While Bram Stoker was living in England, the Catholic religion was shunned as superstition and replaced by the Church of England. As a Catholic (Stoker was Irish), he had to live as the “other” in a country that condemned his beliefs. Hence, Dracula was all about the concept of the “other”, as is all Gothic British literature.

Dracula the monster could reasonably be said to be a doppelganger of Stoker himself, an outsider coming into England with strange beliefs. Van Helsing has the some of same qualities, being a scientist who believes in vampires and other paranormal phenomena. This is best summed up when Dracula tells Jonathan Harker, “”We are in Transylvania, and Transylvania is not England. Our ways are not your ways, and there shall be to you many strange things.”

Initially, no one believes Van Helsing’s claims about a vampire preying upon Lucy. Who turns out to be right, though? The outsiders; Dracula, Van Helsing, and, in a larger sense, Catholic “superstition”. Consciously or not, Stoker was rebelling against the religious repression he lived in and England ate it up.

Science was something that played a major role in Dracula by adding fear to the novel. Blood transfusions were experimental, and not traditionally performed, when Stoker wrote about them. This is made more than clear by Lucy receiving blood transfusions from various men without testing for blood types (they didn’t know about blood typing yet). She surely would have died. As a side note, the exchange of blood in Dracula is equivalent with sex.

In France, there were horror shows, and a feature of many was blood transfusions. They were also riding on trains and Mina was practicing the typewriter. These were all new inventions at the time. Stoker seemed to be afraid of anything new. Lucy embodied the New Woman; sexual, self-assured and free. Mina represented the traditional role of a woman, a school teacher married to Jonathan Harker. Lucy becomes Dracula’s mistress, while Mina is rescued and remains pure.

Reading Dracula in this context makes if obvious that Stoker was innately afraid of Science and Technology while still clinging to the superstitious faith he was raised on.