Dracula: The Unjust War for Feminine Thought Linus Landucci College

“Mere “modernity” cannot kill.” The year is 1897, and European culture is changing. Skepticism about both Christianity and the introduction of Darwinism into common thought is current, and the concept of what we now call “feminism” is planting its roots, apparent in the rise and fall of political parties and movements such as the female-friendly Paris Commune in France (Smith 72). For a man like Jonathan Harker, sitting in Dracula’s castle, this is uncomfortable (Stoker 53). These words demonstrate his doubt that the Count’s societal model, as he’ll soon come to know it, can fail.

Stoker created the character of the Count in Dracula to personify sexual promiscuity and various other counter-cultural ideals that supposedly preyed on British society. Seen as obstructing and infiltrating a system that doesn’t need fixing, Dracula embodies the feminist movement. His framework for English society features more radical ideas than what activists considered cutting edge, making Dracula the perfect villain to even progressive readers.

Dracula works primarily through the captivation of women in the novel, luring them into knowing him sexually. He seeks to take over societal thought through the overmastering of the women’s desires. But...