Context for Dracula, Wuthering Heights and Macbeth

Contextual background of the novels. Events that occured during the time they were written.

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  • Created by: Aimée
  • Created on: 04-05-12 09:21

Dracula Context

  • 1859 Darwin's theory of evolution (the brides)
  • Advancement in science (blood transfusions)
  • Prostitution (the brides)
  • 1897 British empire made people skeptical towards the east (Transylvania)
  • 1895 Oscar Wilde who was prosecuted for homosexuality (authors views on sexuality and how it can be perverse
  • Religion (cross, wafer)
  • Gothic era
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Wuthering Heights Context

  • Industrial revoltuion (role of gentility changed- Heathcliff reflects the wealth created through this change)
  • Romanticism
  • 1838-1901 Victorian Era - phase of expansion
  • Gothic era
  • Social Class (How Heathcliff, Hareton jump between classes)
  • Victorian repression
  • Catherine shows signs of the Suffragette movement that was to come years later after Wuthering Heights was published
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Macbeth Context

  • James I & II
  • The supernatural/witches were drowned and burned (People were more afraid of witches than they are now)
  • The gun powder plot & regicide (Killing Duncan reflects Guy Fawkes trying to blow up the house of lords against James I & II)
  • The Gowrie conspiracy was an assassination attempt on James I
  • James was crowned as King of England. English people were wary of a Scottish King coming into England. This is similar to when Macbeth becomes King.
  • The horror of the play reflects the Jacobean era
  • Equivocation- a play about deceiving
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