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The Fall Of The House Of Usher Analysis

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Loss of narrative identity. A dichotomous interpretation of the duality motif in Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher” The purpose of this essay is to contrast the multiple double stances present in the novella “The Fall of the House of Usher” and to show that this duality motif isn’t presenting the double as an exact mirror image, but rather as a doppelgänger with the meaning of ‘evil twin’. By the end of this essay I will demonstrate that even the narrator becomes a dual image of himself, culminating with the loss of the narrative’s identity, which also subdues itself to the laws of duplicity. My demonstration is proved both by my personal insight and by arguments formed on the basis of relevant secondary sources. The argumentative part of this essay will be divided into three paragraphs, each of them disputing the duality of different aspects: the house in contrast with its surroundings and the Usher family, the opposition of Roderick and Madeline, the narrator in the beginning versus the narrator as a double of Roderick towards the end of the novella and the narrator as part of the general dichotomous scenery and action. To begin with, I will pinpoint the importance of maybe the most significant aspect of the narration – the House of Usher. It is not only the space of the action but roughly the viewpoint character, as it is present in the title, which hints to the first dichotomous Bulhac 2 glimpse of the novella. ‘The House of

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