Kate Cadwell
The New Woman came into popularity in the late 19th century and had many effects on literature and media as well as cultural shifts. Magazines and books that emphasised education and economic independence for women were on a slow rise. Sexual liberation was also a topic in these books that sparked tense controversy on whether the New Woman was an acceptable reality for the future of western culture. However, the novel we are focusing on in this panel, Dracula by Bram Stoker, displays more subtle writings regarding the New Woman. Many literary analysts have tried to identify the nature of his female characters and how they contribute to the conversation about the New Woman during the time in which it was published. Some argue for rampant sexuality quelled by the phallic stake, others say the gender fluidity of the Count and the independent nature of Mina Harker purport an acceptance for suffrage and feminism. I posit that Stoker asserts his opinions about New Women through his characterizations of his female characters and their subsequent outcomes, whether fortunate or less so.
Stoker’s women have an intriguing air to them, instead of adhering to a simple trope as the Angel in the House or the New Woman, they occupy qualities of both facets of Victorian womanhood. Through these opposing attitudes and the eventual outcomes of each woman, we can identify a secret narrative in the novel in which women are punished for or ultimately overcome their New Woman qualities. Because there is such an emphasis on motherhood throughout the novel, and the fact that motherhood is essential to the Angel in the House trope, my analysis will focus on how each character performs motherhood and how that performance contrasts with the New Woman. By doing this I will demonstrate how Stoker writes in favor of traditional womanliness and disdains the New Woman. In order to achieve this I will first briefly lay out a few ideals of Victorian motherhood before delving into character and scene analyses of Lucy and Mina.
Victorian motherhood has certain values that are constantly prescribed to its contemporary mothers. They must be self-sacrificing and ready to raise a new generation of good, traditional children that would benefit the future of the nation. The concept of raising the future citizens of Great Britain being perhaps the most prevalent in Victorian literature as Deirdre Osborne states in her article, “the future of the empire became the responsibility of women via motherhood, and they were urged to excel in this capacity” (Osborne, 209). Mothers were the main parents to their children while fathers, while present, were not culturally drafted to do the day to day parenting of the child. This creates an imbalance of responsibilities for the mothers; they were made to carry, birth, and raise the child nearly singlehandedly and were considered to be at fault if the child did not turn out as a desirable or capable adult.
Another value placed on mothers at the time was that of self-sacrifice. A good mother puts her child and husband first, before she takes care of her own needs, detailed very nicely in the article, “‘How to Be a Domestic Goddess’ Redux”, D’Albertis essentially states the that husband and son are to be taken care of first, “without hope of reciprocity” (D'Albertis, 30). What is important to note here is that in this article she emphasises the son, a daughter on the other hand would take an even further back seat. D’Albertis goes on in her analysis to explain how the woman who neglects her child was perceived as the villain in 19th century novels, however she also makes the point that the overly involved mother was just as harmful to a child’s development (D’Albertis, 33).
Ultimately, self-sacrifice is perceived to be the center of holy womanliness. Just one example that we can see in our analysis of Dracula, is that of the Transylvanian woman who literally throws herself to the wolves in an attempt to save her already lost child. Jonathan Harker writes in his diary, “There was no cry from the woman, and the howling of the wolves was but short. Before long they streamed away singly, licking their lips. I could not pity her, for I knew now what had become of her child, and she was better dead” (Stoker, 70). Harker understands the need for the woman to appeal to the vampire for her child, and he even reveals to the audience that she was better dead than knowing her child to be dead as well. On some level we can also see the mother come to this realization: “There was no cry from the woman”, she resigns herself to her fate knowing that death by wolf pack is better than life without her child. Hence, this unnamed woman is the quintessential Victorian mother, sacrificing herself in an attempt to rescue her child.
However, we also see in the Victorian era traditional patriarchal notions surrounding motherhood beginning to be challenged by the feminist concept of the New Woman. The New Woman was someone who did not want to fit the mold of traditional woman, but instead was career-oriented, pursued marketable skills, were assumed to be more sexually liberated than her traditional counterparts, and demonstrated certain intellectual qualities that had up until this point been culturally reserved for men. However, despite the stereotype seen in some Victorian media, this does not mean that New Women did not want a husband or children, as many authors liked to depict. Schroeder in her essay regarding feminist journals at the time points out that the contemporary feminist thoughts of the time “extolled motherhood as a woman’s highest calling, without sentimentalizing or idolizing it, or assuming that it was a woman’s only calling” (Schroeder, 2). Being a mother and wife was a status many New Women still desired or were pressured to pursue, it simply wasn’t the solitary goal.
Lucy, for example is often seen as hypersexualized and even described as Dracula’s “central fallen woman” (Boudreau, 3) due to her references to polygamy and her confident attitude. One scholar has stated that she is “far too vampy and emancipated for her own good” (Peterson, 33). She is the first victim to the vampiric transformation seen in the novel which may in part be symbolic of her ‘fallen woman’-ness, where due to her invisible sexual transgressions and permissiveness she was open to being infected (penetrated) by the Count. This is purposeful on Stoker’s part, her vampirization is the author’s punishment for her sexed up ideals, this is how she is to become repentant.
