The Fall of the House of Usher was a story with many vivid examples relating to death. The story The Black Cat shows just how insane some people can be when attached to a superstitious belief such as a black cat. The Masque of Red Death showed death being turned into something physical and something that people were afraid of. The Premature Burial was nothing but the horrors and unthought-of visuals of being buried alive. The story the Silence- a Fable really enables the reader to view the dead and feel death within the words. In the stories The Black Cat, Silence- a Fable, The Fall of the House of Usher, The Masque of Red Death, and The Premature Burial, Poe clearly had an obsession with death.
In the House of Usher, Poe relates the falling of the house to the death of the family. When Poe describes the house, it resembles many things of death. Poe states that the house had wood-work rotting from many years and no air was being exposed to it at the time. When a dead body has been buried in the ground for many years, it will decay slowly like the framework of the house. The body also is not exposed to any air whatsoever while it’s underground. “But with a shudder even more thrilling than before --upon the remodelled and inverted images of the gray sedge, and the ghastly tree-stems, and the vacant and eye-like windows” (Poe, “The Fall of the House of Usher”). The windows of the house resemble the eyes of the dead. Poe mentions that the windows look like vacant eyes. When a person dies, the eyes become vacant and the shine is absent. It looks almost as if the eyes are looking into the distance as if trying to find the shine that once lingered so preciously before. The imagery is not only one sign of death, but the scenery and mood also takes part.
Roderick and his sister, Madeline, died at the end. The narrator had said that Roderick and Madeline were the last two remaining in the family. When those two died the house fell and was destroyed. The mood for this story is eerie and to help that feeling along, it takes place in season of autumn on a dark, dull night. “I endeavoured to believe that much, if not all of what I felt, was due to the bewildering influence of the gloomy furniture of the room --of the dark and tattered draperies, which, tortured into motion by the breath of a rising tempest, swayed fitfully to and fro upon the walls, and rustled uneasily about the decorations of the bed. But my efforts were fruitless. An irrepressible tremour gradually pervaded my frame; and, at length, there sat upon my very heart an incubus of utterly causeless alarm” (Poe, “The Fall of the House of Usher”). When the narrator looks at the house, there is a feeling of iciness within the narrator’s heart. That feeling matches with the feeling someone gets when they touch the skin of the dead. The skin of someone who is dead feels ice cold. Also, the narrator could have compared his feeling of sinking within his heart to a heart that has stopped beating. Like someone who is sinking, the heart itself slowly gives out. The thoughts in this story were well put together with the theme of death, but The Black Cat was put together just as well.
The Black Cat was, without a doubt, completely insane. The horrible feelings the narrator has towards the innocent living things is one thing. Another is the torture that had happened to the poor beings. “Uplifting an axe, and forgetting, in my wrath, the childish dread which had hitherto stayed my hand, I aimed a blow at the animal which, of course, would have proved instantly fatal had it descended as I wished. But this blow was arrested by the hand of my wife. Goaded, by the interference, into a rage more than demoniacal, I withdrew my arm from her grasp and buried the axe in her brain. She fell dead upon the spot, without a groan” (Poe, “The Black Cat”). The setting for this story, at that moment, is in a celar which automatically brings the feeling of fear for the space has only way out. Mixed with that, the narrator is insane enough to sleep knowing what had happened. A symbolism piece of this story would have to be black cat itself. Black cats are supersticiously linked with bad luck. The color black also, in most cases, represents death which violently takes place in this story. The mood and imagery are the main concepts in this story, but The Masque of Red Death was more of the physical appearance.
In the Masque of Red Death, Poe brings death to life. Death is described as a figure with a mask that looks like the face of a corpse. Poe had bluntly made death look like death. The Red Death also crashes the party unexpectedly. Just like death in real life, it too can come unexpectedly. “And the revel went whirlingly on, until at length there commenced the sounding of midnight upon the clock. And then the music ceased, as I have told; and the evolutions of the waltzers were quieted; and there was an uneasy cessation of all things as before. But now there were twelve strokes to be sounded by the bell of the clock; and thus it happened, perhaps that more of thought crept, with more of time, into the meditations of the thoughtful among those who revelled” (Poe, “Masque of Red Death”). The room that the first person dies in is the very last chamber which just so happens to be the gloomiest of all the seven chambers. To add on to that chamber, he embedded an old clock and every time it chimes, it silences people leaving them feeling eerie inside. Death came at and that’s when the people died. Since is the ending of night and the darkest time of night, it resembles the ending of the people’s life. Death was portrayed as someone unexpected coming, but The Premature Burial placed death right into the reader’s head.
