the hyperactive heart of a galaxy

LANE | 39 [ white | queer ] [ she/her | they/them | he/him ]

[wowitsverycool]

Lucy’s mom hasn’t got too long (to the tune of Stacy’s Mom)

[immediatebreakfast]

It's incredible how this is the first time we meet Mrs. Westenra, and the first thing we see the woman do is confide to Mina how she is going to to die. There is no dancing around the issue, no maybe, just a firm "Yes I am going to die" which is said to someone who is not her daughter.

Someone who already has the stress of caring for the two most important people in her life, Jonathan who she dreads to be probably dead, and Lucy whose sleepwalking is worsening her state, like an illness. Even if the text itself, and Mina don't write it out loud, it's a situation that anyone would find utterly stressful no matter how they look at it. It's worse for Mina since she is a very hands on active character.

So why does Mrs. Westerna thinks is appropiate to tell this to Mina (her daughter's childhood friend), and not Lucy who is her actual daughter? Well the difference seem to be both infatilization, and wrongfully assigned maturity. Lucy gets treated like a child, while Mina gets treated like an adult woman despite being two or three years apart in age.

Poor dear, sweet lady! She confided to me that she has got her death-warrant. She has not told Lucy, and made me promise secrecy

In the eyes of Mrs. Westerna Mina is mature enough to not only guard this secret from Lucy, but also to understand on top of being mentally fine with the implications that this could bring for Lucy. Also, in Mrs. Westerna's eyes Lucy is still a child; she doesn't see a young lady who is taking in the huge responsability of marriage, but a child that is going to have someone else to protect her when she is gone.

Both Mina, and Lucy needed to know at some point that Mrs. Westenra was going to die, but out of the two of them Lucy deserves to know this tragic fact about her mother first. Even if these news make her sleepwalking worse, she still has to know.

I even dare to say that the socio economical difference between Mina, and Lucy make it easier for Mrs. Westenra to choose who to tell. One girl is an orphan working class girl who was forced by her surrounding circumstances to adapt quickly to many living responsabilities, the other girl is a daughter of a noble family with a chronic condition who has adapted her entire personality to please people that surround her social status out of necessity.

[vickyvicarious]

Lucy is full of quiet joy, and her mother is glad and sorry at once. Later on in the day she told me the cause. She is grieved to lose Lucy as her very own, but she is rejoiced that she is soon to have some one to protect her. Poor dear, sweet lady! She confided to me that she has got her death-warrant.

Here again we see Mrs. Westenra viewing Lucy more as a child who will have a new guardian, rather than a woman who is getting married. She is sad to lose her but looks forward to her continuing to be taken care of. It's all very possessive, and her approval of Arthur takes on a tone of her picking out the person she thinks best able to 'take over' her daughter's care (probably influenced by his money and social standing as much as his personality if not more). Lucy has to belong to someone who can look after her, she cannot stand alone or take care of herself.

Also, finally Mrs. Westenra's secret has been revealed. This leaves us with:

Mina+Lucy - know about Mina's worry for Jonathan (but Mina may try not to confide in Lucy anymore). Know about Lucy's sleepwalking across town but Never Speak Of It despite Mina wanting to know more and Lucy being afraid of the memories

Mina+Mrs. Westenra - making plans about sleepwalking management together (but Mrs. Westenra now out of the loop about how bad it is). Know about Mrs. Westenra dying soon.

Lucy alone - whatever memories she has of that night in the graveyard, if she is aware at all of bat visits, her stress about the wedding or whatever made her start sleepwalking in the first place, whatever she may have noticed about her mother's health.

While there have been a few new confidences since last time I wrote up this list, there are also new secrets, and notably Lucy hasn't shared any new worries (caused them, though). Mrs. Westenra has never shared anything with Lucy ever. Mina is put in charge of all the secrets that require taking responsibility for others. Mina and Lucy both feel like they can't burden one another with their own silly little concerns since the other has bigger things to deal with (Lucy: her mother dying soon, her wedding being ruined. Mina: her fiance gone missing) and confiding will only have negative consequences for the other (Lucy: ruin her happiness, potentially worsen her sleepwalking/health. Mina: burden her too much with trying to fix things for Lucy when her love/entire future is uncertain). The only one here feeling reassured/comforted by the current status quo is Mrs. Westenra, honestly. She's making sure to pass on responsibility for Lucy to others (Mina now, Arthur after the wedding), and since Mina is now at least somewhat hiding how bad the sleepwalking has gotten from her she probably feels like everything is well in hand. Her health isn't good but things seem good otherwise.

[lifeofbrybooks]

I think for the first time in my many Dracula rereads, I’m realizing just how important Mina’s journal is on a personal level. It’s not just the mode through which the story is told. It’s a coping mechanism, as all these entries feel like ways for our characters to solidify reality in the midst of unprecedented horror.

Much like Jonathan in Castle Dracula, Mina has nobody to confide in as the world gets darker and more terrifying. She has no other choice but to write her experiences down — to bleed the worry into ink and place the weight from her shoulders onto paper.

Mina is not trapped in a Castle, but she’s trapped by circumstance and society.

