Stoker, Bronte and Keats
use women as a literary device to create fear, creating female characters who
transgress 19th century society. Mina Harker and Lucy Westenra are
examples of the idealised Victorian female to the improper, sexualised female.
Even before Lucy becomes part of the ‘undead’, she is scandalous when proposed to
three times, claiming ‘Why can't they let a girl marry three men, or as many as
want her, and save all this trouble?’. As an undead vampire, Dr. Seward
describes how her ‘sweetness was turned to adamantine, heartless cruelty, and
the purity to voluptuous wantonness’. Lucy as a living human being as to when
she becomes a vampire are somewhat alienated in Dr. Seward’s description. She
is not just described as being a ‘devil’ when she is a vampire but she is also ‘changed’
physically – her sweet and pure attraction is lost, to be replaced by a
malevolent, sexualised character that repulses and yet entices the men in the
book. It is important to note however that Lucy is the more vulnerable, weak
character, who although is ‘sweet’ still defies the stereotypical Victorian
woman, she is victimised by Dracula. Mina Harker on the other hand, who is ‘a
woman’ is the one who helps to finally track down and defeat Dracula. Van
Helsing even describes her as having a ‘man’s brain’ with a ‘woman’s heart’. Even
when she is forced to drink Dracula’s blood she declares herself as
‘unclean!...my polluted flesh!’ she still returns to her natural, ‘pure’ and
maternal state at the end of the novel ‘the curse has passed away!’. Maurice
Hindle describes the fear of the characters and to some extent the Victorian
reader as ‘the dread is that they themselves will be turned into bloodthirsty
vampires’. Stoker presents these two contrasting female characters to symbolise
the good and evil and the consequences of moral corruption. Where Lucy is the
sexualised, ‘new woman’ she is punished by becoming the victim of Dracula and
part of the undead. Mina on the other hand, who represents the Victorian ideal
is rewarded, by defeating Dracula and living ‘happily ever after’.
