{"id":1334,"date":"2018-11-15T17:39:22","date_gmt":"2018-11-15T22:39:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/?p=1334"},"modified":"2018-11-15T17:39:22","modified_gmt":"2018-11-15T22:39:22","slug":"libido-in-dracula","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/2018\/11\/15\/libido-in-dracula\/","title":{"rendered":"Libido in Dracula"},"content":{"rendered":"

High libido\u2014or any amount of sexual energy save for that which was necessary for reproduction<\/span><\/span>, and then only between\u00a0<\/span><\/span>a married couple\u2014was severely condemned by Victorian society.<\/span><\/span>\u00a0According to Heather Marie Ward in\u00a0<\/span><\/span>Psychosexualism<\/span><\/span>\u00a0in Victorian Literature, 19<\/span><\/span>th<\/span><\/span>\u00a0century society placed \u201cimmense importance on semen,\u201d so that it was\u00a0<\/span><\/span>considered \u201c<\/span><\/span>more important in the male body than blood\u201d (53). Semen\u00a0<\/span><\/span>was\u00a0<\/span><\/span>thought<\/span><\/span>\u00a0to be the bodily fluid that helped \u201cmen maintain their physical and mental strength\u201d (Ward 53) and loss of that bodily fluid\u00a0<\/span><\/span>led<\/span><\/span>\u00a0to health defects in the Victorian male. Thus, sexual relations were heavily discouraged. This<\/span><\/span>\u00a0sort of atmosphere did not allow for much exploration of oneself or one\u2019s sexual preferences. People were forced to turn to literature and the arts as a sort of escapism from the uptight propriety of Victorian society.\u00a0<\/span><\/span>Dracula<\/span><\/span>\u00a0was revolutionary in\u00a0<\/span><\/span>its<\/span><\/span>\u00a0perverse\u00a0<\/span><\/span>nature. The first blatantly sexual scene in the novel was Jonathan\u2019s twisted encounter\u00a0<\/span><\/span>with<\/span><\/span>\u00a0the three vampiric women, in which Stoker placed an emphasis on body parts (\u201cvoluptuous lips…red lips…human lips…arched neck…went on her knees\u201d (Stoker 45)) and phrases (longing… wicked,\u00a0burning desire…sweetness…coquettishly…agony of\u00a0<\/span><\/span>delight…voluptuousness…licked her lips…lower went her head\u201d (Stoker 45)) that<\/span><\/span>\u00a0are reminiscent of sex. Such overt imagery was not usually present in the literature of the day, and understandably caught the attention of Victorian readers. Second was Dracula\u2019s rape of Mina, in which he demanded her silence, threatening that if she so much as \u201cmade a sound,\u201d he would \u201cdash [Jonathan\u2019s] brains out\u201d before her eyes. Dracula forced Mina to exchange blood with him. Strangely, though, he forces her to \u201cswallow some of the blood\u201d from an open \u201cvein in his breast,\u201d a perverse inversion of breastfeeding, and therefore a perverse inversion of gender\u00a0<\/span><\/span>roles, which\u00a0<\/span><\/span>seems to<\/span><\/span>\u00a0demonize the exploration of masculinity and\u00a0<\/span><\/span>femininity. Sex and sexuality\u00a0<\/span><\/span>were\u00a0<\/span><\/span>grossly misunderstood and underdiscussed by Victorians, and even by Stoker. The Athenaeum review of\u00a0<\/span><\/span>Dracula<\/span><\/span>\u00a0suggested it was a book solely for the lower class to be reading. However, it addressed an important topic\u2014sex\u2014vital to the human experience, which the upper classes would not deign to discuss.\u00a0<\/span><\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

High libido\u2014or any amount of sexual energy save for that which was necessary for reproduction, and then only between\u00a0a married couple\u2014was severely condemned by Victorian society.\u00a0According to Heather Marie Ward in\u00a0Psychosexualism\u00a0in Victorian Literature, 19th\u00a0century society placed \u201cimmense importance on semen,\u201d so that it was\u00a0considered \u201cmore important in the male body than blood\u201d (53). Semen\u00a0was\u00a0thought\u00a0to be … Continue reading Libido in Dracula<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3880,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[125359],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1334","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2018-blog-post"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1334","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3880"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1334"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1334\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1334"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1334"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1334"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}