The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe Essay

One of Roderick's fears was death. He was from a well-known and honored family, and he and his sister were the last of the long line of Usher descendants. His sister, Madeline, had been fighting a severe and long-continued illness for quite some time, which had added to much of Roderick's gloom. " Her decease, would leave him the last of the ancient race of the Ushers." Roderick seemed not only to fear the death of his sister and ultimately of himself, but also the uncertainty of the future. "I dread the events of the future, not only in themselves, but in their results. I shudder at the thought of any, even the most trivial incident, which may operate upon this intolerable agitation of soul."

The Usher mansion is slowly deteriorating, just like Roderick Usher himself. The “sombre tapestries,” “ebon blackness,” and “phantasmagoric armorial trophies” did not just start showing in the house; these elements have had time to develop and is now represented as a never ending darkness, which is just like Roderick Usher’s mental illness. Not only does Poe create an image of the house, he also uses lucid details describing the Usher’s mansion and the rooms inside the home to show that Roderick’s mental illness has physically and mentally trapped him. Roderick is a gloomy and mysterious character who looks as if he is dead. Poe describes Roderick’s appearance as one to not easily be forgotten (Poe 152). In Roderick’s mind, he feels as if he has no escape from this illness, which terrifies him. His biggest fear is fear himself. The evil that has overcame his body will take a toll on his life and he is aware of it because he says “I shudder at the thought of any, even the most trivial, incident, which may operate upon this intolerable agitation of soul. I have, indeed no abhorrence of danger, except in it absolute effect-in terror” (Poe 153). As described in the story, the Usher house has rooms that create a somber life and with this creation, Poe is able to portray the kind of life that Roderick Usher is living and will live. Not only is this technique used in “The Fall of the House of

The house seems to be absorbing Usher’s mental health and physical health. Evidence of this is shown by the faltering health and growing fears of Roderick Usher in relation to the growing scariness of the house.

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.

All these things put together and a few others help to connect the house to Roderick and Lady Madeline. When the narrator first sees Roderick after a long period of time, he thinks that he resembles that of a corpse. Then Roderick tells him the reason for his appearance, why he looks so bad. He said he had an illness that was a “morbid acuteness of the senses.” The word morbid, when used anywhere, has very strong meaning and it is of the negative type. He uses the word tortured when he is describing his eyesight and says that even the slightest sound is almost unbearable. Thinking about having all of these symptoms put together is a very bad picture to paint in your mind. His condition, in this case, is very comparable to that of the condition of the house.

A Sense of Tension in The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe

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

Usher represents the inner self of Edgar A. Poe, he is the personality for which Poe knew, and possibly became. Poe quite possibly became Usher but he did not realize it until he re visited his inner self and mind. “Its proprietor, Roderick Usher, had been one of my boon companions in boyhood; but many years had elapsed since our last meeting” (236). Roderick Usher can represent Poe’s madness, Poe knew him in the past but finally along his journey he is coming to terms with his insanity. Edgar is excepting his madness although he still is frightened by the truth. “The writer spoke of acute bodily illness-of a mental disorder which oppressed him-and of an earnest desire to see me, as his best, and indeed his only personal friend” (236). Poe realized that his insanity did exist but he needed to address it and come to terms with it.

As Poe is known to do he builds up the suspense all the way to the horrifying ending. It starts off pleasant enough. An unnamed narrator is called to the manor of his childhood friend, Roderick. The narrator is actually quite excited to go. He remembers the place from his boyhood as being a wondrous place. When he arrives, the house is not at all how he remembers it. In fact, he describes a small fissure running through The House of Usher. This small fissure is actually a representative of a disruption in the unity of the family, more specifically, between Madeline and her brother. Madeline is Roderick’s brother and she ends up dying due to disease. It is also revealed that the two were twins and share a sort of bond. With one of them dying, they wouldn’t be unified anymore, causing a fissure that destroys The House of Usher. This is actually foreshadowed by Roderick himself when he says, "…the period will sooner or later arrive when I must abandon life and reason together, in some struggle with the grim phantasm, FEAR." (Poe 10) The horrifying conclusion to this story happens when Roderick goes mad, claiming to hear his sister from inside her coffin and that they entombed her alive. What’s even crazier, is that a bloody Madeline is actually standing outside the door and tackles her brother where they both die. This causes the narrator to run away as he watches the house crack in

