The Fall Of The House Of Usher By Edgar Allen Poe Essay

In Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher” and Julio Cortazar’ “House Taken Over” the short stories represent the genre of Gothic Literature. Gothic Literature is a genre that combines fiction, horror, death, and romance. Some of these traits are seen in both of these stories through characters and settings. However, there are other traits that set them apart.

Gothic literature is when the setting of a novel or passage is described as being gloomy or has a dark setting. In gothic literature the author might often write about a bleak setting, tortured characters or have a strange or violent plot. Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher” is a good example of Gothic Literature because in the story he expresses it as being dark and mysterious, also it incorporates gloomy moods, and a bleak setting in the story. For example, in Poe’s

Both Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher” and Julio Cortazar’s “House Taken Over” have similar settings because both take place in a spooky large houses. However, in Poe’s story, “The Fall of the House of Usher,”the setting is different because it was dark,gloomy and old house in the middle of nowhere. By contrast, Cortazar’s “House Taken Over,”the house is a little more modern and bright, well taken care of and the environment is greener.Gothic Literature is literature that has bleak or remote setting, a gloomy or melancholy mood. Also, characters or sometime tormented in a physical or psychological way. Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Fall of the house of Usher” is a good example of gothic literature because the setting of the story is very bleak and dark,and the characters in them are tormented physically and psychologically . for example, in the story, it states ,”With the first glimpse of the building, a sense of insufferable gloom pervaded my spirit (13).” This sentence proves my claim because the quote is saying that the character’s spirit feels tormented when he starts to walk into the house. Therefore, “The Fall of the house of Usher” is gothic literature because it shows it shows characters in the story being tormented.

Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher” is a great example of Gothic Literature because of the way the story was

The Fall Of the House Of Usher is a short story written by Edgar Allen Poe in 1839. The short story is complexly written, with challenging themes such as identity and fear. Poe utilises many elements of the Gothic Tradition such as setting and supernatural elements to create a more mysterious story, and uses language to his advantage, employing adjective filled descriptions of literal elements that also serve as metaphors for other parts of the story.

     One of the central themes underlying the short story, The Fall of the House of Usher, is that of the nature of the house. The way it is described and the way it is so mysterious. Another central theme about this story is the nature of the people that live in the house. They are portrayed very much in the same manner throughout the story. Thus, they have several similarities with each other. All of which are of a bad feeling, showing how bad things are for the people and the house. These similarities are very well laid out in the story and are, I believe, meant to be something to be considered when reading it.

Filled with a sense of dread by the sight of the house itself, the Narrator reunites with his old companion, who is suffering from a strange mental illness and whose sister, Madeline, is near to death due to a mysterious disease. The Narrator provides company to Usher while he paints and plays guitar, spending all his days inside, avoiding the sunlight and obsessing over the sentience of the non-living. When Madeline dies, Usher decides to bury her temporarily in one of his house's large vaults. A few days later, however, she emerges from her provisional tomb, killing her brother while the Narrator flees for his life. The House of Usher splits apart and collapses, wiping away the last remnants of the ancient family. Edgar’s inspiration for this story might have come from true events of the Usher House, located on Boston's Lewis Wharf. As that story goes, a sailor and the young wife of the older owner were caught and entombed in their trysting spot by her husband. When the Usher House was torn down in 1800, two bodies were found embraced in a cavity in the cellar (Neilson).

As with many of Edgar Allan Poe's pieces, "The Fall of the House of Usher" falls within the definition of American Gothic Literature. According to Prentice Hall Literature, American Gothic Literature is characterized by a bleak or remote setting, macabre or violent incidents, characters being in psychological or physical torment, or a supernatural or otherworldly involvement (311). A story containing these attributes can result in a very frightening or morbid read. In all probability, the reason Poe's stories were written in this fashion is that his personal life was fraught with depression, internal agony, and despair. Evidently this is reflected in "The Fall of the House of Usher." Conjointly, Edgar Allan Poe's "The

