Last lesson, we were looking at verisimilitude. This is where a piece of fiction contains similarities or reference to real life. For example, some verisimilitudes in Dracula include the locations of France and Germany. Verisimilitudes are the true aspects contained in the novel, things which still exist outside of the novel, another example would be Harry Potter going to King’s Cross station in London. Although Harry Potter is a fictional character, the station is real and so exhibits some realism and authenticity in the reader’s mind. (I don’t know why I used Harry Potter as an example, given that I have never read any of the books).
Once the definition of verisimilitude was established, we than began to look at the opening of Dracula in relation to this. The first extract is from page 8/9 and contains many verisimilitudes and details such as descriptions of the local people, “strangest figures we saw were the Slovaks, who were more Barbarian than the rest, with their big cow-boy hats, great baggy dirty-belts, nearly a foot wide, all studded over with brass nails.” This one sentence alone contains much factual information about the clothing and appearance of the people, it is not very orientated around opinions, but around concrete descriptions. The second extract we looked at was on page 13 of Dracula and was less factual; it contained more picturesque and dreamlike descriptions, such as, “the road, losing itself as it swept round the grassy curve.” Finally, the third extract, from page 14, was even less fact based and contained phrases such as, “peasant’s cart with its long, snakelike vertebra,” and, “produced a particularly weird and solemn effect, which carried on thoughts and grim fancies engendered earlier in the evening.” This extract has become even more based upon opinion and contains far more imagery than clear description. Mysticism has entered the novel, and so because the very beginning of the book contained to much factual and relatable information, the reader is potentially more likely to believe what the narrator is telling them. This is particularly important in a book like Dracula, which contains a lot of mythological ideas and so by containing verisimilitudes, the reader may find the ideas more readable and enjoyable.
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Totally agree with what you've said - with the example you've given of the description of the Slovaks, it's almost as if too much detail is given for it not to be true which, as you've said, encourages the reader to invest more belief in the place and people, even as it gets more mystical and abstract.
ReplyDeleteAlso, you've mentioned the references to France and Germany which, like you say, inject some 'reality' into what eventually unravels to be a mystical, mythological text - I also think that the references to such places re-enforce the idea of national identity and how some countries are similar and some aren't, for example, Transylvania is presented as being quite 'backward' in contrast to England which is seen to embrace modern technologies & scientific advancements. This idea of divisions between nations also comes into play in Doctor Faustus when the play's action moves from England to Rome (and we see the religious differences there) Taking that idea back to what we discussed last lesson, in this quest to define identity, it's almost as if people are trying not only to define themselves as a person but also feel as though they belong to a whole nation by focusing on the differences and faults of other nations. As if they want an individual identity within national identity.