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Superego In The Fall Of The House Of Usher

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Edgar Allan Poe’s well known story “The Fall of the House of Usher” is an eerie story with a gothic setting and the nameless narrator for which he is known for. It starts out with the narrator going to the house of a sick friend named Roderick Usher. Upon making his appearance, he goes in to find Usher pale and lifeless as he has a mental disorder. His sister Madeline also has an illness but of a physical nature. When she dies Usher along with the narrator bury her under the house. A week later they hear noises. Turns out they buried Madeleine alive. Ultimately, she makes her last debut bloodied while she as well as Usher die, the narrator flees from that broken down house which collapses. While Poe achieves many goals with this story, the …show more content…

Right from the start of the story the way he drops everything to go to his friend as “his desire to see me as his best, and indeed his only personal friend” (Poe,2). It displays that he has the heart to take into account how lonely Rodrick is and lessen it, never mind the fact they have not seen each other in decades. This is confirmed when the narrator puts aside his feeling saying “I did not feel at liberty to dispute”(9) as he helps Rodreick in burying his sister, for a person with a superego mental state is more supportive even if that means shoving their feelings down. It is shown yet again by the way he attempts to calm the fear in Rodrick at night stating “ you must not you shall not behold this. These appearances, which bewilder you are merely electrical phenomena not uncommon” (12). The narrator at this point is trying to keep him sane, a common occurrence with Poe’s stories. In contrast, the other characters are more extreme starting with Madeline, who is id to the fullest …show more content…

Although Madeline only appears in the story three times there are subtle hints as to where she lies on the spectrum. The first clue is the narrator’s only look at her as she “passed slowly through the remote portion of the apartment” (6). One can say this because if someone is that close to death they would not be walking around. This is only asserted when she supposedly dies, but there is a “faint blush upon the bosom and the face” (10). She could have made a sign or movement that she is alive, but she did not probably because she wanted her brother to feel the pain of losing her making Madeline that much more selfish. Even in the end she takes her brother down with her as she “fell heavily upon the person of her brother” (15). It is almost like if she cannot live anymore he can not either because of the purity of the family name which screams narcissistic. To balance this out Rodrick represents the ego of a

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Edgar Allen Poe is considered to be one of the leading writers of the Gothic Romantic period of literature. One of Poe’s famous short stories, The Fall of the House of Usher, creates a dark and sorrowful atmosphere, with a deep story of connection between brother and sister intertwined within. Poe conveys this atmosphere through powerful and elaborate use of diction, to tie into the overarching theme of tradition. Poe is renowned throughout history for his beautiful and elaborate use of diction and symbolism. He uses copious amounts of description to conjure up vivid scenes in the reader’s mind.

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Roderick and the narrator spend some time together until Roderick informs him that Madeline has died. The men avoided burying Madeline until she was declared dead by doctors, because she had an illness causing catatonic fits, but they finally put her in a coffin in a sealed basement. While they were laying her in the coffin, Roderick told the narrator that he and Madeline had always shared a telepathic twin power. Towards the end of the story, Roderick becomes more anxious and uneasy and unable to sleep, the narrator reads Roderick a story foreshadowing the events about to come. Roderick tells his friend that he can hear Madeline trying to escape and he is terrified of her.

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For a few moments, he sees some color return to her face, and he supposes that Rowena is still alive, but he has no way to immediately call the servants and continues to watch. However, soon the body returns to death, and the narrator resumes daydreaming of Ligeia. After an hour, the process of semi-revival repeats, and the narrator attempts to help her, but she returns to death, and he returns to thoughts of his first wife. The process occurs several more times, and each time the corpse seems to return more finally to death until eventually, she manages to rise from the bed and walk a few steps towards him. The confused and frightened narrator asks himself if Rowena has revived, but he notices that she has grown taller, and he tears away her funeral shroud to find that her hair is not blonde but black.

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When he first thinks that Madeleine is dead because she isn’t moving could be realistic hence the fact that she has been extremely bodily sick. But when he claims to be hearing and seeing creepy stuff around his home after her death, that is a different story. He must be so upset about his poor sister that it has driven him mad. Then just as things couldn’t get any worse, he bugs out and says that he accidentally buried Madeline alive and the minute he says this she comes through the door. Now this is very strange to try and ponder on because there is absolutely no way that a person could come back to life nor have the ability to claw out of a nailed up coffin and a rock wall.

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He receives a letter from Roderick telling him that his sister is sick and he needs help. She ends up dying from catalepsy putting them both in a stressful situation. They end up burying her alive under the house. She crawls out and attacks Roderick and he dies from fear while she ends up dying completely . The narrator runs away from the house as it falls apart behind him.

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Mental illness, incest, pure horror, and maybe even vampires, “The Fall of the House of Usher” has WORD symbolism and metaphors that can be hard to decipher. The symbolism in his stories reflects his horrific past in a unique way for each piece. By using imagery and symbolism in “The Fall of the House of Usher,” Poe creates very controversial topics to be discussed by the reader such as what Poe meant with the imagery he used to describe the appearance of The House of Usher, Roderick and Madeline's supposed mental illness, and "The Haunted Palace". As previously stated, Poe uses symbolism to show the house's relationship with Roderick's mental illness, but more importantly he uses it again in "The Haunted Palace". "

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When the narrator first meets his old “friend” he notices his terrible condition and the concern of his future that makes him “feel that the period will sooner or later arrive when [he] must abandon life and reason together, in some struggle with the grim phantasm, FEAR” (Poe 5). The fact that his terror, could lead to him soon abandoning his life all together shows his recognition of the power of fear; this gives this abnormal story an uncanny effect. Towards the end of the story, the narrator and Roderick Usher bury Lady Madeline, Roderick Usher’s sister, in a vault. During a stormy night, Lady Madeline seemingly breaks away from her vault as a ghost and violently “bore [Roderick Usher] to the floor a corpse, and a victim to the terrors he had anticipated” (Poe 15). The terror that both Usher and the narrator had foreseen, evidently occurred when Lady Madeline ostensibly killed her brother.

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“ The Fall of the House of Usher “ by Edgar Allan Poe is a short story about a man named Roderick Usher who initiates some events such as evoking his friend The Narrator as a protagonist to the dreadful mansion. The images such as the house and gothic ambience are used to reinforce the idea of giving the mystery to the reader. Edgar Allan Poe uses gothic elements to show how they affect the atmosphere and the characters. In the beginning , the gothic atmosphere of the house is indicated with terrifying images such as “ dull, dark and soundless ” that the feeling of horror vaccinated into reader by the thoughts of the narrator.

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