Written and set in the late 19th century, Bram Stoker's epistolary novel, Dracula, is a pivotal book in the horror/gothic literature. There are strong themes of morality and questioning what exactly is good or evil, there are ties to Christian iconography but what I found to be the most important were the strong themes of female sexuality and oppression. Victorian culture basically revolved around suppressing women and this is quite obvious in many scenes parts of the book. In a typical Victorian society, women were unfairly forced into very restrictive gender roles. A woman would either be looked at as pure and innocent, (or a mother/wife) or she could be regarded as a nothing more than a whore (Buckk). There really was no middle ground for women at that time. This view on women is represented through two of Dracula's main characters, Mina and Lucy. These two women are inexplicably feminine and the prime example of how a woman in the Victorian era should be. The threat that Count Dracula poses in transforming these women becomes a battle that lies upon women's morality. Thus the real fear in the book is not darkness and vampiric nature but the loss of female innocence, a trait apparently extremely valuable and important to men. If Count Dracula were to succeed in turning all the women into vampires, it would completely liberate them from the confines of the gender roles at the time. I think Stoker showed this as a threat in the novel perhaps because of the society he lived in believed that a woman that embraces her sexuality would have power over a man because she could control and nourish men's greatest sexual desires. This power is significantly demonstrated in many aspects Dracula. One example would be Harker's first encounter with the three sisters early in the book. These three women take on a very dominating role that a mild mannered man such as Jonathan Harker is not used to experiencing.
