Dracula - key quotes

'I find that the district he named is in the extreme east of the country, just on the border of three states'

Harker (Chapter 1)

- sets up East v West conflict and suggests I has little identity and is hard to pin point - part of his irrational mind

'...one of the wildest and least known portions of Europe'

Harker (Chapter 1)

- East vs West

Superstition 'the centre of some sot of imaginative whirlpool'

Harker (Chapter 1)

- metaphor shows how out of control superstition is in the East and its danger to Victorian modernity

'...the further East you go the more unpunctual are the trains'

Harker (Chapter 1)

- East seen as uncivilised and unmodern

'the light of the lamps...projected against...the figures of my late companions crossing themselves'

Harker (Chapter 1)

- 'lamp' symbolises rational society shining on superstitious east.

'I think I must have fallen asleep and kept dreaming of the incident'

Harker (Chapter 1)

- uncertainty conveyed in 'I think' questions epigraphs belief that memory is always fact. Harker knows little of his irrational other

'The whole room behind me was displayed; but there was no sign of a man in it, except myself'

Harker (Chapter 2)

- mirror a symbol of Victorian rationality

- supernatural occurrence suggests doppelganger of Harker; he is also Dracula

'The castle is on the very edge of a terrible precipice'

Harker (Chapter 2)

- setting used to show Victorian fear of falling back into feudal past at 'peak of modernity'

'...doors, doors, doors everywhere, and all locked and bolted'

Harker (Chapter 2)

- repetition shows frustration at social constraints to evade uncovering own irrationality

- setting also symbolises societies fears of its repressed desires

'I might let the servants know I had finished - but I could not find one.'

Harker (Chapter 2)

- no servants and rich suggests Dracula is not a real man.

- He is a symbol of capitalism and alludes to how Marx described capitalism as a vampiric force, sucking the blood from the working classes

'though it seemed to be locked, gave a little under pressure'

Harker (Chapter 3)

- his repressed desires are untouched but he willingly transgresses

'The habit of entering accurately must help to soothe me.'

Harker (Chapter 3)

- Harker uses his diary entries as a way of rationalising the irrational.

'I felt in my heart a wicked desire'

Harker (Chapter 3)

- antithesis of 'wicked' and 'desire' shows how Harker knows his 'eve of wedding' desires cannot be shown (social repression) but knows he's transgressed.

'I was afraid to raise my eyelids, but looked out and saw perfectly under the lashes'

Harker (Chapter 3)

- 'lashes' - feminine symbol shows how Harker is emasculated by the vampire women

'both thrilling and repulsive'

Harker (Chapter 3)

- ANTITHESIS

"Yes, I too can love:...'

Dracula (Chapter 3)

- potential homoerotic desire of the Count highlights Victorian fear of subversive sexuality

'I shall try to do what I see lady journalists do...'

Mina (Chapter 5)

- embraces liberated role of New Woman here. Stoker alludes to how women's professions were broadened.

'Oh, Mina, dear, I can't help crying.'

Lucy (Chapter 5)

- Stoker highlights fears of liberating women because they are too emotional

'Why can't a girl marry three men, or as many as she wants to?'

Lucy (Chapter 5)

- Lucy is liberated and transgresses from social norms. Victorian fear of New Woman leaving loyal domestic role is revealed.

'What was it, whether man or beast, I could not tell'

Mina (Chapter 8)

- Acknowledges duplicity and blurring of boundaries Dracula represents

'...I could see Lucy half-reclining with her head lying over the back of the seat'

Mina (Chapter 8)

- 'half' suggests ambiguity as it is a medial state between being victimise and transgression

'I toiled up the endless steps'

Mina (Chapter 8)

- agency shown against supernatural force

'the God created from human vanity sees no difference between an eagle and a sparrow'

Seward (Chapter 8)

- suggests Renfield is insane because he refuses to acknowledge a hierarchy.

- makes us question Seward's professional judgement

'I must be careful not to let it grow into a habit'

Seward (Chapter 8)

- allusion to drug taking ironically makes us believe his judgement is clouded.

"A brave man's blood is the best thing on this earth when a woman is in trouble"

Van Helsing (Chapter 12)

- exaggerative to reinforce own masculinity

- blood transfusion represents modern attempt to subdue supernatural and sex - Van Helsing suggests sex is what reinforces masculinity

'...has had put into her veins the blood of four strong men'

Van Helsing (Chapter 12)

- sexual transgression on behalf of Lucy

- shows appetite of New Woman but she remains passive

'Arthur was simply choking with emotion'

Seward (Chapter 12)

- 'choking' implies being overcome; Arthur is overcome by emotion, an ironically feminine characteristic

'he laughed again, and laughed and cried together, just as a woman does'

Seward (Chapter 13)

- hysterics typically a condition treated for women as it means 'from the womb'

- suggests blurring of gender roles through Van Helsing's laughter - transgressive

"yet even at such moment King Laugh come to me and shout and bellow in my ear..."

Van Helsing (Chapter 13)

- personifies psychological transgression - shows he is out of control of psyche

'...and that the stream had trickled over her chin and stained the purity of her lawn death-robe'

Seward (Chapter 16)

- New Woman seen as corrupting purity of Victorian ideology

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

Seward (Chapter 16)

- positions Lucy as Medusa figure - she emasculates men - resembling fear of New Woman to social and religious authority

"Come, my husband, come!"

Lucy (Chapter 16)

- Lucy shown to be conventional compared to men - she conforms to monogamy

"And so the circle goes on ever widening, like as the ripples from a stone thrown in the water"

Van Helsing (Chapter 16)

- image alludes to Harker's earlier image in Chapter 4.

