Count Dracula: Character Profile

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Count Dracula

Here's an analysis of Count Dracula's character:

Sexualised perception

Over the years, Stoker’s original description of Dracula as seen through the eyes of Jonathan Harker is sometimes overlooked in favour of a suaver, sexually-attractive depiction, typified by the actor Bela Lugosi who played the Count in the 1931 film adaptation.

Actual appearance - repulsive

Stoker’s vampire is repulsive and Jonathan is unable to “repress a shudder” in his presence.
Victorian society placed great faith in the pseudoscience of Physiognomy, believing a person’s physical appearance was a reflection of their moral-character.
One of the first observations Jonathan makes of Dracula is how “marked” his Physiognomy is.

Parasite-like

Dracula is a parasite, feeding on the life of others to sustain his own in a foul-parody of immortality.
Even when rejuvenated, his appearance is intended to disgust - Jonathan notices how “on the lips were gouts of fresh blood” - the use of “gouts” alluding to the ancient practice of bloodletting using leeches.

Threat to British society

Perhaps the true horror from Dracula is the threat he represents to the civilised British way of life.
He is the Gothic outsider - a hostile invader who must be eradicated before vampirism becomes a pandemic across the whole of the Empire.
Whilst at times his dialogue may be more befitting of a pantomime villain rather than the Prince of Darkness, Dracula does seem to revel in the act of evil, warning the band of heroes after their encounter in Piccadilly.

Quotation - Dracula in Picadilly

“You think to baffle me, you – with your pale faces all in a row, like sheep in a butcher’s. You shall be sorry yet, each one of you! You think you have left me without a place to rest; but I have more. My revenge is just begun! I spread it over centuries, and time is on my side. Your girls that you all love are mine already; and through them you and others shall yet be mine – my creatures, to do my bidding and to be my jackals when I want to feed. Bah!”

Count Dracula (Cont.)

Here's an analysis of Count Dracula's character:

Identical description of Dracula

Numerous characters encounter Dracula, but the description they give is almost identical: tall, thin, dressed in black with red eyes.
The repetition helps to create a sense of ubiquitousness - he has the potential to be anywhere and seen by anyone; equally, frightening is the potential for anyone to be his next victim.
The description aids with the reader’s suspension of disbelief: the more people who bare witness to Dracula and his uncanny appearance, the more plausible he becomes.

Dracula: many parallels

Unlike other famous Gothic doppelgangers such as Frankenstein’s creature, Count Dracula's ‘double’ is not limited to one character - just as he has the strength of twenty men, all of the male characters in the novel mirror him in some manner.
As is the case with other doubles in Gothic literature, to assign them as being simply ‘good’ and ‘evil’ is a gross oversimplification: those on both sides are capable of transgressing the boundary between the two.

Van Helsing, Harker and Seward

Van Helsing exhibits the most commonalities with Dracula.
Jonathan Harker, in his desperation to escape Castle Dracula, crawls down the walls in the same lizard-fashion as the Count, a descent symbolising a trip into Hell.
Lucy is fascinated by Seward’s position as the director of the asylum and the “wonderful power he must have over his patients”.

Arthur and Quincey

Both Dracula and Arthur belong to their country’s aristocracy and use their influence (Dracula with the Romanian Gypsies) to aid their goals.
Both Quincey and Dracula are from the extreme east and west of the known world respectively, with England at the centre.

1Context - Gothic Literature

1.1Origins & Conventions of Gothic Literature

1.1.1Origins of Gothic Literature

1.1.2Key Ideas in Gothic Literature

1.1.3Gothic Genre Conventions in Dracula

1.2Vampires in Gothic Literature

1.2.1Vampires

1.3'Terror' & 'Horror'

1.3.1Ann Radcliffe & Lewis' The Monk

1.3.2'Terror' & 'Horror' in Dracula

1.4Narrative Features

1.4.1First-Person Narration & Epistolary Format

2Context - The Victorian Era

2.1The Victorian Era

2.1.1Fin de Siecle

2.1.2The 'New Woman'

2.1.3The Contagious Diseases Act

3Chapter Summaries & Analyses

3.1Chapter Summaries & Analyses

3.1.1Chapters 1-2

3.1.2Chapters 3-4

3.1.3Chapters 5-7

3.1.4Chapters 8-10

3.1.5Chapters 11-12

3.1.6Chapters 13-14

3.1.7Chapters 15-16

3.1.8Chapters 17-18

3.1.9Chapters 19-20

3.1.10Chapters 21-23

3.1.11Chapters 24-25

3.1.12Chapters 26-27

4Character Profiles

4.1Archetypal Gothic Characters

4.1.1Stock & Proppian Gothic Characters

4.2Count Dracula

4.2.1Count Dracula: Character Profile

4.2.2Count Dracula: Different Literary Perspectives

4.3Other Main Characters

4.3.1Jonathan Harker

4.3.2Dr Abraham Van Helsing

4.3.3Dr Jack Seward

4.3.4Mina Harker

4.3.5Lucy Westenra

4.4Minor Characters

4.4.1Arthur Holmwood & Quincey Morris

4.4.2Renfield

5Key Ideas

5.1Key Ideas

5.1.1Transgression of Boundaries

5.1.2The Supernatural & Un-dead

5.1.3Masculinity & Femininity

5.1.4Science, Modernity & Superstition

5.1.5Madness, Illness & Confinement

6Writing Techniques

6.1Writing Techniques

6.1.1Epistolary Form & Narrative Voice

6.1.2Intertextuality & Cultural References

6.1.3Structure

7Critical Debates & Interpretations

7.1Initial Reception of Dracula

7.1.1Initial Reception of Dracula

7.2Modern Reception of Dracula

7.2.1Modern Reception of Dracula

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