Date of Graduation
5-2019
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts in English (MA)
Degree Level
Graduate
Department
English
Advisor/Mentor
Lopez Szwydky, Lissette
Committee Member
Quinn, William A.
Second Committee Member
Dempsey, Sean A.
Keywords
Dracula; Hyde; Mobility; Monsters; social mobility
Abstract
This thesis explores Late Victorian Gothic texts that are central to theories on monstrosity in terms of mobility by examining Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and Dracula. The goal of this project is to survey the ways in which two exemplary monsters, Mr. Hyde and Count Dracula, promote mobility for others and themselves as an inherent part of their monstrosity. The variety of this mobility is demonstrated by examples showing how monsters move and encourage movement in ways that are social and transformative as well as physical. Because social mobility is essential to these movements, this study also considers the societies these monsters enter and interrupt. The gentleman bachelors of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and Dracula's Crew of Light and the women they seek to protect are presented as monolithic groups that the monster joins, transforms, and spurs into movement. By identifying mobility as one of the main attributes of monstrosity, this argument seeks to not only add to the copious amount of scholarship already done on these works but also to reconcile some of them since many of the most critically controversial aspects of these texts are rooted in the monster's mobility. A study focused on movement not only adds something that is missing from the existing discussion on these seminal monsters but also provides a new framework through which to discuss constantly evolving theories of monstrosity.
Citation
Weese, A. D. (2019). Monstrous Mobility in Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and Dracula. Graduate Theses and Dissertations Retrieved from https://scholarworks.uark.edu/etd/3142