Table Of Content
The vault in which we placed it (and which had been so long unopened that our torches, half smothered in its oppressive atmosphere, gave us little opportunity for investigation) was small, damp, and entirely without means of admission for light; lying, at great depth, immediately beneath that portion of the building in which was my own sleeping apartment. It had been used, apparently, in remote feudal times, for the worst purposes of a donjon-keep, and, in later days, as a place of deposit for powder, or some other highly combustible substance, as a portion of its floor, and the whole interior of a long archway through which we reached it, were carefully sheathed with copper. Its immense weight caused an unusually sharp grating sound, as it moved upon its hinges. He admitted, however, although with hesitation, that much of the peculiar gloom which thus afflicted him could be traced to a more natural and far more palpable origin—to the severe and long-continued illness—indeed to the evidently approaching dissolution—of a tenderly beloved sister—his sole companion for long years—his last and only relative on earth. “Her decease,” he said, with a bitterness which I can never forget, “would leave him (him the hopeless and the frail) the last of the ancient race of the Ushers.” While he spoke, the lady Madeline (for so was she called) passed slowly through a remote portion of the apartment, and, without having noticed my presence, disappeared.
In literature
Firstly, an overview of the works of the Gothic genre in England is given, followed by a short timeline of the works in the genre on the American continent with special regard to the work of E. Several pivotal points are used to establish a correlation with Poe’s story and the works of the Early Gothic, such as the setting, family relations, the treatment of madness, intensity of emotions, the role of prophecy, the structure of the narrative, and the supernatural occurrences. The conclusion summarizes the influence early Gothic works had on E. No sooner had these syllables passed my lips, than—as if a shield of brass had indeed, at the moment, fallen heavily upon a floor of silver became aware of a distinct, hollow, metallic, and clangorous, yet apparently muffled reverberation. Completely unnerved, I leaped to my feet; but the measured rocking movement of Usher was undisturbed.
The fall of the house of Usher, and other tales
Netflix’s House of Usher’s lemon speech is full of the show’s flaws - Polygon
Netflix’s House of Usher’s lemon speech is full of the show’s flaws.
Posted: Sat, 14 Oct 2023 07:00:00 GMT [source]
He suffered much from a morbid acuteness of the senses; the most insipid food was alone endurable; he could wear only garments of certain texture; the odours of all flowers were oppressive; his eyes were tortured by even a faint light; and there were but peculiar sounds, and these from stringed instruments, which did not inspire him with horror. Upon my entrance, Usher arose from a sofa on which he had been lying at full length, and greeted me with a vivacious warmth which had much in it, I at first thought, of an overdone cordiality—of the constrained effort of the ennuyé man of the world. A glance, however, at his countenance, convinced me of his perfect sincerity. We sat down; and for some moments, while he spoke not, I gazed upon him with a feeling half of pity, half of awe. Surely, man had never before so terribly altered, in so brief a period, as had Roderick Usher!
In film and television
His eyes were bent fixedly before him, and throughout his whole countenance there reigned a stony rigidity. But, as I placed my hand upon his shoulder, there came a strong shudder over his whole person; a sickly smile quivered about his lips; and I saw that he spoke in a low, hurried, and gibbering murmur, as if unconscious of my presence. Bending closely over him, I at length drank in the hideous import of his words.
Who entereth herein, a conqueror hath bin; Who slayeth the dragon, the shield he shall win. VI.And travellers now within that valley, Through the red-litten windows seeVast forms that move fantastically To a discordant melody;While, like a rapid ghastly river, Through the pale door,A hideous throng rush out forever, And laugh—but smile no more. V.But evil things, in robes of sorrow, Assailed the monarch's high estate;(Ah, let us mourn, for never morrow Shall dawn upon him, desolate!)And, round about his home, the glory That blushed and bloomedIs but a dim-remembered story Of the old time entombed. IV.And all with pearl and ruby glowing Was the fair palace door,Through which came flowing, flowing, flowing And sparkling evermore,A troop of Echoes whose sweet duty Was but to sing,In voices of surpassing beauty, The wit and wisdom of their king.
Character descriptions
An excited and highly distempered ideality threw a sulphureous lustre over all. Among other things, I hold painfully in mind a certain singular perversion and amplification of the wild air of the last waltz of Von Weber. From the paintings over which his elaborate fancy brooded, and which grew, touch by touch, into vaguenesses at which I shuddered the more thrillingly, because I shuddered knowing not why;—from these paintings (vivid as their images now are before me) I would in vain endeavour to educe more than a small portion which should lie within the compass of merely written words.
His air appalled me—but anything was preferable to the solitude which I had so long endured, and I even welcomed his presence as a relief. One of the phantasmagoric conceptions of my friend, partaking not so rigidly of the spirit of abstraction, may be shadowed forth, although feebly, in words. A small picture presented the interior of an immensely long and rectangular vault or tunnel, with low walls, smooth, white, and without interruption or device.
Roderick Usher
But the under surfaces of the huge masses of agitated vapour, as well as all terrestrial objects immediately around us, were glowing in the unnatural light of a faintly luminous and distinctly visible gaseous exhalation which hung about and enshrouded the mansion. I had taken but few turns in this manner, when a light step on an adjoining staircase arrested my attention. In an instant afterward he rapped, with a gentle touch, at my door, and entered, bearing a lamp. His countenance was, as usual, cadaverously wan—but, moreover, there was a species of mad hilarity in his eyes—an evidently restrained hysteria in his whole demeanour.
In film and television
DURING THE WHOLE of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country; and at length found myself, as the shades of the evening drew on, within view of the melancholy House of Usher. I know not how it was—but, with the first glimpse of the building, a sense of insufferable gloom pervaded my spirit. I say insufferable; for the feeling was unrelieved by any of that half-pleasurable, because poetic, sentiment, with which the mind usually receives even the sternest natural images of the desolate or terrible. 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. What was it—I paused to think—what was it that so unnerved me in the contemplation of the House of Usher?
Over the next week, both Roderick and the narrator find themselves increasingly agitated. Poe was often dismissed by contemporary literary critics because of the unusual content and brevity of his stories. When his work was critically evaluated, it was condemned for its tendencies toward Romanticism. The writers and critics of Poe’s day rejected many of that movement’s core tenets, including its emphasis on the emotions and the experience of the sublime. Accordingly, commentaries on social injustice, morality, and utilitarianism proliferated in the mid-19th century. Poe conceived of his writing as a response to the literary conventions of this period.
Like Madeline, Roderick is connected to the mansion, the titular House of Usher. He believes the mansion is sentient and responsible, in part, for his deteriorating mental health and melancholy. Despite this admission, Usher remains in the mansion and composes art containing the Usher mansion or similar haunted mansions.
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