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| Picture Came from HERE |
Stories
are often, for the reader, a dream come to life. Stories offer us an escape
from our reality and a chance to vicariously experience a different life from
our own. However, not all stories are warm and fuzzy and not all dreams are
sweet. There are times when a person is experiencing stress or oppression in
their life that the repressed memories begin to find their way to the surface
of their mind. Repressed thoughts and memories may manifest themselves into nightmares
that are overwhelming and they make the escape from reality seem more like an
impenetrable prison. While it may still be an escape from our own daily life’s reality,
we instead find ourselves overcome by anxiety as we are having to face down and
survive our manifested fears and repressed emotions. “In Freud's psychoanalytic
theory of personality, the unconscious mind is a reservoir of feelings,
thoughts, urges, and memories that [are] outside of our conscious awareness.
Most of the contents of the unconscious are unacceptable or unpleasant, such as
feelings of pain, anxiety, or conflict…Freud believed that many of our
feelings, desires, and emotions are repressed or held out of awareness. Why?
Because, he suggested, they were simply too threatening. Freud believed that
sometimes these hidden desires and wishes make themselves known through dreams…”
(verywell.com)
A
person is haunted by a figure of repression that lurks in the depths of their
very own psyche. Dracula, the main character of Bram Stoker’s novel (written in
1897) is the author’s monster, which is a repressed figure of unconscious fear.
This monster, Count Dracula, “would translate culturally, historically and
socially to repressed Victorian society. A group of people that outwardly felt
civilised and at the peak of technological / industrial revolution. But
inwardly still struggled with only comparatively nascent understanding of
religion, superstition, science, psychology and the mind.” (Webb) The Victorian
Era in British history (1837 to 1901) which overlapped the European Industrial
Revolution (1760-1840), was a period of peace, prosperity, and refinement, with
an outwardly social focus on morality, language, and behavior. The advancements
in education, technology, and industry during this era of peace brought great
wealth to several people while also rendering some folks useless when a machine
replaced them in the work field. Despite the technology and machines invented
for industrial improvements, humans are still subject to the effects of nature,
which can render one helpless. Irish born author Bram Stoker watched as his
homeland was struck with famine. Stoker saw his society struggle dwindle away
despite the technology, the earth remained barren. They were helpless. These
feelings of helplessness cause an internal struggle in the human psyche, we
struggle to find meaning in life, as well as our reason for existing in this
world. When the answers are not found in the natural realm, we search for the
supernatural. Stoker chose to put pen to paper to create a story from the
natural and supernatural world that he was witnessing first hand.
Bram
Stoker’s novel, Dracula, is
structured as a series of letters, journals, and personal diaries of the
characters which represent this civilized society. Jonathan Harker, a London
solicitor, travels outside of the modern city, and into a foreign country,
where he meets the mysterious Count. Following Jonathan’s journal emphasizes
the long stretches of time that he is alone on the journey and inside the
castle. Between his diary entries, he wants to ignore what he thinks that he
has seen and tries to doubt instead of confront. However, his unconscious is
very aware of the fact that Dracula did not have a reflection in his shaving
mirror, though he consciously denies this. There are several entries where
Jonathan mentions “queer dreams” (12), “bad dreams” (40), repetitive dreams
(21), and a desire to not dream (40). Jonathan chooses to continually repress
these images and events into his unconscious instead of confronting what he has
witnessed, which would go against the social moral norm of his Victorian
beliefs.
During Jonathan’s time that he is trapped inside the
castle, he reports in his entries of other moments of unconsciousness which
creep to the surface of awareness. “Feeling as though my own brain were
unhinged or as if the shock had come which must end in its undoing, I turn to
my diary for repose. The habit of entering accurately must help to soothe me.”
(43) As Jonathan begins to let down his social etiquette, “The Count’s warning
came into my mind, but I took a pleasure in disobeying it” (43), he also lets
escape of his libido in pages 43 through 45 with the events of the three female
vampires which he simultaneously desires and repulses. Jonathan never fully
gives in to his desires, however, and manages to escape the castle and return
to London.
