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How Does Poe Create Suspense In The House Of Usher

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In "The House of Usher", Edgar Allan Poe uses suspense, symbolism, and horrifying revelations. With all of these devices, Poe creates a cynical and sorrowful story full of twists and despair for the Usher family. Poe uses suspense in way to describe the madness and mystery that is going on in the Usher household. This is shown when the narrator states "The writer spoke of acute, bad illness of a mental disorder which oppressed him." (Poe. 294). When the narrator says this, it gives an intro into the state of Usher's mind in which he is going mad. Another way he uses suspense is foreshadowing when he writes "The entire family lay in the direct line of descent, and had always, with very trifling and very temporary variations, so lain." (295). …show more content…

The first example of symbolism in the story is how the house has a big crack throughout it and seems to be falling apart. This symbolizes the Usher bloodline and how it is coming to the end because there are only two members of the family left but they are doomed. Another use of symbolism in the story is the never-ending storm over the house. This storm symbolizes the curse that the whole Usher line is under and how they are doomed to an entire lifetime of gloom despair. Another recurring device in the story is the use of horrifying revelations in which the narrator and Usher go …show more content…

The first example of a horrifying revelation is when the narrator says "For a moment she remained trembling and reeling to and fro upon the threshold,-- then, with a low moaning cry, fell heavily inward upon the person of her brother, and in her violent and now final death-agonies, bore him to the floor a corpse, and a victim to the terrors he had anticipated." (Poe 304). What the text means is that Usher had realized that he had accidentally buried his sister alive and had killed her; and from learning this, his body went into so much shock that he died. Another use of a horrifying revelation is when the narrator says "While I gazed, this fissure rapidly widened--there came a fierce breath of the whirlwind--the entire orb of the satellite burst at once upon my sight--my brain reeled as I saw the mighty walls rushing asunder--there was a long tumultuous shouting sound like the voice of a thousand waters--and the deep and dank tarn at my feet closed sullenly and silently over the fragments of the 'House of Usher'." (304). What this means is that once the remaining members of the Usher bloodline had died, the house collapsed and the narrator realized that the house represented the life of the Usher's and once the whole bloodline died, so did the

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Stendhal is recreating this house in the story, bringing the idea of these dark stories to life. “ ‘During the whole of a dull, dark and soundless day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been passing alone on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country, and at length I found myself, as the shades of evening drew on within the view of the melancholy House of Usher.’ ” .

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