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Dark Romanticism In The Fall Of The House Of Usher

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In the 19th century two significant different genres in American literature emerged: Transcendentalism and Dark Romanticism/Anti-transcendentalism. Towards the middle of the 19th century, the Transcendentalism movement became significant in literature. Thus, as a reaction to the widespread movement, Dark Romanticism was founded. Transcendentalism was based on logical thinking and human’s consciousness, whereas, Dark Romanticism was different in many aspects. Transcendentalism emphasizes the power of one’s intuition and has a positive and educational tone, while Dark Romanticism has a more pessimistic and dark tone. In addition, Transcendentalism states that individuals’ intuition is crucial to understand life and attain happiness. However, Dark Romantic characters that follow their intuition and act illogically usually come to a gloomy end and fail to achieve success. Poe criticizes the transcendentalist views strongly in the short story The Fall of the House of Usher. Poe did not agree with transcendentalism because he believed the concepts to be optimistic and unrealistic. He clearly expresses his disagreement with transcendentalism by presenting the anti-transcendentalism ideas in the short story The Fall of the House of Usher. Throughout the story Poe, presents a …show more content…

That is, rather than having the transcendentalist ideals that build to an optimistic ending, The Fall of the House of Usher presents a lifeless plot that comes to be gloomier as the story develops. For instance, the description of the house and its residents are presented as a sarcastic criticism of that movement. The house is described as a haunted house with a gloomy atmosphere. It seems to be connected with the Ushers and falls with

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