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Literary analysis on Edgar Allan Poe
Literary analysis of Edgar Allan Poe's work
Literary analysis on Edgar Allan Poe
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Edgar Allan Poe is one of the most well known influential American authors. His prose captivated audiences, both local and international, and helped create the modern horror story. Poe created his famous style by letting his actual life bleed into his work along with injecting it with symbolism and atmosphere. These techniques can be seen in many of his short stories such as The Fall of The House of Usher, Masque of the Red Death, and Pit and the Pendulum where he uses them to comment on the flaws of man and on his inner darkness. Poe had a terrible life that he used to influence his work. Enduring the deaths of many of his loved ones Poe self medicated with copious amounts of alcohol. From his life he created the themes that he would use in many of his stories; The Themes of Death and Addiction. His obsession and usage of death can be seen in Masque of the Red Death. When a group of people decide to hide within a castle during an epidemic a mysterious figure arrived and essentially crashed the party. “ And now was acknowledged the presence of the Red Death....And the life of the ebony clock went out with that of the last of the gay. And the flames of the tripods expired. And …show more content…
Poe used symbolism to better show his themes to the reader. Without the use of symbolism the themes in Poe's work would have been lost. Unless the audience knew poe and his life they would not be able to pick up on the meanings without the help of symbols. Some of Poe's stories such as The Fall of The House of Usher are full to the brim with symbolism. The theme of the story is a struggle between Poe’s masculinity and femininity, however it is because of the symbols that the morale is visible. The cracked home represents a split of Poe's mind. The coffin in the basement represents poe burying his feeling deep within his mind. Poe's style needed symbolism due to the very personalized natures of his
As explained before, the "dull, dark, and soundless" house serves as both "the castle" and "gloomy atmospheres'' in this story. Poe uses the house as the main tool to create a gloomy and mysterious atmosphere. However not all of Poe's gothic elements are actual physical objects. Fear is Poe's next choice of gothic elements as even our main character Roderick predicted would "sooner or later'' become his untimely demise. Fear is the dark recesses of the human heart and conscience and Roderick's fear in this brilliant story was not even death; but it was fear its self. Lady Madeline death is Poe's next gothic element because her death is a crime. Lady Madeline is the victim a the incompetents of her twin Roderick and unfortunately suffered a premature burial. Poe dose this the emphasize the extreme emotion of Roderick and the severity of the situation. Poe as well uses the description of the "decaying house...ghastly river..[and] black and lurid tarn'' to create feelings of darkness, shadows and gloominess and give the story a gothic ambiance. Poe Uses these elements to give his literature a gothic, gloomy, and overall dark atmosphere.
Poe was a very experienced author of unique tales. He was born on January 19, 1809 and died on October 7, 1849. He had a dark life growing up because his mother, foster mother, and his wife died from tuberculous. His father abandoned him and his foster father disliked him. This background may have greatly influenced his work. He wrote 70 poems and 66 short stories during his lifetime. Poe has written many Gothic horror stories. “The Tell Tale Heart,” “The Masque of the Red Death,” and “The Fall of the House of Usher” show these similarities.
Human happiness is represented by the Prince, who seeks to block or prevent the threat of death however death will come to all. The symbolism of the clock, hour by hour, minute by minute, the life of the ebony clock slowly dies. The ticking or chimes of the clock is a reminder to all of the limited time left before death.
Introduced by tragedies early in his life, Edgar Allan Poe became one of the most successful writers, poets, and storytellers to ever live. Edgar Allan Poe had the intelligence to do anything he wanted to do, however, the pain of losing his loved ones always seemed to drive him towards a pen and paper. His emotions never failed to show through his writings, which helped the story line touch the readers. Poe became very close to several different women but each would die shortly after he came to love them. This only pushed him to write more emotionally. Poe had a natural talent for putting his real life experiences into a fictional story and making it seem as if it were really happening.
...scarlet stained windows, the images are “ghastly in the extreme” (Poe 517). Normally, a room would not be decorated in a way that everyone is to frightened to enter. Therefore, the fear of the space mimics man’s fear of death. Poe’s life had been shaped by death and perhaps this influenced his writing. His mother had passed away when he was just three years old. His foster mother also passed away, after a long illness. Then, Poe’s wife passed away from illness. These occurrences in his life may have taught him that time is precious and life is not everlasting. No matter how hard a man tries to ignore death, we will all die eventually. Tragically, Poe himself died under mysterious circumstances just as he was turning his life around and becoming successful. The way Poe set the story and the symbolism used throughout clearly drove home the point that life is fleeting.
Edgar Allan Poe primarily authored stories dealing with Gothic literature; the stories were often quite dreary. Poe possessed a very sorrowful view of the world and he expressed this throughout his literary works. His goal was to leave an impression with every detail that he included in his stories. Although Poe’s stories seem very wretched and lackluster they all convey a certain idea. A trademark of Poe’s is his use of very long complex sentences. For instance, in his work The Fall of the House of Usher, Poe tried to ensure that every detail was as relevant as possible by integrating a wide variety of emotion. In the third paragraph, of page two hundred ninety-seven, Poe wrote, “Feeble gleams of encrimsoned light made their way through the trellised panes, and served to render sufficiently distinct the more prominent objects around…” This sentence illustrates the descriptiveness and complexity that Edgar Allan Poe’s works consisted of. The tormented cognizance of Poe led him to use a very gloomy diction throughout his writing. Edgar Allan Poe’s use of symbols and the way he conveyed his writing expr...
