The Evolution of Vampirismthroughout American Gothic Fiction: A Case Study Stephen King’sDoctorSleep

Abstract

The theme of our dissertation is "The Evolution of Vampirism throughout American Gothic fiction. A case study: Stephen King's Doctor Sleep.". Our aim in this dissertation is to study the evolution of the vampire representation and depict the shifts and changes while making a gothic feminist reading of the novel. Furthermore, this theory aims at acknowledging the situation of women, in which social aspects were held in the chain of events. The author lived and witnessed the different waves of feminism. Thus, the content of the work leads us to discover a major evolution even if he is a male gothic. In our study, we will concentrate on the portrayal of femininity by examining characteristics of female gothic in it and gender role through time. In order to do this, "Gothic Feminism" is the most suitable theory, which will help us to discover the existence of feminist ideas in a novel written by a male figure in the modern era. In addition, this work helped us to draw our attention to the way women faced their awkward conditions of their times. Our real aim is to prove that there are changes in the representation of vampires and the image they convey in gothic literature, which is in constant evolution. Our research paper is divided into two chapters. The first chapter will be devoted to the introduction of the major concepts in the theoretical part by providing definitions to terms such as: Vampirism, Vampires, Gothic, Feminism and "Gothic Feminism" for understanding our works. The second chapter will be a contextual and textual analysis of both the evolution of the vampire figure and the selected novel, and this will be achieved through the introduction of the author’s biography. In the analysis, weapply the traditionalgothic elements and Gothic feminism as a theory on it in order to spot the changes.