- highlights fear of the 'other' being released into everyday spaces uncontrollably

'The Thing'

Seward (Chapter 16)

- objectifies Lucy to make it easier to commit violent act of killing her

'The body show and quivered and twisted in wild contortions'

Seward (Chapter 16)

- actions show pain but also sexual arousal on Lucy's part

'He looked like a figure of Thor'

Seward (Chapter 16)

- Arthur positioned as god-like in reclaiming masculinity by staking Lucy

'He reeled and would have fallen had we not caught him'

Seward (Chapter 16)

- Arthur immediately shown to be effeminate, making us question Seward's grandiose description of him as a 'figure of Thor'

'All we have to go upon are traditions and superstitions'

Van Helsing

- blurring of boundaries between archaic and modern. Modern seen as something which can't ironically destroy the past

'He was never so resolute, never so strong, never so full of volcanic energy'

Mina

- Mina reinforces masculinity of Jonathan despite the fact we know he has had a breakdown.

- Proves lack of self-insight in fighters of Dracula

'She has a man's brain...and woman's heart'

Van Helsing

- reinforces idea that Mina is androgynous in terms of gender.

'but it is no part for a woman'

Van Helsing

- forced subordination of Mina

'...talking elemental philosophy, and with the manner of a polished gentleman'

Seward

- we doubt Seward's judgement due to suddenly suggesting Renfield is sane. Makes us question notion of sanity

'but some lethargy seemed to chain my limbs and even my will'

Mina (Chapter 19)

- encounter with Dracula positioned as passive and victimised

'I must be careful of such dreams'

Mina (Chapter 19)

- dismisses encounter with Dracula as irrational nonsense

'...his face flushed, and breathing heavily as though in a stupor'

Seward (Chapter 21)

- Harker emasculated and positioned as victim

'Her white nightdress was smeared with blood'

Seward (Chapter 21)

- symbolic of forced sexual encounter with Dracula. Seward positions it as assault

'a child forcing a kitten's nose into a saucer of milk to compel it to drink'

Seward (Chapter 21)

- simile strangely and contradictorily suggests Mina's encounter with Dracula is both assaulting and nourishing

'champed together like those of a wild beast'

Seward (Chapter 21)

- simile reveals animalistic 'otherness' of the Count

"Unclean! Unclean!"

Seward (Chapter 21)

- Mina's exclamation shows how she believes she has corrupted the purity of marriage

- intertextual reference to Leviticus

"All the manuscript had been burned...the cylinders of your phonograph too were thrown on the fire'

Arthur (Chapter 21)

- Dracula positioned as clear threat to modernity

"tell us exactly what happened"

Van Helsing (Chapter 21)

- ironic to ask this to Mina when Crew of Light saw Dracula's attack

- blurs boundaries of truth and lies

"I did not want to hinder him"

Mina (Chapter 21)

- Mina accepts sexual encounter with Count

'I was in a half swoon"

Mina (Chapter 21)

- repetition of 'half' alludes to Lucy's liminal state earlier in novel

"And so you, like the others, would play your brains against me"

Dracula (Chapter 21)

- Dracula seems to accuse Mina of betraying him for having liberated her

"...so that I must either suffocate or swallow some of the - "

Mina (Chapter 21)

- Mina's omission suggests sexual encounter with Dracula

- positions herself as forced into transgression

'had burned into the flesh as though it had been a piece of white-hot metal'

Harker (Chapter 22)

- simile about wafer suggests Mina has transgressed and destroyed Christian purity

'in my trance I heard the cows low and water swirling...'

Mina (Chapter 26)

- Mina relies on map to deduce Dracula's position but also reliant on telepathic link - irrational

'I shudder as though I have come to do murder'

Van Helsing (Chapter 27)

- 'shudder' highlights the terror of understanding one's own barbarism

- Van Helsing has lack of self-insight, suggesting killing vampire women is not murder

'...the voluptuous mouth present to a kiss - and man is weak'

Van Helsing (Chapter 27_

- Van Helsing positions female sexuality as threat to men

'it was butcher work'

Van Helsing (Chapter 27)

- embraces own barbarism

'The Professor and I...held out weapons ready'

Mina (Chapter 27)

- weaponry usually a masculine utensil but Mina has it, so is on equal footing with men

'instinctively they cowered aside and let him pass'

Mina (Chapter 27)

- unrealistic masculine view of Jonathan's strength and masculinity

'It was like a miracle'

Mina (Chapter 27)

- simile reveals how Crew of Light he killing Dracula not as brutality but as defending religion

'The castle stood as before...'

Harker (Note)

- symbolis for remaining threat of Dracula

- return to Transylvania shows how characters still continue to embrace irrational

'there is hardly one authentic document...'

Harker (Note)

- narrative unreliability

"What a brave and gallant woman his mother is. Already he knows her sweetness and loving care"

Van Helsing (Note)

- Mina positioned as combination of masculine and feminine qualities which must be preserved. Stoker shows Mina as the perfect New Woman - link to Sos Elis

'he might satiate his lust for blood, and create a new and ever widening circle of semi-demons...'

Harker (Chapter 4)

- highlights Victorian fear of foreigners infiltrating British purity.

'A terrible desire came over me to rid the world of this monster'

Harker (Chapter 4)

- highlights violence of Victorian society beneath moderate surface

'I cannot think freely when my body is confined'

Renfield (Chapter 20)

- Seward shown to be cruel as a Victorian symbol of modernity