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ELA 12: 1.15 Vat I Vant to Say 11 Views


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Description:

Dracula was either a nationalist book about vampires or a vampire book about nationalism... or maybe it was a nationalist Vampire book about capital... nobody really knows for sure.

Language:
English Language

Transcript

00:02

On one hand Dracula is definitely the story of the Dracula [Dracula stood in a corridor]

00:06

shocker the title is a pretty big giveaway but on the other hand Dracula

00:10

is about a whole lot more like any good work of fiction there are layers of

00:13

metaphor and subtext flowing underneath the story like raging underground river [Dracula with a snorkel underground]

00:17

sounds cool in theory but it probably make for some pretty bad tubing and

00:21

Dracula touches on so much stuff from nationalism to capital and beyond that [Nationalism, Capital and Beyond appears in a library]

00:26

it's a tough to tell what it's really about but whatever it is it's definitely about

00:31

more than vampires with goofy accents I want to suck your blood.

00:36

Let's think about the nationalism angle for a bit in chapter

00:41

three during a long talk about Johnathan and Dracula the count talked [Dracula and Johnathan talking outside of a castle]

00:44

proudly about his family history, maybe a bit to proudly he says We Szekelys

00:48

have a right to be proud for in our veins flows the blood of many brave

00:53

races who fought as the lion fights for lordship blood is too precious a thing

00:59

in these days of dishonourable peace and the glories of the great races are as a

01:05

tale that is told.. that's how they talked really I'd like a tape recording from the actual [Dracula thinking about writing in his diary]

01:10

thing I will sounds like a fun post dinner conversation right when Dracula says

01:14

that in order veins flows the blood of many brave races who fought as the lion

01:18

fights... he's talking a language of

01:21

nationalists and it's folks who treasure identities grounded in ethnicity. Remind [nationalism definition]

01:27

you of anyone? and in talking about few days of dishonorable peace, Dracula's

01:33

coming pretty close to the nationalist idea that the various nations really [Dracula stood beside Hitler]

01:36

ought to be at war with the stronger prevailing and the weaker most

01:40

definitely not prevaling thinking Darwin there, sort of twisted.. Even though Dracula was

01:45

written decades before the rise of National Socialism in Germany. The count[Hitler thinking about Dracula's influence]

01:49

would fit right in there with Hitler and his pals which really doesn't bode well

01:52

for well either of them. Looking elsewhere though we find capital coming to the forefront in Chapter four when Jonathan's hanging out at Dracula's [Jonathan hanging out in Dracula's house]

02:00

place he's examining the contents of a room he's probably looking for the count's

02:04

diary so he can blackmail him with secret crushes he says the only thing I

02:09

found was a great heap of gold in one corner Gold of all kinds Roman and

02:14

British and Austrian and Hungarian and Greek and Turkish money covered with the

02:19

film of dust as though it had lain long in the ground

02:23

none of it that I noticed was less than 300 years old there were also chains and

02:28

ornaments some jewels with all of them old and stained

02:32

though no diary what a bummer but this emphasizes the fact that Dracula's not [Dracula beside a pile of money]

02:36

only some old vampire he's an extremely rich old vampire yeah well.. well

02:43

that means the threat he poses to London isn't just a whole lot of unsightly neck [People in London looking threatened]

02:48

wounds but the metaphorical threat of an old aristocracy trying to use it's

02:52

capital, wealth to conquer the West well sure a big bag of money might not

02:56

seem of threatening as fangs but when it comes to political influence the [Dracula carrying a big pile of money to Hitler]

03:00

ability to buy weapons too - you can only bite your way to so much power so which

03:04

one is it? Is Dracula about nationalism or capital capitalism or both or neither

03:09

or typewriters or blood well the short answer is we don't know our theses about [Dracula holding a flag of nationalism and capital capitalism]

03:14

nationalism and capital capitalism each depended on single passages better than

03:19

nothing but not great it really beefed up these thesis, yeah try saying

03:24

that five times fast.. we need to find at least three examples the one example

03:28

might be chance to a coincidence but three makes a pattern and don't worry too [passages of Dracula novel]

03:32

much if it seems like Dracula is about a whole bunch of things, rich-text tend to

03:36

touch on a lot of ideas, so don't be surprised if Dracula is actually about

03:40

nationalism a capital technology and Dracula's secret crush on Jennifer Anniston [Nationalism and Capital capitalism flag either side of Dracula]

03:46

at least assuming that what his diary would say he wants to suck your

03:50

blood be friends, yes be friends..blah [Dracula watching Friends on the TV]

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