The mood for The Premature Burial was anything but pleasant. The name of the story even foreshadows what is about to happen. The mood for this whole entire story was dark and depressing. Also, it was a bit uncomfortable and disturbing for the reader to read. “The movement of the jaws, in this effort to cry aloud, showed me that they were bound up, as is usual with the dead. I felt, too, that I lay upon some hard substance, and by something similar my sides were, also, closely compressed. So far, I had not ventured to stir any of my limbs -- but now I violently threw up my arms, which had been lying at length, with the wrists crossed. They struck a solid wooden substance, which extended above my person at an elevation of not more than six inches from my face. I could no longer doubt that I reposed within a coffin at last” (Poe, “The Premature Burial”). Throughout the whole entire story, Poe used imagery to make an impact on the reader. It was so vivid that it placed the reader in the spot of the narrator’s. The eerie effect that this story has makes the reader see the more painful side of death. Poe really emphasized on the struggle and fear that takes over when it comes to dieing. Many people are scared to die and Poe related this story to the fears of the common people. Poe used terror and fear to get into the minds of the reader, but the story the Silence- a Fable has a different approach.
Silence- a Fable has interesting detail pertaining to death. When Poe mentions in the story the river and the surroundings, it brings forth a picture of a person who is dead. “And they flow not onwards to the sea, but palpitate forever and forever beneath the red eye of the sun with a tumultuous and convulsive motion. For many miles on either side of the river's oozy bed is a pale desert of gigantic water-lilies. They sigh one unto the other in that solitude, and stretch towards the heaven their long ghastly necks, and nod to and fro their everlasting heads” (Poe, “Silence- a Fable”). The skin of the body is pale with no moisture, but only that of a waxy complextion. The body itself is in complete solitude in the grave. However, the body of the dead shall remain buried in the earth and shall never proceed forward just like the water in the river. Poe also wrote that the rain falling was droplets of blood. Even though the blood droplets were raining on a desert land, those droplets will eventually dry up. The blood within the veins of the dead runs dry as well. Later on in the story, everything that was once being disturbed was then settled down into silence. Death can or can not be a painful experience, but both have one thing in common; the silence at the end.
These stories show a variety of ways in which Poe wrote about death. The Fall of the House of Usher used the haunted effect that most people feel when thinking of a dead person. The Masque of Red Death embedded the feeling of death into someone visual but with the same purpose. The terror that is felt in The Black Cat strongly emphasizes insanity with an eerie story. The Premature Burial leaves the reader bothered with vivid ideas of what it’s like being inches away from death. The Silence- a Fable shows feelings of death as well as a peaceful side. The Fall of the House of Usher, The Masque of Red Death, The Black Cat, The Premature Burial, and the Silence- a Fable are stories of different perspectives, but all the stories show that Poe had an obsession with death.
Works Cited
"The Black Cat." By Edgar Allan Poe. Robert Giordano, 1 July 2005. Web. 16 Mar. 2012. <http://poestories.com/read/blackcat>.
"The Fall of the House of Usher." By Edgar Allan Poe. Robert Giordano, 1 July 2005. Web. 16 Mar. 2012. <http://poestories.com/read/houseofusher>.
"The Masque of the Red Death." By Edgar Allan Poe. Robert Giordano, 1 July 2005. Web. 16 Mar. 2012. <http://poestories.com/read/masque>.
"The Premature Burial." By Edgar Allan Poe. Robert Giordano, 1 July 2005. Web. 16 Mar. 2012. <http://poestories.com/read/premature>.
"Silence - A Fable." By Edgar Allan Poe. Robert Giordano, 1 July 2005. Web. 16 Mar. 2012. <http://poestories.com/read/silence>.
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