In an older article, talking about the definition of success, I’d talked about the obsession we have with measuring. Your camera is this many megapixels, while your stereo system is this many megawatts. A tablet has this much memory, while the computer has this much storage capacity. All these are good and nice, until we confuse measurement with quality. Today I want to talk about public healthcare value.
Inspiration for this article came after I noticed something peculiar: Google allows ratings for public hospitals, as if they were books, cinemas or restaurants. That, in my opinion, is bizarre to say the least. Moreover, it is plagued with aspects of ideology – far exceeding the scope of this article, but you know, food for thought…
OK, picture this: you’ve just won the lottery. Imagine the feeling of unreality pervading you, the surreal knowledge that your wildest dreams are becoming true. Now, what if I told you that no fate is worse than seeing your dreams come true? Welcome to The Other Side of Dreams, my newest literary fiction novel.
The Other Side of Dreams is a book following my tradition of literary fiction novels that focus on the individual. If you take a look at my Goodreads profile, you will see that my work revolves around the themes of the repressed past, the impossibility of choices, flawed men and determined women. That was the blueprint for To Cross an Ocean: Apognosisand it is for The Other Side of Dreams as well. Furthermore, although this newest novel can be read completely independently from Apognosis, the reader will encounter some familiar faces and settings.
Note: the following article on gender and sexuality in Dracula is a modified excerpt (pp. 102-107) from my doctoral dissertation, “Time is Everything with Him”: The Concept of the Eternal Now in Nineteenth-Century Gothic, which can be downloaded (for free) from the repository of the Tampere University Press. For a list of my other academic publications, see the list on the main website.
Productive and Non-Productive Sexuality in Dracula
Bram Stoker’s Dracula is a text replete with sexual innuendos. More importantly, it is filled with hints at a non-normative sexuality.
Count Dracula makes it almost explicit, when he warns the three female vampires that are about to attack Jonathan to stay back, stating “[t]his man belongs to me!” (Stoker 2003, 46). Hindle notes that Stoker’s earlier drafts were even more revealing, as Dracula’s full warning originally was “[t]his man belongs to me I want him” (Hindle 2003, xxxiv).
Victorian sexuality is a misunderstood subject
In this regard, it is pertinent to underline that this kind of sexuality implied here is non-productive. Not only is it contrary to the normative heterosexual monogamy encouraged by Victorian society, but through this very lack of procreation it also becomes atemporal; by denying the children, it essentially denies the future.
In terms of homoeroticism and temporality, it is also worth noting that Baudelaire considered the lesbian as “the heroine of modernism because she combines with a historical ideal the greatness of the ancient world” (Benjamin 1983, 90).
Perhaps tapping into Stoker’s only-unconscious writings, Coppola’s film adaptation includes a fleeting scene where Mina and Lucy kiss in the garden during the storm.
