@inbook{31148,
  keywords = {leprosy, Exclusion},
  author = {Wright K and Bouet E},
  title = {Utopian Leprosy: Transforming Gender in Bram Stoker’s Dracula and History in the Strugatsky Brothers’ The Ugly Swans},
  abstract = {<p>In 'Monster Culture (Seven Theses),' Cohen argues that the monster prevents intellectual, geographic, or sexual mobility. He contends that the monster patrols the border of the possible, ready to destroy those who step outside of the categories of the official order. This chapter will engage with this claim by showing how the monster is not the one patrolling the borders outside the categories of normality, but is instead the one creating these categories of exclusion. These cultural, ideological boundaries emanate from power structures which create monsters to deter its subject from deviating from the norm. This chapter will support this claim by looking at Bram Stoker's Dracula and Arkady and Boris Strugatsky's The Ugly Swans. Both novels use the disease of leprosy as a metaphor. The leprous characters expose the constrictions placed upon them: Mina Harker is undermined because of her gender and the lepers of The Ugly Swans because of their strong intellectual bond with the children of the novel. However, they all serve to mirror the monstrosity of the other characters who are trying to oppress them. Their leprosy is intrinsically linked to transformation, offering a glimpse of utopian possibilities. In both novels, the lepers are cured or fade, foreclosing any utopian hope. In that, the novels suggest the impossibility of utopia. Both novels expose the multiplicity of monstrosity: the lepers, deemed monstrous, reveal the path to a more inclusive community but also act as a mirror, revealing humanity's monstrosity in that it is unable to shake off its categories of exclusion and to realise utopian possibilities.</p>
},
  year = {2018},
  journal = {Disgust and Desire},
  number = {91},
  pages = {113-141},
  publisher = {Brill},
  doi = {10.1163/9789004360150_007},
  language = {eng},
}