Lucy Westenra Flashcards
(31 cards)
“I suppose we women are such cowards that we think a man will save us from fears, and we marry him”
Chapter 5
- misogynistic
- paints women as weak and unable to fend for themselves
“She put her hand to her throat again and moaned”
Chapter 8
- hiding her neck: shame
- marks on neck: typical signs of early sexual experimentation
“Something like life seemed to come back to poor Lucy’s cheek”
Chapter 10
- blood transfusion initially has a profound impact; reinforces the idea that science is good
- by the end of the transition she has the blood of 3 men inside her; symbolic of her desire for 3 husbands
“Soft voluptuous voice… kiss me!”
Chapter 12
- pre modifying adjective
- newly found fowardness
- demands sexual satisfaction
“Canine teeth looked longer and sharper”
Chapter 12
- alerts the reader she has moved into the supernatural realm
- Seward notices change in her teeth
“All Lucy’s loveliness had come back to her in death!”
Chapter 13
- appeal of her beauty increases when dead
- first sign of life after death
“Her face of unequalled sweetness and purity”
Chapter 16
- restored sexual innocent
- her second death is salvation
- draws a close to phase 2 of the novel
Boundaries Crossed by Lucy
- promiscuous vs traditional
- human vs liminal
- dead vs undead
Meaning of the name ‘Lucy Westenra’
- ‘West’enra: contrasts Dracula coming from the East
- connotes ‘Lucifer’: fallen angel?
- link to 7 deadly sins: lust
“I must say you tax me very unfairly with being a bad correspondent”
Chapter 5
- playful and passionate
- contrasts Mina’s serious letter
“Men like women, certainly their wives, to be quite as fair as they are”
Chapter 5
- relies on men to feel fulfilled, as seen by her desire to get engaged
- contrasts Mina, who is more modern
“Why can’t they let a girl marry three men, or as many as want her, and save all this trouble? But this is heresy, and I must not say it”
Chapter 5
- verb
- sexual connotations
- would be frowned upon in Victorian times
- shows her trust for Mina, to admit this to her
“Although she is so well, has lately taken to her old habit of walking in her sleep”
Chapter 6
- creates a sense of danger and vulnerability
“There are two little red points like pin-pricks, and on the band of her nightdress was a drop of blood”
Chapter 8
- alludes to attack by Dracula
- her previously white dress is covered with blood; alludes to sexual desire
“I was wakened by Lucy trying to get out”
Chapter 8
- drawn by the supernatural force
- AO3: Victorians feared that sexually liberated women because sexually insatiable
Why might Lucy’s death be so prolonged?
to show that vampirism is a degenerate disease (link to attitudes towards STIs)
“To be able to think and move about is like feeling sunshine after a long spell of east wing out of a steel sky”
Chapter 10
- simile
- the ability to think is relieving: emphasises the pain she had gone through
“Thank everybody for being so good to me! Thank God! Good night, Arthur.”
Chapter 10
- exclamatory
- thankful for science AND religion (crossing boundary)
“I shall hide this paper in my breast […] God help me!”
Chapter 11
- ready to die
- the reader can trust the information as it comes from Lucy
“By her side lay Lucy, with face white and still more drawn”
Chapter 12
- Dracula has fed from her
- closer to death than the dead
“In the long hours that followed, she had many spells of sleeping and waking and repeated both actions many times”
Chapter 12
- drifting between consciousness and full control over her thoughts to a state of hypnosis
“We thought her dying whilst she slept, and sleeping when she died”
Chapter 12
- death has repurified her
“Bloofer lady”
Chapter 13
- ‘bloofer’ is Victorian slang for ‘beautiful’
- Lucy is drinking children’s blood, a vampire
- physically dead but becomes undead (crossing boundary)
“I drew near and looked. The coffin was empty.”
Chapter 15
- reflects Jesus’ resurrection; Jesus ascended but Lucy has not, she is undead