It is after her complete transformation that Lucy attains a more sinister demeanor. In the horror-filled graveyard scene after her vampirization, she holds a small child, coddling it as if it were her own --this is also after she is known to take children in the night, bite them, and send them home, kindly referred to by the children as the “bloofer lady” (Stoker, 190). The sentiment she shows the children is far from malicious, proven by their fondness for her and a desire to act as her when they play (Stoker, 190), but she is now a full vampire and irredeemable in the eyes of the men.
Many analysts focus only on her openness to sexuality saying her “primal woman[ness]” was far too much for the Victorian reader (Peterson, 35). I argue that despite her New Woman qualities, and perhaps because of her badge as a fallen woman, she is in actuality craving the typical Angel in the House lifestyle. Her love for Arthur as well as the kidnapping and attempted vamping of the local children speaks to the audience as an intense desire for the family unit. She calls out to her former fiance, “‘Come to me, Arthur. Leave these others and come to me. My arms are hungry for you’” (Stoker, 221). This crying out may signify her repentance for her former feminist nature, a rejection of the small notions she had of polygamy and of her wily nature, and proof that now she longs for the traditional path of women: motherhood and wifehood.
Other critics may argue that Lucy was even further liberated by her vampirization. Dennis Foster argues in his essay that the transition has led her to freedom from the traditional lifestyle, saying that the “more striking change in Lucy is that she is no longer the frustrated maiden in white waiting for some man to release her from her situation of constrained femininity, a release that would bring the inevitable physical and psychological burdens of children” (Foster, 544). In essence, he claims that the assault on her person has actually freed her to become a more liberated New Woman. I, however, strongly disagree with this notion but rather view the transgression as Lucy being forced away from the life she desired. Becoming undead has limited her ability to perform normal functions like child bearing, marriage, and sleeping in a bed instead of a tomb. This is by all accounts a symbolic retribution for her less-than-conservative suggestions, deserved or otherwise.
Mina takes a much different approach to the New Woman than Lucy. Instead of a sexually liberal woman, Mina displays skills usually reserved for the Victorian male, including her high intellect and her proficiency as a stenographer. These qualities are very clearly defined as being male only, evidenced most distinctly by Van Helsing’s many references to her “man’s brain” (Stoker, 242). While assisting the men in their hunt for Dracula, she is attacked by the vampire and begins a slow transformation into a vampire; this, like Lucy, is Mina’s punishment for her maleness. However, unlike Lucy, Mina exhibits traditional feminine traits that may in Stoker’s mind counteract her New Woman-ness and therefore save her from ultimate condemnation.
For example, her maternal nature is evident far before she even gives birth to her son. Mina becomes “the maternal figure for the band of men” (Boudreau, 5) most clearly defined for the audience as she comforts Arthur after the death of Lucy. She states
We women have something of the mother in us that makes us rise above smaller matters when the mother-spirit is invoked; I felt this big, sorrowing man’s head resting on me, as though it were that of the baby that someday may lie on my bosom, and I stroked his hair as though he were my own child. (Stoker, 238)
This bond she creates with the men is much stronger than that of Lucy’s, she becomes very useful to them as the mother figure, comforting and caring for every member of the group at some moment in the novel. Her maternity, much like her intellect and note taking, are essential to the men’s survival (and sanity) in hunting the vampire, whereas Lucy had provided very little. This makes her male qualities less harmful to tradition but no less unwelcome.
After her vamping is cured and the Count is slayed, the epilogue of the novel (written in Jonathan Harker’s perspective) notes that Mina has given birth to a son, Quincy, named after each of the male members of the vampire hunting escapade (Stoker, 371). He also reveals that the notes, recordings, and all paraphernalia regarding the event has been put away and had miraculously been lost (Stoker, 371). The action of Mina becoming a mother to a child --named as a reminder for the event that nearly condemns her to damnation-- is a representation of her rejection of her former qualities that led to aforesaid condemnation. She now takes part in the most traditional pastime for the Victorian woman: motherhood -- and she is mother to a son, the best possible scenario for a woman adhering to Victorian social normativity. Stoker writes the epilogue to display Mina’s rejection of the New Woman. She no longer writes in her journal, she no longer hunts down an evil creature, the proof of her intellect has been locked away and mystically disappeared, and --as a final confirmation of this rejection-- her husband is the one writing on her behalf in the epilogue. Mina’s womanly qualities displayed throughout the novel are rewarded with salvation from a vampiric body, and the resignation from her post as burgeoning New Woman is rewarded with a son.
It appears to me that Bram Stoker’s ideal brand of woman did not include the up and coming New Woman, but very definitively favored the traditional Angel in the House. His secret narrative of punishing women for their feminist transgressions are visible through the sexuality of Lucy, the intellect of Mina, and the potential outcome of their vampirism. Lucy’s transformation and staking is a warning to his female audience that the fallout is deadly, while Mina’s salvation is a promise of reward for those who continue down the path of tradition. Without a doubt this narrative stems from a male fear of the New Woman and a fear for the future of Western Culture, and certainly this fear is crafted in one of the most famous works of fiction to have been written in the Victorian era.
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Biography
Katlyn Cadwell is a CSUF alumni and current graduate student of the same institution. She is working toward her MA and plans to continue on to earn her PhD in Literature. Her main focus is Horror and Contemporary Lit, but has a broad knowledge of literature from the 1800s to present day.
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