Julia Cameron also photographed Alice Liddell when Alice was in her 20s. Cameron's photographs are fascinating as early photographic art, a record of Victorian aesthetics, and just in themselves. She was born in India and wound up spending the latter part of her life in Ceylon, so she is also an exemplar of the globalised lives English people could live during the height of their empire.
I think I gasped out loud when I read the Norton note about Florence and Oscar. Norton with the hot goss! 😅 My brain seems to want to find a parallel to Kate Reed’s insinuation that there is some romantic entanglement in Jonathan’s past that causes Mina some embarrassment. The more I learn about Bram the more I see threads of his own life woven through the novel. But I don’t know if I am seeing things that aren’t really there.
As much as Bram may have written himself into Mina, it sounds like maybe he wrote Florence in too, as Mina is surely also effective! As much as Mina perhaps strives to embody the Angel of the House (ew ew ew ew) ideal, and is pretty successful at it, she would probably be extremely bored and unhappy if she did not engage her mind in some way. Later in the novel we see that she doesn’t last very long when she is cut from the action. She’s too useful to be shelved like that!
I suspect Lucy would also be bored by being an Angel, but we don’t really get to find out for sure. To everyone who doesn’t witness her being changed before her death and undeath, she forever remains the Victorian ideal, and those who do witness it go to great lengths to ensure that is how she is remembered. Reputation intact, sweetness and light forever. (Sigh... I think I need to make “Justice for Lucy t-shirts lol)
One of the things that has been driving my research since all this started is that I was convinced Bram was making a feminist point about the treatment of women during his time. I still think he was, TBH, though I know many would disagree with me on that point. This was the most openly progressive time of his life. And totally! I think Mina is a lot of Bram, but I also think she’s a lot of Florence, though nobody was seriously calling Florrie “sweet.” Bram also wasn’t interested in bringing any scandal to Henry Irving’s doorstep. I think that’s the biggest reason he pulls back. There are several social issues where he seems to be advocating for change, but only in small socially acceptable ways.
I think we’ve talked about this before, but Bram absolutely wasn’t perfect. He was above average (even for Victorian times) on racism. He privately held very negative views on people of color. I think it’s best to just be open on that point.
That’s a really good point about his feeling of responsibility to Irving being motivation to avoid any kind of scandal. And to be sure, I am not looking for perfection!
I guess what I think I’m seeing is more of a questioning than a coherent viewpoint. Like he’s working out his own ambivalence or reflecting the ambivalence of the era. As you’ve mentioned, since he retreats somewhat, later in life, it seems we can’t know whether he reached any definite conclusions or changed his mind.
I am entirely open, or at least trying to remain open, to seeing things differently than I have seen them before - I have definitely had my tacit assumptions or unconsidered impressions turned on their heads several times so far! I am searching for all the clues I’ve missed before - I am just not sure if a lot of them will be legible to me.
It’s challenging to try to “unknow” the ideas that shaped our modern perspectives, or perhaps more accurately, to actually know and recognize them as part of my own bias that is tinging my perceptions. I feel like I can recognize where I have that bias but I can’t always see around it and find what I’m missing because of it. But I endeavor to try!
This is part of why it's so fun for me to talk about this! I'm not sure I could get into my level of research with another person from the same era. So many of them have so many egregious moral failings that I just get too stuck in the "ick" factor. Example, I love reading Dickens, but I just can't with him.
I feel like my research is fundamentally slowly rewiring my brain because it forces me to consider how someone arrived at ideas I find fundamentally objectionable personally. It's honestly one of the only things that keeps me sane as I try to make sense of our modern history and that's exactly why I'm so passionate about sharing it with others. I don't know that they'll have the same experience, but it feels much more satifying than feeling stricken with fear/rage/anxiety 24/7. My brain needs a puzzle to work on just to feel okay about existing. If that puzzle helps me feel better about the world I'll take any win I can.
There is always a risk of ruining it for yourself I think, delving into the personal character of an artist of any kind (and from any age!). I admit sometimes I choose not to look too hard and just engage with the work itself. An average person like me (an expert in nothing, not an academic or researcher) at any prior period in history probably didn’t have much inclination or ability to do that kind of examination, just due to limited access. Score one for Al Gore I guess. 🤣
I’m fascinated by how it’s changing your mode of thinking about conflicting viewpoints. I often wonder are we missing the point of art and literature, if we get too focused on an artist’s character flaws or bad takes. But if working through that is changing your ability to engage with ideas you don’t agree with in a more constructive and less reactive way, that seems objectively positive to me, and therefore maybe it IS the point after all. Or at least A point.
I might be getting too abstract navel-gazey but I find myself considering this sort of thing a lot because I could definitely, for sure, no doubt, I 100% admit, benefit from being more thoughtful and less reactive. So maybe it would do me good to go wrestle with Dickens and his shitty opinions. 😅
I can't remember the exact interview, but somebody asked Bram what the "point" of Dracula was. He said something to the effect of "if there is a point I want the reader to discover it for themselves." Since he stated that was his intention I've tried to honor what I take to be his wishes. What ever message you find in the text is correct. It's weird how trying to reconcile that internally has made me far less reactive, yes, but at the same time it's also made me more internally resolved. Is Dracula activisim a thing? because ugh! Just you wait. I'm sure you already know, but we're just getting started on #justiceforlucy.
Julia Cameron also photographed Alice Liddell when Alice was in her 20s. Cameron's photographs are fascinating as early photographic art, a record of Victorian aesthetics, and just in themselves. She was born in India and wound up spending the latter part of her life in Ceylon, so she is also an exemplar of the globalised lives English people could live during the height of their empire.
https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/270819
I've spent many fascinated hours poring over her photographs, as reproduced online.