In the story, “The Fall of The House of Usher”, there are many mysterious happenings that go on throughout the story between the characters Roderick Usher and the narrator. Throughout the story, Edgar Allan Poe uses themes such as madness and insanity to connect the house back to Roderick Usher. In the “Fall of The House of Usher”, the narrator goes through many different experiences when arriving to the house. The narrator’s experiences start out as almost unnoticeable in the beginning, turn into bigger ones right before his eyes, and end up becoming problems that cause deterioration of the mind and the house before the narrator even decides to do anything helpful for Roderick and his mental illness. In “The Fall of The

In fact, the first five paragraphs of "The Fall of the House of Usher" are devoted to creating a gothic atmosphere. An ancient, decaying castle paints an eerie, moldy picture. The surrounding moat seems stagnant and sullen. The time period also ties into this mood. It's autumn and the weather is cool and dreary. How many horrors take place in the daytime? Not many, and this story is no different. It's dark, or at least semi-dark. Immediately Poe entraps the reader. There is a sense of being confined within the walls of the Usher house. Outside a storm is raging and inside there are mysterious rooms where windows suddenly whisk open, blowing out candles. Creaking and moaning sounds fill the air. The wind is whipping, and the landscape is barren. This is gothic writing and these are its trappings. The darkness of everything symbolizes death to come. Upon entering the gothic archway of the deteorating mansion, the narrator is led "through many dark and intricate passages" filled with "somber tapestries" and "ebon blackness". Over everything, Poe drapes his atmosphere of sorrow and irredeemable gloom. He evokes his primary effect, the anticipation that some fearful event will soon transpire.

"The Fall of the House of Usher" by Edgar Allan Poe has a gothic horror story setting. Gothic means that the author emphasizes the mysterious, the horrible, the ghostly and the fear that can be aroused in the reader. Everyone knows that a gothic story or a ghost story will often have a setting that will be in an old, decaying mansion far out in a desolate countryside. The mansion will be filled with cobwebs, strange noises, bats, and an abundance of secret panels and corridors, in which people might be running and screaming in terror. The author uses every literary trick to give us an eerie sensation or to scare us if we hear an unexpected noise. The

Edgar Allan Poe, renowned as the foremost master of the short-story form of writing, chiefly tales of the mysterious and macabre, has established his short stories as leading proponents of “Gothic” literature. Although the term “Gothic” originally referred only to literature set in the Gothic (or medieval) period, its meaning has since been extended to include a particular style of writing. In order for literature to be “Gothic,” it must fulfill some specific requirements. Firstly, it must set a tone that is dark, somber, and foreboding. Next, throughout the development of the story, the events that occur must be strange, melodramatic, or often sinister. Poe’s short stories are

“The Fall of the House of Usher (1939)”, arguably Edgar Allan Poe’s most famous short story, is a tale centered around the mysterious House of Usher and its equally indiscernible inhabitants. These subjects are plagued with physical and mental degradation – the Usher siblings suffer from various abnormal ailments and unexplained fears, while the house itself seems to be tethering on the edge of collapse. The gothic elements in the story are distributed generously, and the plot is increasingly ridden with the supernatural as it progresses.

The Fall of the House of Usher is a story “of sickness, madness, incest, and the danger of unrestrained creativity. This is among Poe's most popular and critically-examined horror stories” (Gordon). For example if you were to close your eyes while someone was reading the story you would see the house “decaying” in your imagination (Poe). From the start of the story the narrator’s strange “insufferable gloom” is introduced. He notes the darkness of his surrounding (Gordon). The stories are very deeply described and felt.

Faithful to the principles of the author, the first detailed words of description of the setting announce the decadent character of the composition- “All the main lines of action are supported by a systematic elaboration of detail” (Robinson, 79). The Fall of the House of Usher begins with the description of the place where all the facts of the story will develop: “It was a dark and soundless day near the end of the year, and clouds were hanging low in the heavens… through country with little life or beauty; and in the early evening I came within view of the House of Usher” (Poe, 22). At exterior levels, the presence of a crack crosses the whole structure of the house: “a crack making its way from the top down the wall until it became lost in the dark waters of the lake.” (Poe, 23). The dark aspect is present in the obscure interiors of the house: “Dark covering hung upon the walls. The many chairs and tables had been used for a long,