Dracula - key quotes

"we were leaving the West and entering the East"

"some old Oriental band of brigands" (Harker, Ch.1)

Orientalism and post-colonial criticism - Harker's Eurocentric/Westernised view of Transylvania as uncivilised/primitive.

"prodigious strength"

"great door, old and studded with large iron nails...worn by time and weather" (Harker, Ch.2)

Dracula's castle and servants mirror his strength/ancientness - exist as an extension of him.

"sharp white teeth...protruded over his lip"

"pale"

"nails were...cut to a sharp point"

"his eyes blazed with a sort of demoniac fury" (Harker, Ch.2)

Dracula's description has become synonymous with Western views/features of vampirism - evil, dangerous, threatening.

"the castle is a veritable prison, and I am a prisoner!" (Harker, Ch.2)

Themes of imprisonment and entrapment, victimisation of Harker as he is held captive by Dracula.

"I saw the whole man slowly emerge from the window and begin to crawl down the castle wall" (Harker, Ch.3)

Animalistic image of Dracula - abhuman, supernatural creature/monster.

"brilliant white teeth that shone like pearls against the ruby of their voluptuous lips"

"fair cheeks blazing red with passion"

"a wicked, burning desire that they would kiss me"

"waited with a beating heart" (Harker, Ch.3)

Threatening and seductive sexuality of the vampire women - exaggerated eroticism reflects fears of open female sexuality/desire. An exploration of Victorian social taboos, subverting traditional views of femininty.

"an agony of delightful anticipation"

"deliberate voluptuousness which was both thrilling and repulsive" (Harker, Ch.3)

Pain/pleasure paradox - Harker finds himself simultaneously attracted to and repulsed by the open sexuality and eroticised beauty of the vampire women.

"this man belongs to me!" (Dracula, Ch.3)

Implicit homoeroticism in 'Dracula' as Dracula claims ownership of Harker. A subversion of the traditional imperiled female heroine, as this masculine, evil threat instead predates Harker, a young man. Perhaps this is the taboo explored through the vampire.

"he was either dead or asleep...the cheeks had the warmth of life through all their pallor"

"as if his youth has been half renewed" (Harker, Ch.4)

The vampire exists in a liminal state between dead and alive - not only is the vampire undead and dependent on the consumption of blood to remain a life, but also exists as an ancient folkloric tale within a 'modern' Victorian society.

"I want to keep up with Jonathan's studies...when we are married, I shall be able to be useful to Jonathan"

"I shall try to do what I see lady journalists do" (Mina, Ch.5)

Mina may be viewed within the realm of the 'New Woman' through her pursuit of work and commercial skills. However, her desire to serve her husband overrules her ambition, placing her in the traditional domestic sphere of femininity.

"Why can't they let a girl marry three men, or as many as want her, and save all this trouble?" (Lucy, Ch.5)

Lucy displays a predisposition to promiscuity through her subversive, unfeminine desire to marry multiple men. Shows a disregard for social convention and expectations, highlighting the taboo of polygamy.

"a most noble ruin of immense size...big graveyard, all full of tombstones" (Mina, Ch.6)

Whitby Abbey, like Dracula's castle, provides a traditionally Gothic setting for Lucy's vamping. Ruins as a symbol of a feudal past, and religious images/settings are common within the Gothic. Images of death may foreshadow the vamping and subsequent staking of Lucy.

"Lucy...has lately taken to her old habit of walking in her sleep" (Mina, Ch.6)

Lucy's sleepwalking habit may be read as a desire for premarital sex and a restlessness within the strict conventions of bourgeois Victorian society - suggestion that Lucy is complicit in her vamping, drawing Dracula to her through her display of sexuality.

"the New Woman won't condescend in future to accept; she will do the proposing herself. And a nice job she will make of it, too!" (Mina, Ch.8)

Mina mocks the New Woman jokingly - suggests an awareness of emerging challenges to typical feminine roles, but also a disregard of those rebelling against convention.

"the silver light of the moon struck a half-reclining figure, snowy white"

"a white face and red, gleaming eyes"

"she was breathing...in long, heavy gasps" (Mina, Ch.8)

Lucy's sexualised vamping - corruption of innocence by the evil of the vampire.

"she is paler than is her wont, and there is a drawn, haggard look under her eyes"

"growing weaker" (Mina, Ch.8)

"ghastly, chalkily pale; the red seemed to have gone even from her lips and gums, and the bones of her face stood out prominently" (Seward, Ch.10)

Lucy is weakened by her vampirism - images of illness and physical decay may mirror a moral transgression and decay.