YAS! I’m so excited you know Julia Cameron! She was an absolute icon.
Her photos are gorgeous, thank you for sharing this!
https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search?artist=Julia+Margaret+Cameron
I think I gasped out loud when I read the Norton note about Florence and Oscar. Norton with the hot goss! 😅 My brain seems to want to find a parallel to Kate Reed’s insinuation that there is some romantic entanglement in Jonathan’s past that causes Mina some embarrassment. The more I learn about Bram the more I see threads of his own life woven through the novel. But I don’t know if I am seeing things that aren’t really there.
As much as Bram may have written himself into Mina, it sounds like maybe he wrote Florence in too, as Mina is surely also effective! As much as Mina perhaps strives to embody the Angel of the House (ew ew ew ew) ideal, and is pretty successful at it, she would probably be extremely bored and unhappy if she did not engage her mind in some way. Later in the novel we see that she doesn’t last very long when she is cut from the action. She’s too useful to be shelved like that!
I suspect Lucy would also be bored by being an Angel, but we don’t really get to find out for sure. To everyone who doesn’t witness her being changed before her death and undeath, she forever remains the Victorian ideal, and those who do witness it go to great lengths to ensure that is how she is remembered. Reputation intact, sweetness and light forever. (Sigh... I think I need to make “Justice for Lucy t-shirts lol)
One of the things that has been driving my research since all this started is that I was convinced Bram was making a feminist point about the treatment of women during his time. I still think he was, TBH, though I know many would disagree with me on that point. This was the most openly progressive time of his life. And totally! I think Mina is a lot of Bram, but I also think she’s a lot of Florence, though nobody was seriously calling Florrie “sweet.” Bram also wasn’t interested in bringing any scandal to Henry Irving’s doorstep. I think that’s the biggest reason he pulls back. There are several social issues where he seems to be advocating for change, but only in small socially acceptable ways.
I think we’ve talked about this before, but Bram absolutely wasn’t perfect. He was above average (even for Victorian times) on racism. He privately held very negative views on people of color. I think it’s best to just be open on that point.
That’s a really good point about his feeling of responsibility to Irving being motivation to avoid any kind of scandal. And to be sure, I am not looking for perfection!
I guess what I think I’m seeing is more of a questioning than a coherent viewpoint. Like he’s working out his own ambivalence or reflecting the ambivalence of the era. As you’ve mentioned, since he retreats somewhat, later in life, it seems we can’t know whether he reached any definite conclusions or changed his mind.
I am entirely open, or at least trying to remain open, to seeing things differently than I have seen them before - I have definitely had my tacit assumptions or unconsidered impressions turned on their heads several times so far! I am searching for all the clues I’ve missed before - I am just not sure if a lot of them will be legible to me.
It’s challenging to try to “unknow” the ideas that shaped our modern perspectives, or perhaps more accurately, to actually know and recognize them as part of my own bias that is tinging my perceptions. I feel like I can recognize where I have that bias but I can’t always see around it and find what I’m missing because of it. But I endeavor to try!
This is part of why it's so fun for me to talk about this! I'm not sure I could get into my level of research with another person from the same era. So many of them have so many egregious moral failings that I just get too stuck in the "ick" factor. Example, I love reading Dickens, but I just can't with him.
I feel like my research is fundamentally slowly rewiring my brain because it forces me to consider how someone arrived at ideas I find fundamentally objectionable personally. It's honestly one of the only things that keeps me sane as I try to make sense of our modern history and that's exactly why I'm so passionate about sharing it with others. I don't know that they'll have the same experience, but it feels much more satifying than feeling stricken with fear/rage/anxiety 24/7. My brain needs a puzzle to work on just to feel okay about existing. If that puzzle helps me feel better about the world I'll take any win I can.
There is always a risk of ruining it for yourself I think, delving into the personal character of an artist of any kind (and from any age!). I admit sometimes I choose not to look too hard and just engage with the work itself. An average person like me (an expert in nothing, not an academic or researcher) at any prior period in history probably didn’t have much inclination or ability to do that kind of examination, just due to limited access. Score one for Al Gore I guess. 🤣
I’m fascinated by how it’s changing your mode of thinking about conflicting viewpoints. I often wonder are we missing the point of art and literature, if we get too focused on an artist’s character flaws or bad takes. But if working through that is changing your ability to engage with ideas you don’t agree with in a more constructive and less reactive way, that seems objectively positive to me, and therefore maybe it IS the point after all. Or at least A point.
I might be getting too abstract navel-gazey but I find myself considering this sort of thing a lot because I could definitely, for sure, no doubt, I 100% admit, benefit from being more thoughtful and less reactive. So maybe it would do me good to go wrestle with Dickens and his shitty opinions. 😅
I can't remember the exact interview, but somebody asked Bram what the "point" of Dracula was. He said something to the effect of "if there is a point I want the reader to discover it for themselves." Since he stated that was his intention I've tried to honor what I take to be his wishes. What ever message you find in the text is correct. It's weird how trying to reconcile that internally has made me far less reactive, yes, but at the same time it's also made me more internally resolved. Is Dracula activisim a thing? because ugh! Just you wait. I'm sure you already know, but we're just getting started on #justiceforlucy.
Ooh I love that! Less reactive, more resolved. I’m going to hold on to that. And as always I look forward to where our journey takes us!
Same! Thanks for being here, friend. The only thing I can say (so far) about the journey is that itn’t never been boring. ha!