Roderick Usher is a victim of circumstance. The House he has known his whole life seems to have turned against him. Poe

As the story progresses, the narrator also questions the unique relationship Roderick and his sister Madeline experience and how they participate in an immoral connection which is modern day incest. Furthermore, the insanity is present in Roderick when he expresses his desire for burying his dead sister in a tomb which is located under the house. This is also a direct connection for Poe between the title “The Fall of the House of Usher” and Roderick’s depleting sense of sanity. As described earlier, the external structure is starting to decay which is a direct link to Roderick’s mental capacity and the burial of his sister, who is believed to be dead, is a decaying of the internal structure due to the location of the tomb. “The brother had been led to his resolutions (so he told me) by consideration of the unusual character of the malady of the deceased, of certain obtrusive and eager inquiries on the part of her medical men” (Poe 1123). Here the narrator is commenting on the downward spiral he is observing in Roderick as the story progresses because he believes that the doctors that were unable to cure her sickness would inevitably dig up the body of Madeline and uses it for scientific research. As the story comes to a conclusion, the narrator petitions to Roderick that he has been hearing noises. Roderick exclaims that he had been hearing the noises that were being described for “many hours, many days” (Poe 1127). As the noises drew closer, both

In the middle of the story, readers start to see clues that will eventually show that the Ushers will meet their demise due to their illnesses. For example, as the story progressed, one can see that Roderick Usher’s symptoms got worse. He started to hear things as well as see strange images. Usher tried his absolute best to get his friend to get better. He calmed him down with his favorite things like arts and crafts and reading. The narrator also started to get affected by Roderick’s illness. He felt he was also getting progressively worse. He would relate Roderick’s illness with other aspects and works he read. It was basically a struggle for survival in the house. It was not until the end that the narrator left and feared for his life. It creates that aspect of fear that is prevalent in horror stories. According to Dawn B. Sova, “The focus in this story is placed on the narrator’s perceptions and observations of a disintegrating intellect—of a crumbling Roderick Usher rather than a crumbling castle or abbey” (87). Because of their eventual changing, they provided readers with a clear

Poe includes many details that contribute to the ominous tone in the beginning. One important attribute of Roderick Usher is that he is a twin. When he found Madeline “dead,” this had a huge toll on his mental state and even his physical appearance. “The luminousness of his eye had utterly gone out.” (pg. 84)

Surely, man had never before so terribly altered, in so a brief period of time, as Roderick Usher!”(Poe). Along with Roderick’s physical illness, he also suffers from mental disorders. A few he appears to posses are Obsessive-Compulsdive Disorder, Bipolar Disorder, and anxiety. His OCD is seen by the fact he can only wear certain textures and that “The most insipid food was alone acuteness of the sense”(Poe) or in other words, Roderick only eats specific bland foods. In addition, his bipolar disorder is seen through his bouts of depression and in ways he performs actions which are, “alternately vivacious and sullen”(Poe). Finally his anxiety is most prominent through the fact he is “enchained by certain superstitious impressions” (Poe). The life which Roderick lives is certainly full of constant duress. Therefore, as Edgar Allan Poe critic Charles May suggests, either, “...Roderick is mad or the narrator is mad...”(May 71). This is by no means surprising as Roderick is, “the embodiment of obsession and desire...”(May 71). Yet Roderick is not only tortured by illness of both his mind and body, but by the fact he is almost completely alone. His own twin sister is dying and he suffers from an “acuteness of the senses”(Poe). Even the narrator knows that, “some combinations of objects have the power of

Edgar Allan Poe is known for his poetry and short stories especially his tales of mystery and morbidity he was one of the countries first practitioners of short stories such as the Fall in the House of Usher many of his poems and short stories is said to have been inspired by Poe’s real and tumultuous life, in “The Fall of the House of Usher” Edgar Allan Poe uses sound, feeling and sight imagery to create and explore an atmosphere of horror and to convey to the reader the idea that fear coalesced by isolation and enclosure can lead to insanity.