The Virgin Suicides: The Fall Of The House Of Usher

The short stories “The Fall of the House of Usher” by Edgar Allan Poe and “House Taken Over” by Julio Cortazar are two well known works of literature that encompass unique literary styles. Poe utilizes Gothic literature in his story, a style of writing that incorporates elements of darkness, gloom, drama, and intense descriptions. On the other hand, Cortazar uses Magical Realism and its realistic characters, setting, and fantastic and unusual events to tell his tale. Despite the two being completely different genres, they share many similar traits, specifically relating to fear.

Fransicco, Collado-Rodrigues. “Back To Myth And Ethical Compromise: Garcia Màrquez’s Traces On Jeffrey Eugenides’s The Virgin Suicides.” Atlantis (0210-6124) 27.2 (2005): 25-40. Literary Reference Center Plus. Web.

For it is only within the context of this nightmare that one can explain why “Usher,” occupies such an important place in the 19th century development of the Gothic genre. With great attention to economy of expression and unity of effect, this pattern would be revisited by countless other Gothic stylists” (Dougherty 6). This means that Poe used the fantasy of impending doom in “The Fall of the House of Usher” to change it from being just an upper class dream, to a tale of horror which brought together some of the political situations in the nineteenth century such as those of race and class. Hawthorne and Poe successfully incorporated gothic elements in their writing which provides greater insight to the meaning and interpretation of their works.

     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.

Poe’s ‘The Fall of The House of Usher’ express gothic completely immersed in madness and darkness while ‘The Yellow Wallpaper’ limits the decent madness of woman but shows the depression and gloominess of the character.

Various authors develop their stories using gothic themes and characterizations of this type to lay the foundation for their desired reader response. Although Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher” and Peter Taylor’s “Venus, Cupid, Folly and Time” are two completely different narratives, both of these stories share a commonality of gothic text representations. The stories take slightly different paths, with Poe’s signifying traditional gothic literature and Taylor approaching his story in a more contemporary manner.

While reading “Young Goodman Brown” by Nathaniel Hawthorne, I couldn’t help but feel a constant overwhelming sense of dread. The root of this could have come from the story’s dark setting deep within an “haunted forest” or from Brown’s mysterious “Devil”-esque companion. While I read, another story came into my mind; the story of the “Fall of the House of Usher” by Edgar Allan Poe. In Poe’s tale the same heart pounding emotion can be felt as he describes the reunion of two friends within “the House of Usher.” With the manors “eye-like windows” and “sorrowful impression,” Poe wastes no time in setting the Gothic mood. Through their distinct writing styles Hawthorne and Poe establish a common Gothic theme within their stories.

Edgar Allen Poe’s short story, “The Fall of the House of Usher”, sets a tone that is dark, gloomy, and threatening. His inclusion of highly descriptive words and various forms of figurative language enhance the story’s evil nature, giving the house and its inhabitants eerie and “supernatural” qualities. Poe’s effective use of personification, symbolism, foreshadowing, and doubling create a morbid tale leading to, and ultimately causing, the fall of (the house of) Usher.

The descriptions in Edgar Allan Poe’s story “The Fall of the House of Usher” are visual and can easily be adapted from words into mental images. Poe employs gothic imagery throughout the entire story using the narrators descriptions. He incorporates many examples of vivid descriptions but, he also in detail gives the reader background information. In the opening paragraphs of the story, Poe communicates to the audience of the Usher family’s history, “ that his very ancient family had been noted,”(7). Their importance to their community is because of their passion towards the arts. The story focuses on a narrator reuniting with his boyhood friend, Usher, at his mansion due to the crisis of his dying sister, Madeline. The narrator provides companionship

In the story “ The Fall of the House of Usher” by Edgar Allan Poe, has an American romanticism with its characters. Edgar Allan Poe is considered a Dark Romanticism because of the way he writes his poems and short stories centered around the concept of evil human nature, darkness, and death. Roderick and Madeline Usher were said to be related during the middle of the story; they were twins. It explained how they were sick, Roderick had a mental disorder and Madeline was physically sick. As the narrator enters the desolate house, he finds both Roderick and his sister in a severe state of depression and they both appear sick like. The narrator tries to make Roderick feel better, but Roderick wouldn’t budge. Roderick thinks that the house is making him sick and making him to appear crazy.

In most Gothic literature stories, imagination plays a big role in creating fear that for the reader to feel. Both of the stories that were read in class, “The Fall of the House of Usher” and “House Taken Over” included elements of Gothic literature which made the reader use their mind and have a imagination. These short stories involve many examples of imagination conquering of reason.

Edgar Allen Poe's Use of Gothic Setting in The Fall of the House of Usher

“A Stranger in this Century”: An Analysis of Sexuality in Gothic Literature of the Nineteenth Century Demonstrated in Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher” Edgar Allan Poe is regarded as the father of the short story with a dark romantic style rooted in the Gothic mode. Gothic fiction of the nineteenth century was about “reaching into some undefinable world beyond fictional reality” (Haggerty 10) in order to comment and critique the society in which the author lived in. This concept suggests that sexuality was used within the Gothic as an attempt to “rewrite the psychic reality” (10) in order to shift the “range and complexity of cultural control” (10) as a means to challenge the status quo and to expand upon Gothic’s own influence

“The Virgin Suicides” shows a clear depiction as to how the fictional world in the novel can relate to the nonfictional world. Eugenindes uses two different concepts that prove this connection. One connection is the presence of suicide. Another one is the depletion of the American Dream. Each of these components comes together in order to connect to nonfictional world that we live in.

“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.