Isolation In The Fall Of The House Of Usher

The Fall of the House of Usher: Isolation does not come from being alone but being unable to communicate with people that are not yourself. “The Fall of the House of Usher” by Edgar Allen Poe shares an American romanticism with the characters of the story. Poe incorporated the romantic characteristic of nature by portraying it as something terrifying, mysterious, and dark. He used metaphors to highlight the high society of gothic literature by using gothic elements to set the tone. Poe portrays this in many stories and brings it to life in “The Fall of the House of Usher” through showing the fear he had for himself. In the “Fall of the House of Usher”, Edgar Allen Poe reveals that isolation leads to madness as shown through the symbol of

The house symbolizes a place of isolation, illustrating the way that when humans no longer have communication with others it leads to madness. One of the main focuses of the story is the house and the loneliness it endures, Poe, throughout the story does an excellent job describing the state of the house, which is fundamentally coming apart at the scenes, expressing, “… and upon a few white trunks of decayed trees... with an utter depression of soul.” (Poe 14) The individual stones are crumbling, and the yard and the trees are not attended to at all, showing extensive decay when looked upon. Poe goes into detail of the landscaping of the house explaining, “Upon the bleak walls... upon the vacant eye like windows… upon a few rank sedges” (Poe 14) to let readers know the house the narrator has approached is lonely itself. In further exploration of the story, the narrator details the inside of the

One day in the story Roderick comes to announce that Lady Madeline is “no more”; he says further that he is going to preserve her corpse for two weeks because of the inaccessibility to the family burial ground and due to the “unusual character of the malady of the deceased” (Poe 23) which foreshadows the re-emergence of Lady Madeline later in the story. After days of bitter grief, Usher changes substantially, the narrator explains, “His ordinary manner had vanished. His ordinary occupations were neglected or forgotten.” (Poe 24) Usher is now wondering feverishly and running from chamber to chamber, often he stops and stares vacantly into space as if he is listening to some faint sound. This is showing to the reader that now that Madeline is “gone” this causes Usher to go even more insane than he was before due to being locked away alone in his own fear. Subsequently, we learn that Lady Madeline was buried alive in the tomb which has caused Roderick to obtain even more insanity, Roderick later states,