blog




  • Essay / The relationship between The Family Mansion and The Roderick Usher

    Edgar Allan Poe, born in the early 19th century, had an undeniable impact on American literature. Influenced by the trend of the time, romanticism, he wrote numerous short stories, tales and poems embellished with gothic features and grotesque humor. His best-known works are The Pit and the Pendulum, The Tell-Tale Heart, The Black Cat, The Raven and The Fall of the House of Usher. In this essay, I will address the latter point, exploring the strange connections between the protagonist and his house and the supernatural events that have happened to him. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essayPoe uses personification to describe the Usher mansion, one could say that he is considered the fourth character. Upon entering the scene, the narrator found himself in a dark and terrible state, which he was unable to rationally explain. The house with its "empty eye-shaped windows" (Works, III. 273), the atmosphere "which reeked of rotten trees" (Works, III. 276) all had their terrible influence on Usher and on the narrator . Childhood friend Roderick Usher summons the narrator to his mansion, claiming that he is suffering from a mysterious mental illness; so he doesn't have much time left and asks the narrator to spend a few days with him. His illness, a “constitutional and familial evil” (Works, III. 280), the curse and fate of the Usher race, “an effect which the physicality of the gray walls and turrets… caused on the morale of his existence” ( Works, III. 280-281) had poisoned him. It is Usher who suggests that "the house is alive and has a malignant influence on his mind" (Thompson, p. 18). According to Barton Levi (qtd. in Jonas 55), “the idea of ​​‘dwelling’ has two aspects: a temporary state…it can be abandoned and even left to ruin; on the other hand, it implies the dependence of life on its environment… a decisive difference for the inhabitant and determines his entire condition” (3). , this is the second alternative; everything around the house and inside is contaminated and contagious. Books, arts and its people are contagious; this is why even the narrator wonders if he has lost his mind while reading their books, and acts as such. an audience that listens to Roderick's music and art. The personification of the family mansion reaches its climax when the narrator notices that Usher's face resembles the house. It's not just the mansion that has fallen into disrepair, but Roderick has also had his destructive impact on it. his large, luminous eyes…his “silky, cobweb-like hair”…merge the face-shaped structure of the house with the face of Usher” (Thompson, p. 20). This indicates that the mansion is more than just a personification. The cursed house of the Usher race is not only a personification, but also represents the diseased spirit of Roderick. The entrance scene implies that the house is actually Roderick's brain condition; "there seemed to be a wild inconsistency between the still perfect fit of the pieces and the crumbling state of the individual stones" (Works, III. 276), indicating that Usher's mind is still a driving force in works, but many areas are damaged and demoralized. . The “barely perceptible crack, which extended from the roof… ran down the wall in a zigzag” (Works, III. 276) also shows his broken and sick spirit. When the narrator is taken by the valet to the “master”, he then realizes the number of “dark and complex passages” (Works, III. 276) that he must go through to find Roderick in the workshop. This scene implies that in our minds we have hidden rooms full of thoughts and,