(In the context of the Dracula book) What are the similarities and differences between Lucy and Mina? Be sure to include their personalities, interests, and interactions with other characters, and any other details you can think of. What is your opinion of the role Victorian women played in society as shown by these two ladies? Explain why you feel this way.

Mina is an educated woman who is engaged and then married to Jonathan Harker. She is a schoolteacher, and financially independent. While her husband studies law, she also tries to keep up on his studies. The other men in the novel praise her for having a 'man's brain'. She is a smart cookie, but also a very devoted wife. She tends to Jonathan as he recovers from his ordeal with Dracula in Transylvania and wants to be of help to him whenever possible. She often comments on her gratitude for the strong, brave men around her, while also acting as a kind of mother to the group. Count Dracula tries to turn her into a vampire, but through her own will and the help of the other male characters, she is saved.

Explanation:

Lucy Westenra is a 19-year-old woman who lives with her mother. She is described as very beautiful and almost angelic in her looks and her personality. She is kind and innocent, but a little bit vapid. She is mostly concerned with finding a husband. On account of her good looks, she is proposed to by three different men in one day! The decision is difficult, and she laments to Mina that she wishes she could marry all three men, which is quite a scandalous thing to say! Lucy ultimately accepts Arthur Holmwood. Lucy becomes the victim of Count Dracula, and she is turned into a vampire.