just some tatyana & strahdyana thoughts from me and my gf @tatyanafederovna
narratively tatyana has to embrace the monster the vampire because that represents breaking away from the oppressive gender roles that have been placed upon her
there’s smth beautiful about not being the delicate princess and embracing volatility and violence and i think in the choice between strahd and sergei it can be read as a choice between mother and monster. even though strahd is a liar his form of feral and self destructive love feels more genuine than the fairytale love sergei seems to impose onto tatyana (ignoring the preconceived notions strahd seems to have for her for a moment because this narrative isn’t just about him just as dracula isn’t just about the vampire it’s about mina murray)
sergei to me represents traditional life and societal norms and acceptability and i think its why i rebel against him as a character and his ending so much whereas strahd represents hidden desires and the otherness and pushing against those boundaries / the transgressions of social norms (like exploring sexuality) which is what the monster is supposed to represent
i say mother versus monster because traditional societal norms expect women to be mothers and be pure and nurturing and caring which ties into compulsory heterosexuality and how it affects even straight women it’s just this very strict assumption that romantically and emotionally women are only supposed to be oriented towards men and reproduction rather than themselves because that would be monstrous or whorish for lack of a better word and then motherhood is associated with a gentle maternity and everything that isn’t violence
it’s the madonna-whore duality. women were either pure and virtuous like a madonna or corrupt and sexually available like a whore and the duality suggests that women cant be both at the same time
it’s why i adore yellowjackets because as teenagers going into womanhood instead of motherhood they’re thrust into monster-hood to survive the wilderness and there is something to be said about violence and rage and hunger being natural (woman is wolf)
and that’s why i also think ladies loved 1930s dracula so much it was sensuality and terror all in one. we see this a lot w/ post bram stoker dracula which is far more romanticized and shows a world where the monstrous (whore) side is allowed love. with bela lugosi!dracula it was like this vampire (monster) is a man who will love me for my feminine sensibilities but also my feminine violence and feminine fury
acceptance from a monster feels like recognition and love from a hero feels like expectation
