, and further failures eventually led to the banning of transfusions in England and France for the next 150 years. The practice was still uncommon and mistrusted in the 1800s. Blood types weren’t even discovered until the early 1900s, so transfusions before then were risky for the patient.

Given this historical context, Van Helsing is a little too quick to jump to blood transfusions as a way to save Lucy. I think the success of the four operations is wishful thinking on Stoker’s part. Lucy’s body could have easily rejected the foreign material. Van Helsing’s language also resembles the language of the 17^th century scientists. By the 1890s, they knew about some micromolecules, but Van Helsing still characterizes the blood using abstract terms. He calls Arthur’s blood “bright” (Stoker 132). He emphasizes the need for “brave man’s blood” (Stoker 160). At one point Van Helsing even decides not to follow scientific practice, saying of Arthur, “‘He is so young and strong and of blood so pure that we need not defibrinate it’” (Stoker 133). The transfusion exists in some space between science and magic. Medically, it is helping Lucy–she needs the blood to survive. But it is also strengthening her mentally. The men are giving her their life, their strength, their bravery, their purity.

The descriptions of early pioneers in blood transfusions remind me a little too much of Dr. Moreau, who also made his start in transfusions (Wells 53). Maybe it’s a bit of a stretch, but in this context Van Helsing seems a lot like Dr. Moreau. Of course, he’s not transfusing blood just for fun, but he is pushing the limits of what are acceptable medical practices. Why would he have his own transfusion equipment in a time when transfusions were unusual? Is he even a practicing medical doctor? (Dr. Seward is a little disturbing in this sense as well. He expresses interest in vivisection and laments its poor reputation). Given the anxieties of the period, Van Helsing’s foreignness, religion, and unique knowledge set him up to be a villain. Maybe in another scenario he would be the mad scientist.

Yale, Elizabeth. “First Blood Transfusion: A History.” (2015). http://daily.jstor.org/first-blood-transfusion/

Lower, Richard. “The Method Observed in Transfusing the Bloud Out of One Animal into Another” Philosophical Transactions (1665-1678) 1 (1665):353–358. Web.

The primary discussion in the Carol A. Senf article, “Dracula: The Unseen Face in the Mirror,” is about good and evil as coexisting ideas rather than opposing forces. She wrote, “…the majority of literary critics read Dracula as a popular myth about the opposition of Good and Evil … my reading of Dracula is a departure from most standard interpretations in that it revolves, not around the conquest of Evil by Good, but on the similarities between the two” (421). She continues on to establish connections between the “good” narrators and the “evil” Dracula, pointing out that in multiple ways, the behaviors are exactly the same with the only difference lying in who is narrating the scene. Similarly, she mentions that “the only difference between Dracula and his opponents is the narrators’ ability to state individual desire in terms of what they believe is the common good” (427).

A particular passage of Dracula that confused me was not mentioned within Senf’s article, but the article can be applied to it. The passage is an exchange between Van Helsing and Mina:

“’Oh, Madam Mina, I will be grateful; you will do me much favour.’ I could not resist the temptation of mystifying him a bit – I suppose it is some of the taste of the original apple that remains still in our mouths – so I handed him the shorthand diary. He took it with a grateful bow, and said:-

‘May I read it?’

‘If you wish,’ I answered as demurely as I could. He opened it, and for an instant his face fell. Then he stood and bowed.” (195)

The reference to Adam and Eve stood out as feeling incongruous, even though the general topic of temptation seems to permeate the entirety of the text, especially when reading it through the lens of Senf’s argument with good and evil in conjunction. Senf claims that “By the conclusion of the novel, all the characters who have been accused of expressing individual desire have been appropriately punished: … even Mina Harker is ostracized for her momentary indiscretion.” Although this seemingly minor conversation was not the moment of indiscretion that gets Mina into trouble, the message underlying the text denotes the “evil” individual desire linked to Dracula rather than the “good” group Mina belongs to. She uses the word “temptation” in combination with the story of the fall, which both portray this idea of the desires of the individual. Her “temptation” was in momentarily fooling Van Helsing and, through that action, proving her own intelligence equivalent to that of her male counterparts. When he figures out that he cannot read it without her assistance, he is initially displeased, but quickly the displeasure turns to being impressed by her abilities. The word “demurely” adds to the subtext, seeming unnecessary in this interaction, indicating that what Mina is doing is wrong and something she should be shy about. Yet Mina gives into this temptation, generally regarded as falling into the category of “evil,” even though the action of handing over the diary for the benefit of the group is “good.” Looking at this in the terms of Senf’s argument, the motion aligns her with the group pursuing Dracula while the intention aligns her with Dracula himself.

A few lines after the passage above, Mina says, “By this time my little joke was over, and I was almost ashamed” (196). According to Senf, “The narrators insist that they are agents of God and are able to ignore their similarity to the vampire because their commitment to social values such as monogamy, proper English behavior, and the will of the majority” (430). Mina’s feeling of shame likely stems from the fact that she is committed to these upright behaviors. She knows that her game is postponing the mission of “the will of the majority,” even if only slightly, and by the action she is not accomplishing anything for the “common good,” only giving herself an ego boost. However, it is important to notice that despite having the feeling that she should not have tricked Van Helsing for selfish purposes, she is only “almost” ashamed. Not feeling fully ashamed is just one step closer to the “evil” of the vampire and one step away from the “good” of the group.

By making this comparison between Mina, Adam and Eve, and the fall in this seemingly insignificant moment within the text, Stoker could easily be making the claim that by succumbing to even the smallest of individual desire or wishing to elevate herself to the status of the men around her, Mina could risk the success of the entire operation, the “common good.”