Advisor Information
David Peterson
Location
UNO Criss Library, Room 231
Presentation Type
Oral Presentation
Start Date
3-3-2017 11:00 AM
End Date
3-3-2017 11:15 AM
Abstract
The purity movement in Victorian England created a context where fluid sexuality was considered a threat to the bodies and souls not only of the current generation, but of the human race in general. Drawing on the reception Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass received in a time where decency laws preached conservative rigidity, Bram Stoker crafted Dracula to encapsulate Victorian anxiety and critique purity’s effectiveness. Using Whitman and his poems as a base for Count Dracula, the novel follows the struggle of the older generations to eradicate sexuality that threatens the Christian norms of the time by personifying these changes and corruption through the sensuality of vampirism. At the same time, the struggle of the young characters to conform to Victorian norms by repressing their own sexual desires allows Stoker to engage with the ways both Dracula and Whitman speak to a fluid sexuality that cannot be eradicated by social crusades. By examining Whitman’s poems and personal correspondence, motifs and images make their way into Dracula and a clear model for social critique is evident as Stoker’s infamous villain is ultimately a monster of progress.
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Bloody Drops: Dracula, Sexuality, and Walt Whitman
UNO Criss Library, Room 231
The purity movement in Victorian England created a context where fluid sexuality was considered a threat to the bodies and souls not only of the current generation, but of the human race in general. Drawing on the reception Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass received in a time where decency laws preached conservative rigidity, Bram Stoker crafted Dracula to encapsulate Victorian anxiety and critique purity’s effectiveness. Using Whitman and his poems as a base for Count Dracula, the novel follows the struggle of the older generations to eradicate sexuality that threatens the Christian norms of the time by personifying these changes and corruption through the sensuality of vampirism. At the same time, the struggle of the young characters to conform to Victorian norms by repressing their own sexual desires allows Stoker to engage with the ways both Dracula and Whitman speak to a fluid sexuality that cannot be eradicated by social crusades. By examining Whitman’s poems and personal correspondence, motifs and images make their way into Dracula and a clear model for social critique is evident as Stoker’s infamous villain is ultimately a monster of progress.