Meanwhile, back in London, Lucy is being overpowered by a
mysterious oppression. She believes that her declining ailment is because of
her somnambulism, or sleep-walking. She is also “so sweet and sensitive that
she feels influences more acutely than other people do.”(89) Lucy is a perfect
subject to aid Dracula in his quest for power, strength, and immortality. He
needs her blood (her livelihood) in order to gain strength, to build a new
estate in London with new followers, which will assure that his livelihood as a
vampire will continue forever. The events that plague Lucy happen while she is
asleep, in a trance-like state bringing harm to herself unconsciously. Lucy is
not the only somnambulist that we encounter in Gothic fiction and film, we also
know of a patient of Dr. Caligari in the film The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. This patient, Cesare, while in asleep
in a trance-like state, unconsciously brings harm to others (i.e. murder).
Dr.
Caligari and Dracula are using their power over the somnambulists in order to
gain even more power/control in society; Dracula by gaining physical strength,
and Caligari by gaining a better understanding. However, they both seem to wish
for anonymity in this quest for power. Dracula wishes to blend into the crowd,
and so he comes to Lucy as other creatures, or lures her out into the dark
night where he can remain unseen. Dr. Caligari, we find out is the asylum
director, Dr.Olsen, who has used the disguise of Dr. Caligari. These two men,
the director and the doctor, are revealed to be two in one. “…Uncanny is unheimlich in German, or
"unhomely", and Freud claims it is the home that we refuse to
acknowledge and from which we are estranged which causes the double among other
eerie manifestations.” (Kolokoz.Wordpress.com) “The eeriness of two selves
where there should only be one is, Freud argued, an irruption of disquiet
caused by our separation from our origin in our mother's womb...” (Kolokoz.Wordpress.com)
The idea that being separated from the mother creates two selves within one
person sparked an idea in filmmaker Alfred Hitchcock, who was a fan of
psychology and had created several films exploring the ideas of psychology and
fear.
One
of Hitchcock’s most famous films is Psycho,
in which the main character Norman Bates, a young man who lives alone, is not
really alone. In fact, half of his mind belongs to his physically deceased Mother.
Not knowing how to cope with the horror of her death, “[Norman] began to think
and speak for her, give her half his life, so to speak...He was never all
Norman, but he was often only Mother…After the murder, Norman returned as if
from a deep sleep…When the mind houses two personalities, there is always a
conflict, a battle, and in Norman’s case, the battle is over and the dominant
personality has won.” (Dr. Fred Richman, Psycho)
Norman returning as if from a deep sleep is a familiar notion, many of the
Gothic stories use somnambulism as I had previously stated. Author Stephen King
uses this notion as well in his novel, The
Shining, in which a young boy named Danny is a clairvoyant that receives his
visions while unconscious. Danny describes this as waking in "…darkness
and a few minutes later he [comes] back to real things with a few vague
fragments of memory, like a jumbled dream." (p.29) Generally, in the trope of somnambulism, the characters
wake up to find the reality of the terrible things that they had done while
they were unconscious. However, in Danny's case, the unconsciousness is itself the
horror for him. He is receiving visions of words that he is too young to
understand or visions of frightful events from the future that will be
committed by another person. Danny sees in his unconscious what the others do
not see in theirs, yet he is still just as helpless to the events. To feel as
if you are without help, or without control, is frightening. These feelings of helplessness cause an
internal struggle in the human psyche, we struggle to find meaning in life, as
well as our reason for existing in this world. When the answers are not found
in the natural realm, we search for the supernatural.
Gothic
Fiction and Film is infused with elements of horror, death, psychology, and
overall fear. While stories in general may be an escape from our own reality,
we can find ourselves overwhelmed by anxiety as we come face to face with these
manifested fears and repressed emotions of our unconscious mind. “The minds
that have us believing that we are helpless are the same minds that can help us
discover our own strength and ability. A great deal of that learning has to do
with taking action, even if we don’t think we can, even if we don’t FEEL like
it.” (Fearmastery Blog) Perhaps that is the appeal of these gothic stories,
that we can escape our daily lives and live vicariously through another person
who is also facing our manifested fear and together with them, we take action
against the monster and we survive.
Citations:
Stoker, Bram. Dracula. Pyramid
Books. 1965. New York City. Print
Kracauer, Siegfried. From
Cabinet to Hitler: The Cabinet of Caligari. 2004. Oxford University Press. New
York City. Print.
Film
Screening Report
