Gothic novels of the popular culture are usually interpreted to illustrate the subjugation of men and women, and frequently confront the anxieties encompassing gender and sexuality prospects in Victorian Britain. The Victorian era failed to make room for sexual candidness and gender distortion, and these ideologies are challenged in Robert Louis Stevenson’s Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and Bram Stoker’s Dracula. Both novels were based around the Victorian era and both explore gender fluidity. The patriarchal views of the Victorian society imposed authority and domination of men over women and through these two texts; it is shown that the Victorian ideologies and prospects of society led to the discouragement of the two genders.
Societal norms have transformed over time. Victorian Britain displayed heteronormativity, that being the assumption that heterosexuality is the natural sexual preference and that …show more content…
She is economically autonomous, intellectually independent and has the ability to think like a man. Stoker refers to her as having ‘a man’s brain - a brain that a man should have were he much gifted - and a woman’s heart’. Here, manliness is welcomed as she still plays by the standards she is intended to take after. Even though she still marries and her husband is able to control her, Mina challenges the Victorian ideology that gender should not be fluid. In the novel there is a strong connection to the up and coming suffragette movement at the time. However, the novel was written prior to this movement, leaving the expectations and standards for women incredibly limiting. Mina refers to herself as ‘The New Woman’ which suggests she is a progressive woman, much like the women of the suffragette movement. She is physically and mentally independent and this female superiority over men, and the idea of women having what were considered male characteristics subversively questioned societal norms of the 19th century Victorian
Societal norms have transformed over time. Victorian Britain displayed heteronormativity, that being the assumption that heterosexuality is the natural sexual preference and that …show more content…
She is economically autonomous, intellectually independent and has the ability to think like a man. Stoker refers to her as having ‘a man’s brain - a brain that a man should have were he much gifted - and a woman’s heart’. Here, manliness is welcomed as she still plays by the standards she is intended to take after. Even though she still marries and her husband is able to control her, Mina challenges the Victorian ideology that gender should not be fluid. In the novel there is a strong connection to the up and coming suffragette movement at the time. However, the novel was written prior to this movement, leaving the expectations and standards for women incredibly limiting. Mina refers to herself as ‘The New Woman’ which suggests she is a progressive woman, much like the women of the suffragette movement. She is physically and mentally independent and this female superiority over men, and the idea of women having what were considered male characteristics subversively questioned societal norms of the 19th century Victorian