Dracula as the Persecuted Outsider in Bram Stokers Dracula Essay

genus genus genus Dracula as the Persecuted Outsider in Bram Stokers DraculaBram Stokers Dracula is highly acclaimed and has received many different interpretations which deal with complex symbolisms and metaphors. These interpretations often require a great deal of knowledge in psychology, political science, anthropology, and other non-literary disciplines. These interpretations may be valid, as they are cerebrate to the disciplines on which their arguments are based, solely the true power of the novel is due to a very simple theme that lies beneath the other, more convolve interpretations. This theme is the ecumenic concept of identity us versus them. This criticism sets digression outside disciplines and focuses on the literary motif of identity. John Allen Stevenson gives an in-depth criticism of this lean based mostly on anthropological ideas, but he states that Dracula is a representation of fears that are more universal than a peculiar(prenominal) focus on the tight-la ced background would allow (141). He brings up the concept of universal ideas but fails to pursue them on a universal scale. The truly universal theme involves the perception that Dracula is a monster. precisely Dracula is not a monster - he is simply a persecuted outsider. In this interpretation, it is important to seperate the actions of the characters from what those actions represent in relation to the theme of identity. calculation Dracula is shown to be a vampire - a monster who engages in horrific, violent acts, but these acts of violence are merely Stokers vehicle for presenting the residual between the Count and the other characters. His vampirish actions are not to be interpreted literally. Dracula is not a work of fantasy - it is primarily a realistic novel with one fantastic charact... ...safe once Dracula left, but the pursuit and slaying of him represents societys wish to remove him entirely from their minds. The killing of Dracula is not literal--he is only dead t o society because they refuse to acknowledge his decline to be different. Thus, Dracula is the victim of this story, not the ones society felt he victimized. Works Cited Arata, Stephen D. The Occidental Tourist Dracula and the Anxiety of Reverse Colonization. Victorian Studies 33.4 (Sum. 1990) 621-45. Stevenson, John Allen. A Vampire in the Mirror The Sexuality of Dracula. PMLA 103 (1988) 139-49. Stoker, Bram. Dracula. 1897. Oxford Oxford UP, 1992. Wasson, Richard. The government of Dracula. English Literature in Transition 9 (1966) 24-27. Zanger, Jules. A harmonized Vibration Dracula and the Jews. English Literature in Transition 34 (1991) 33-44.