Beyond Empiricism and Transcendentalism in House of Usher
When Edgar Allan Poe wrote "The Fall of the House of Usher," two factors greatly influenced his writing. A first influence was John Locke's idea of Empiricism, which was the idea that all knowledge was gained by experiences, exclusively through the senses. A second vital influence was Transcendentalism, which was a reaction to Empiricism. While John Locke believed that reality or truth was constituted by the material world and by the senses, Transcendentalists believed that reality and truth exist within the spiritual or ideal world. They believed that the external world was dependent solely on the conscious. Beverly Voloshin suggests that "Poe presents transcendental projects which threaten to proceed downward rather than upward" (19). Here it becomes obvious that there is a strong connection between John Locke's Empiricism and the resulting ideas of Transcendence, and the powerful effect that they had on Poe and other emerging Romantic writers of that time. In "The Fall of the House of Usher," Poe establishes a new type of literature, one that emphasizes aspects of Empiricism as well as the idea of Transcendence. Poe uses this unique literature to introduce the Usher mansion and its intriguing and very troubled inhabitants.
Locke wrote the "Essay Concerning Human Understanding," which was published in 1690, and is credited with opening up the period of Enlightenment in Europe. Its strongest connection to Poe was that it had a "late popularity in New England"(Voloshin 18). With this popularity in New England, many of the writers of the time either voiced their approval of Empiricism, or took an opposite stance in their literature. Locke believed th...
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...an upward. "The tales have a paradoxical structure in which transcendence is figured as an outward or downward movement, as the method for going beyond the universe of Lockean empiricism is to go through it" (Voloshin 19). Poe brings this out with the narrator's "depression" and the "unredeemed dreariness of thought." The language that is used in "The Fall of the House of Usher" presents a connection between the mental and the physical world, which then correlates with the debate between Transcendentalists and the empiricism presented nearly two centuries before.
Works Cited
Koster, Donald N. Transcendentalism in America. Boston: Twayne, 1975.
Sahakian, Mabel Lewis and William S. John Locke. Boston: Twayne, 1975.
Voloshin, Beverly. "Transcendence Downward: An Essay on 'Usher' and 'Ligeia.'" Modern Language Studies 18 (1988): 18-29.
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Head is the one displaying ignorance in every spoken.From the beginning of the story Mr. Head is seen as a character extremely selfish and only concerned with ...
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Toby is presented as a young college student who is in graduate school on scholarships. He is studying science and seems easy going. He is simple but not a flat character. He starts out not knowing love and ends the story knowing broken love. He learns what it means to love but has not learned what it means to be a husband. In the relationship, he was more of a friend to the two rather than a dad and husband. I do not think he ever saw fault but rather felt pity that she left him.
In conclusion Poe excellent use of characterization and imagery to depict fear and darkness, truly make The Fall of the House of Usher a story of the battles the we must face our fears in order to free our mind.
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