Edgar Allan Poe is one of the most influential writers to date. His thrill filled tales of darkness and death helped people see a different side of romantic literature. Many believe that his isolated life and drinking problem helped influence his works. Poe showed his most prominent life accomplishment and disappointments through his life in his stories. He defined a lot of his life’s parallels through his works.
used to symbolize death. Poe's use of language and symbolism is shown in his description of the
The clock serves as more than just a decorative element, it “is the relentlessly paralyzing reminder of ‘the Time that flies…’” (Freedman 238). Poe’s repeated mention of the clock and its chimes creates a level of anticipation and anxiety that must mirror what the partygoers are feeling as they are left unable to ignore the fact that time is passing and death is growing nearer. No matter how much wealth or luck these people may have had, they are not above dying. While the partygoers may try to “avoid the black and blood-tinted chamber, the echoes of the clock resound throughout the abbey” and leave each of them with a feeling of uneasiness as they are pulled back to reality (Freedman 238). While the prospect of people dying beyond the walls seemed not to weigh heavily among the party guests, “the chimes of the clock” made even the “giddiest [grow] pale” (Poe 439). The inclusion and repetition of such details as the partygoers’ reactions towards each of the clock’s hourly chimes show that they are finally, though unwillingly, beginning to acknowledge the finality of the death that awaits them. However, whenever the clock’s “sound fades, [the partygoers]
Edgar Allan Poe is forever identified with his eerie poem “The Raven” with his many gothic horror stories, and as the father of the detective story (Werlock1). Poe’s stories are known in America and Europe. Most of Poe’s stories are Gothic, which he describes them as “arabesque” a term that he felt best described as flowery (Wilson52). Poe proclaimed his writing a reaction to typical literature of the day, which he called “the heresy of the Didactic” for its tendency to preach (Wilson52). Some of Poe’s stories are also comedies. “The Fall of the House of Usher” was a nevertheless typical of Poe’s short stories in that it presents narrator thrust into a psychologically intense situation in which otherworldly forces conspire to drive at least one of the characters insane (Wilson53).Edgar Allan Poe had a difficult life after dropping out of college. He became a short story writer, one of his stories being “The Fall of the House of Usher”. “The Fall of the House of Usher” uses literary elements of symbols and settings to further the theme of evil.
Edgar Allan Poe is undoubtedly one of American Literature's legendary and prolific writers, and it is normal to say that his works touched on many aspects of the human psyche and personality. While he was no psychologist, he wrote about things that could evoke the reasons behind every person's character, whether flawed or not. Some would say his works are of the horror genre, succeeding in frightening his audience into trying to finish reading the book in one sitting, but making them think beyond the story and analyze it through imagery. The "Fall of the House of Usher" is one such tale that uses such frightening imagery that one can only sigh in relief that it is just a work of fiction. However, based on the biography of Poe, events that surrounded his life while he was working on his tales were enough to show the emotions he undoubtedly was experiencing during that time.
Many authors often use symbolism to express a deeper meaning. They use the symbols to connect an unrelated thought or feeling into their literary work they are writing. Edgar Allan Poe frequently uses this literary device in his works. Symbols are many times seen in his poems and in his short stories. Many symbols are evident in Poe’s works “The Raven,” “The Tell-Tale Heart,” and “The Black Cat.” Because Poe’s works are typically dark, his use of symbols is in a dark way. Although there are many types of symbols manifested in these stories, Poe’s works generally include a symbol that eludes death or the end of something and many include references of sight and vision.
Edgar Allan Poe is one of the most influential writers of the horror genre in American history. His horror stories have impacted numerous authors and their stories over the years. Various people have tried to copy his way of writing style, but they have failed to achieve the success he did. Even though Poe is no longer living, his impact on American literature can still be felt today.
Poe uses figurative language to quickly draw the reader into the story. For example, in the beginning of the story, he personifies the house in saying that it has “vacant eye-like windows,”(Poe 294) and that the house’s horrific appearance is that of “the hideous dropping off of the veil.”(294) His descriptions of the house are luring in the reader in preparation for the story that has already begun.
Edgar Allan Poe led a strange and unusually hard life, but through his experiences he produced many outstanding and wonderful works which have with out a doubt contributed to American Literature in several different areas. His stories are treasured by an immense readership. Although, Poe was quiet popular for his gothic tales, he was also well known for being and accomplished humorist, which is seen in many of his short stories. Poe was credited for singlehandedly inventing the detective story. No other played a more crucial role in shaping and developing the aesthetic theory, in the nineteenth-century, than Edgar Allan Poe. Thus, Poe remains a permanent fixture of our literary culture.