She can’t confide her worry to Mrs. Westenra and risk the woman’s life, she can’t tell Lucy because she’s also not entirely well and the subject of her worries, Jonathan is missing and nobody else would believe what she’s seen.

So she sits alone with her journal and her thoughts as she tries to reason through the unreality of her reality.

To me, it just really makes the story feel more realistic and raw — which is exactly what Bram Stoker wanted. He wanted the horror to derive from believability despite the supernatural basis. He got me.

[dathen]

Poor Mina hearing that she can’t confide her worries in Lucy’s mother, since a fright could cause her death,

and we know the letter on the way with news of Jonathan says she can’t even confide in him, since it could cause a relapse.

She keeps having to shoulder more and more worries and keeps it all to herself :((

[emmikay]

Also, interesting note on Lucy’s condition. Stoker is actually subverting what was a common trope in that time period. 

It was a common for characters in novels to fall ill, often from tuberculosis, which had similar symptoms as what Lucy is experiencing- paleness, loss of energy, difficulty breathing. A victorian reader would quickly recognise these symptoms, and the trope they are suggesting. 

But in this case, nope, it’s not that rascally consumption this time, Lucy’s got a case of the vampires, lads.

[treesaspen]

Starting to suspect that Mina was never treated as an equal of Lucy's by Mrs Westenra and Mina is used to it and doesn't even complain.

[vickyvicarious]

Ah, we were wise to keep from her the affair of the dreadful night of Lucy's sleep-walking.

Mina is getting secret-keeping reinforced again. So far she's been told (going by when Sister Agatha's letter was sent, she has of course not actually received it yet) that talking about spooky or frightening things to either Mrs. Westenra or Jonathan would, respectively: kill her, cause him to regress into madness.

And Lucy's "quiet joy" - is this a case of Lucy finding it difficult to be loud/open with her emotions and just generally being more quiet about her joys? Or is it influenced by Mina's confiding in her about Jonathan, and Lucy feeling bad about making too big a display of her own happiness, so being quieter to try not to be insensitive? I could see both at play. I could also see Mina seeing both at play and having the (mistaken) takeaway that she shouldn't tell Lucy more of her worries because it is getting in the way of her enjoying her own wedding prep especially when she is already struggling with her health, and will possibly lose her mother soon. Better to let her fully enjoy as much happiness as possible, better to shelter her, better to carry these burdens silently...

[kaiserin-erzsebet]

I find the way Mrs. Westenra infantilizes Lucy very frustrating. Lucy is 19. While she is young, she is an adult. She deserves to know that her mother has a heart condition, even if stress makes her sleepwalking worse.

Yet, the infantilizing is probably not unfamiliar to anyone with a chronic condition. Being deemed too fragile to be treated like an adult is unfortunately a common experience.

[thanks-for-the-crabapples]

[georgiacooked]

Dracula Daily sketch for August 15th

In which Lucy's mother confides in Mina.

[henrypercyhotspur]

on today's episode of Dracula Daily:

a chekov's gun is loaded

[simplynewyorkbound]

nice heart you have there… would be a shame if something happened to it…

[gandalfthemorallygrey]

Gotta say, Mrs. Westenra, you picked the wrong genre to have a medically fragile heart in

[lifeofbrybooks]

just the way Dracula’s reach stretches throughout the novel.

How it starts as legends and rumors, warnings passed from the locals to Jonathan. How it becomes very personal for our good friend. First-hand experience of what Dracula is capable of builds the legend into reality. Wolves and weird sisters, locked doors and burned letters, lizard fashion and a mother crying out for her child.

And it’s not confined, Dracula is not confined. He terrorizes the Demeter from the shadows. Wickedness in motion. A figure the crew can’t explain. Bad weather and rough seas and madness that spreads alongside sightings of a tall thin man and red eyes through dense fog. A crew picked off one by one.

Then Dracula lands in Whitby unknowingly. The Demeter’s arrival is called a miracle, the captain dead at the wheel. Swales’ neck is snapped and a dog disappears but another is found slaughtered. Lucy looks well but her sleep walking is erratic. Evil has washed up on the shore and it can’t be contained because Dracula is not contained.

[see-arcane]

You know, considering badminton was taking off as a favorite sport in the time period, I wouldn't be surprised if the girls' place in Whitby had a handy piece of anti-Dracubat equipment on hand. Namely:

Come to the badminton court if you want an asskicking you little shit 🦇🏸

[drac-kool-aid]

I like how in these past two entries Dracula is just There In the Background.

He's a flying bat, maybe a bird, he's that figure on the seat over there in the distance with the glowing red eyes. This is so different from how he menaced Jonathan (where he was the creepy old man that is Actively Keeping Me Prisoner yet still wants to have nightly chats) or the Demeter crew (where he understand the Nothing is Scarier trope and generally keeps out of sight till the end).

This time, he's just chillaxing in the background because we've had those two instances of different flavors of horror, and now we are thoroughly terrified of him, so just seeing him in the background is enough.

And this kind of tickles me in a weird way because I do so love when you can see the danger. It may not be actively menacing you. In fact, it may be moving away from you. Honestly, you don't even know if it has noticed you, and it's still TERRIFYING.

Like, sure, the idea that the monster is watching you and you not realizing it is scary, but sometimes you watching the monster is worse.