"he is only a wreck of himself, and he does not remember anything that has happened to him for a long past time"

"I do not know if it was all real or the dreaming of a madman" (Mina, Ch.9)

Images of madness are traditionally Gothic - a fascination with insanity shown through both Renfield and Jonathan. A loss of rationality and logic through the terror of his experiences in Transylvania, perhaps a corruption of Harker's mind by the uncivilised/barbarian setting.

"my life is hers, and I would give the last drop of blood in my body for her" (Arthur, Ch.10)

Blood as a metaphor for love/sex/romance/desire - a life force which is transferred between lovers as a bodily fluid.

"little miss"

"good child" (Van Helsing, Ch.10)

"poor, dear Madam Mina" (Van Helsing, Ch.24)

Van Helsing's address of both Mina and Lucy is often condescending/patronising - the female characters are simultaneously infantilised and sexualised by the male characters.

"licking up, like a dog, the blood that had fallen from my wounded wrist" (Seward, Ch.11)

Animalistic depictions of Renfield highlight his insanity and loss of rationality.

"the angelic beauty of her eyes"

"death had given back part of her beauty"

"soft, voluptuous voice" (Seward, Ch.12)

Lucy's beauty is returned in death - sexualised description of Lucy aligns her with the vampire women.

"she is one of God's women...so true, so sweet, so noble, so little an egoist" (Van Helsing, Ch.14)

Religious imagery highlights Mina's morality and virtue, creating a stark opposition with the promiscuity and transgression displayed by Lucy as a vampire.

"the sweetness had turned to adamantine, heartless cruelty, and the purity to voluptuous wantonness"

"Lucy's eyes unclean and full of hell-fire"

"growling over it [the child] as a dog growls over a bone" (Seward, Ch.16)

Lucy as the Bloofer Lady - aligned with sacreligion/sin/the devil and corruptive, destructive beauty and sexuality. Her treatment of the child subverts traditional expectations of femininity and ideals of motherhood, emphasising her transgression of gender norms.

"his untrembling arm rose and fell, driving deeper and deeper the mercy-bearing stake"

"strike in God's name"

"her face of unequalled sweetness and purity" (Seward, Ch.16)

Sexualised staking of Lucy through the phallic symbol of the stake punishes her for her sexual transgressions and restores the gender expectations upheld by the novel's male characters. These characters use religion and the post-penetrative peace experienced by their victims to justify the murders that they commit.

"this Thing is not human - not even a beast" (Mina, Ch.17)

The vampire as supernatural/abhuman.

"we women have something of the mother in us that makes us rise above smaller matters when the mother-spirit is invoked" (Mina, Ch.17)

Motherhood as a key role for women - Mina's femininity and purity are restored by her return to domesticity at the end of the text, as she becomes a wife and mother. Suggestion that these gendered roles are natural.

"for the blood is the life" (Renfield, Ch.18)

Thirst for blood is at the centre of Dracula - acts as a symbol of life and vitality, but is also a corruptive force, representing sex/infection/inherited disease.

"she has a man's brain...and a woman's heart" (Van Helsing, Ch.18)

Like Mina's desire to work/acquire employable skills, her intelligence means that she blurs the boundaries between expectations of femininity and masculinity. While she certainly conforms to expectations of women's physical inferiority and weakness, her intellectual strength complicates the novel's strict gender dynamics.

"the white-clad figure of his wife...a tall, thin man, clad in black"

"forcing her face down on his bosom...her nightdress was smeared with blood"

"his eyes flamed red with devilish passion" (Seward, Ch.21)

Similarly to the vamping of Lucy, Mina and Dracula are portrayed in a sexualised tableau. Contrast between the black 'evil' of Dracula and the purity/chastity associated with Mina's white figure - a purity that is corrupted by Dracula's influence. Drinking blood as a subversion of the Eucharist.

"your girls that you all love are mine already; and through them you and the others shall yet be mine" (Dracula, Ch.23)

Implicit homoeroticism present in the relationship between Dracula and the other male characters - through the heterosexual transferral of fluids to the female characters, Dracula is able to access the blood of the male characters.

"horrid poison which has got into her veins" (Seward, Ch.24)

"tainted as she is with the devil's illness" (Harker, Ch.26)

Images of infection and sin aligned with vampirism and blood.

"it was like a miracle; but before our very eyes...there was in the face a look of peace" (Mina, Ch.27)

Like Lucy, the peace experienced by Dracula upon his death is used to present his violent murder as natural. A restoration of convention and British imperial/male dominance.

"with a smile and in silence, he died, a gallant gentleman" (Mina, Ch.27)

Quincey Morris' death acts as a sacrifice necessary to the defeat of evil.