LOGIN | NEU REGISTRIEREN

Schule > Englisch > Interpretation of the vampire as a metaphor for disease

Dracula as a metaphor for disease

Although they don't fit neatly into our historical records, myths and folklore are not untrue per se. Rather they serve as a basis of our culture, for they are our fears and anxieties, out hopes and dreams crystallized into a narrative to be told and retold again. As such they serve as a light in our darkest hours, a message to future generations: Fears and anxieties can be overcome, dreams and hopes come true.
I find that this is true for fiction as well, especially fiction that draws heavily from folklore such as vampire fiction.
Bringers of disease
The vampires of mythology are closely related to real-life epidemics. They served as an explanation for clusters of inexplicable illnesses, typically found within the same family or small community. Nowadays, especially going through a global pandemic, things like germ theory or contagion come to mind when we're faced with these things. But Vampires are relics of times where this was far from scientific consent and even farther from common sense.
In vampire fiction the motif of disease is ever present. The vampire's victim usually falls mysteriously ill for a couple of days before passing away. The vampire Carmilla herself seems fragile and sickly by day, indicating that she, too, had been wasting away before joining the ranks of the undead herself.
In Dracula it is even more prevalent. Not only do we see Lucy Westenra and Mina Harker suffer from the symptoms inflicted by vampirism, Stoker also evokes the motif of the plague ship: Dracula reaches England onboard the ship Demeter. The sailors fall victim to Dracula one by one until there is no one left but the captain, who ties himself to the steering wheel where he, too, perishes. The Demeter arrives at Whitby a ghost ship, devoid of life.
The fate of the Demeter, ironically names after the Greek goddess of the harvest, reminds us of the ships carrying the black death into European harbours from where it spread across the land during the renaissance and early modern period.
We also often see Characters like Polidori's Aubrey descending into madness after their encounter with the undead or Stoker's Renfield, who is already mad and easily manipulated by Dracula. Therefore, the metaphor of disease does not only apply to diseases of the body but also the mind. Fittingly so considering that many people, who were "identified as vampires and thus starting points of epidemics by their communities, were considered "odd in live and often died by suicide.
Multiple diseases have been suggested to have influenced the vampire myth throughout the years, such as rabies and porphyria, a rare genetic blood disease. Although the truth is most likely a combination, none matches the signs of vampirism Lucy Westenra in particular exhibits in Dracula as closely as tuberculosis.
A fashionable fever
Tuberculosis or TB is one of the oldest diseases known, possibly even predating mankind. It is also highly contagious and exceptionally deadly if left untreated. Tuberculosis was known, amongst other things, as the great white plague or the white death, due to the extreme pallor of those affected. Another name was the robber of youth. Between 1851 and 1910 four million died of tuberculosis in England and Wales. Of these deaths over a third were ages 15-34 and about half of all 20- to 24-year-olds would die from TB.
Lastly and perhaps most famously, tuberculosis was known as consumption, because the disease seemed to consume the individual.
In the 18th and 19th century TB flourished because the houses of the industrial revolution era were poorly ventilated, working condition were deprived and sanitation was in poor in general. By the late 19th century about 80% of those who developed active tuberculosis died of it.
But besides the horrors of the white plague romantic poets such as Lord Byron and writers of gothic novels like Edgar Allan Poe would find a strange and terrible beauty in the affected. Tuberculosis became romanticized, the pallor was seen as a sign of spiritual purity. The appearance of consumptive patients as thin, pale, and melancholy, almost delicate and spirit like, was thought of as attractive.


The consumptive vampirism of Lucy Westenra
Lucy Westenra is often neglected in Dracula adaptions on favour of her best friend, Mina Harker, or depicted as promiscuous to varying degrees, because no less than three men proposed to her on the same day and her wishing she could accept them all. The reason for this is not that Lucy is a greedy flirt, but in her kindness, she is worried that she'll hurt the feeling of those she must reject. Lucy is characterized as being genuinely pure, sweet, and innocent. Therefore, her characterization is already reminiscent of the beauty ideal of the consumptive patient even without any symptoms at all.
Shortly after accepting one of the proposals, she begins to suffer from severe insomnia. It is the first of many major symptoms of tuberculosis present in her case.
Lucy takes on the characteristic pallor of a tb patient, even though van Helsing claims «the conditions of her are in no way anaemic.» (Stoker 2011, p. 120)
«It must be something wrong with my lungs, for I don't seem ever to get air enough. » ( Stoker 2011, p. 115)
This, too, is a common symptom of TB. It is often accompanied by a persistent cough. In severe cases patients are known to even cough up blood. While this is not the case for Lucy, her lips still become bloodstained later as she turns into a vampire.
In a Telegram to van Helsing, Dr. Seward notes:
«Patient greatly improved. Good appetite; sleeps naturally; good spirits, colour returning.» (Stoker 2011, p. 123)
The reference to Lucy's appetite could just be a standard remark made because Seward is a doctor and doctors tend to comment on their patients' eating habits. Also, Lucy did not indicate loss of appetite as one of her symptoms so far. However, the fact that it is made among remarks relating to Lucy's symptoms and in a telegram no less, where every unnecessary word is wasted money, suggests that it is indeed one of her symptoms, even though it is not mentioned anywhere else. This, too, she would share with a consumptive patient. TB patients would often lose a great deal of weight as well, making them look thin and fragile. Lucy's Illness is too short lived for her to significantly lose weight, Dracula himself, however, is described as thin.
It is also noteworthy that at the age of 19, Lucy falls into the demographic of those most affected by TB.
A cure for Lucy
Over the course of the novel, Lucy receives blood transfusions from all her suitors as well as van Helsing himself. Blood transfusion could have also been given to TB patients to ease the anaemia. In 1897 this was still a risky treatment, because blood types were not yet discovered. This explains why everyone seems to be a compatible donor to Lucy.
It is also interesting that van Helsing attempts to treat Lucy by fitting her with wreath of garlic flowers around her neck. Obviously, garlic is known to the modern-day reader as a vampire repellent, but allegedly "Garlic contains allicin. This is a strong antibiotic. It's released when cloves are crushed or chewed. (Stanford Children's Hospital) Van Helsing's choice to use garlic flowers rather than cloves might have been an aesthetical one due to artistic liberty. However, the advent of modern antibiotics marks breakthrough in TB treatment. It is most likely a coincidence, given that this breakthrough occurred 46 years after Dracula was published, but nonetheless an interesting one.
Lastly if Dracula is a metaphor for disease, it is only fitting that neither the cowboy, nor the lawyer or the aristocrat among the heroes figures out how to treat it, but van Helsing, a medical doctor.
Conclusion
The comparison of Lucy Westenra's vampirism with the real-life disease of tuberculosis shows a perfect marriage of the mythological motif of the vampire as a bringer of disease and the socio-cultural background of Stoker's time. It's hard to imagine this could have been coincidental, given that Stoker did such extensive research into vampire mythology.

Download: PDF