The Fall of the House of Usher By Edgar Allan Poe

Summary: The unnamed narrator travels to the House of Usher at the summons of his old friend Roderick Usher. Upon first seeing the home, the narrator is consumed with a nameless dread, “a sense of insufferable gloom pervaded my spirit…I looked upon the scene before me – upon the mere house, and the simple landscape features of the domain – upon the bleak walls – upon the vacant, eye-like windows – upon the rank sedges – and upon a few white trunks of decayed trees – with an utter depression of soul which I can compare to no earthly sensation …”

Summary: The narrator soon discovers that all is not well in the House of Usher. Roderick suffers from physical and emotional ailments. He is subject to hypersensitivity to sound, touch, sight, etc. “He suffered from the most morbid acuteness of the senses; the most insipid food was alone endurable; he could wear only garments of certain texture; the odors of all flowers were oppressive; his eyes were tortured be even a faint light…” Roderick lived in fear of FEAR.

Roderick was superstitious and dreadful of the house, “an effect which the physique of the gray walls and turrets, and of the dim tarn into which they all looked down, had, at length, brought abut upon the morale of his existence.” Madeline Usher was Roderick’s twin sister. Madeline suffered an undiagnosed disease, “A settled apathy, a gradual wasting away of the person, and frequent although transient affections of a partially cataleptical character were the unusual diagnosis.” After Madeline’s death, Roderick wanted to entomb her in the family vault instead of burying her in the family grave yard so as to preserve her from “certain obtrusive and eager inquiries on the part of her medical men.”

After Madeline’s entombment, Roderick became more agitated and unwell, “He roamed from chamber to chamber with hurried, unequal, and objectless step. The pallor of his countenance had assumed, if possible, a more ghastly hue – but the luminousness of his eye had utterly gone out.” During a sleepless night, while the narrator was reading to Usher, he became aware of a strange sense of the description in the story matching the sounds of the House. Those sounds are ultimately discovered to be Madeline clawing her way out of her tomb, “say, rather, the rending of her coffin, and the grating of the iron hinges of her prison, and her struggles within the coppered archway of the vault.”

Madeline enters the room and falls upon her brother, who dies instantly, “There was blood upon her white robes, and the evidence of some bitter struggle upon every portion of her emaciated frame. 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.” The narrator leaves in haste, “and from that mansion, I fled aghast.” As he is leaving the grounds, the house splits in two and sinks down into the tarn (lake).

Setting Poe uses extensive imagery to establish a sense of death and decay which contributes to the unity of effect. “The House of Usher” refers not only to the crumbling mansion but also to the remaining Usher family members – Roderick and Madeline. Poe’s “house of Usher” looks more like a medieval castle or English cathedral in Gothic style

Theme Roderick and Madeline are not just twins but represent the mental and physical components of a single being or soul. Roderick represents the mind (mental decay) and Madeline represents the body (physical decay).

The twins: Poe addresses the dual and conflicted nature of the Self Mind and body are at war with each other in each of us We try to repress one side and live without it But we cannot achieve a harmonious existence in this way Roderick is all mind in a weak body Roderick lives upstairs (mind) He represents in one way the life of the isolated artist Paintings Reading Guitar playing

Madeline Madeline is entombed below ground (body) Illness has debilitated her All descriptions focus on the body Madeline is entombed below ground (body) “gradual wasting away of the person” “the huge antique panels…threw back” She “fell heavily inward upon…her brother and…bore him to the floor a corpse”

Mind-body problem The mind-body problem is the problem of explaining how mental states, events, and processes—like beliefs, actions and thinking– are related to the physical states, events, and processes, given that the human body is a physical entity and the mind is non- physical.

Unity of Effect Poe’s primary concern was “unity of effect,” which means that every element of a story should help create a single emotional impact. He coined this term while writing as a literary critic. His theory of literary unity was articulated in a review of Hawthorne’s collection of stories, Twice-Told Tales in 1842 An author should “conceive, with deliberate care, a certain unique or single effect to be wrought out, [and] then invent such … events as may best aid him in establishing this preconceived effect. In the whole composition there should be no word written, of which the tendency, direct or indirect, is not to the one pre-established design.

Paraphrase “There was an iciness, a sinking, a sickening of the heart– an unredeemed dreariness of thought which no goading of the imagination could torture into aught of the sublime.” (16-18)

Paraphrase “I have said that the sole effect of my somewhat childish experiment—that of looking down within the tarn– had been to deepen the first singular impression. There can be no doubt that the consciousness of the rapid increase of my superstition—for why should I not so term it?– served mainly to accelerate the increase itself. Such, I have long known, is the paradoxical law of all sentiments having terror as a basis.” (69-74)

Unity of Effect Now that you know UoE, apply the concepts to the rest of the story. Answer the following questions in your application: How is Roderick described? What does this imply about his nature? Is Poe’s description too ornate? What type of music is Roderick restricted to? Why does the narrator conclude that Roderick is losing “lofty reason” (275)? How can you connect these two concepts? (art and sanity)? What is the narrator feeling towards the end of the story (417)? How does this add to the Unity of Effect??

Write now Complete #5 on page 424, and then: Consider the role of the narrator. At first he seems the typical faceless, nameless chronicler of events—a window into the narrative through which the reader can examine the real man of the story, Usher himself. But he becomes a character in his own right, and the horror of the tale depends largely on our ability to see events through his experience. How does Poe lend the Narrator the qualities of a character? To what extent is he reliable??

Evaluate UoE In your opinion, does Poe’s technique of the unified effect accomplish its intended purpose? What, if any, are the disadvantages of his approach? Explain.