Pluto is the Roman god of the underworld, and Poe is foreshadowing a hellish and horrific experience for the narrator. He also sets up an expectation in the reader and truly tests the thin but palpable sympathetic emotional response that is built in the opening lines of the story. He foreshadows the narrator's actions by stating subtly that the narrator has begun to feel strangely as the story unfolds. The narrator states, "(I) experienced a radical alteration for the worse. I grew, day by day, more moody, more irritable, more regardless of the feelings of others. I suffered myself to use intemperate language to my wife. At length, I even offered her personal violence. My pets, of course, were made to feel the change in my disposition. I not only neglected, but ill-used them.." The reader, now draw into the story, begins to feel like the narrator is not quite right, and the level of trust established with the reader is tested here. It is also quite frightening to witness the logical and moral decline of the narrator as he attempts to justify his actions, as they grow more and more atrocious. The climax of both stories contains similar literary devices and elements as well, as the conclusions leave the reader quite horrified and emotionally tormented. As time passes in "The Masque of the Red Death," the feeling that the Prince has made himself and his guests helpless by welding the gates to his compound shut begin to take on importance as the red masked stranger arrives. The red death is unstoppable because of the very efforts of the Prince to stop it, and the fear and helplessness that the reader feels are designed to leave an impression on the reader. The mystery and then true horror of the identity of the masked...
As in "The Black Cat," the ending of the story is horrible, but relieving in that the narrator finally (we assume) gets caught for his actions. The reader is left in suspense, or mystery until the very end when the villain (narrator, or in the case of "Masque," the prince) gets what is coming to them. The idea that anyone, no matter how smart they are or powerful they remain in their own mind cannot escape death, or the inevitable is comforting in the case of "The Black Cat" and frightening in "Masque." There is a certain sense of hopelessness, for each of the protagonists. The prince's own ignorance and naivety get the best of him and his guests and the bravado and boasting of the narrator in "The Black Cat" contribute to his demise. Another theme that runs in common in both stories is the feeling of being trapped. He prince and his guests were trapped, unknowingly in their compound with the red death and the narrator in "The Black Cat" was trapped by his own conscience or pride. Likewise, the second one-eyed cat was trapped with the narrator's murdered wife, begging the question of who was really ultimately trapped by his actions, the cat or the narrator?
Another Poe classic short story entitled the Tell Tale Heart also displayed his unique way of gaining the attention of the reader by use of dark and gloomy descriptions. This story is about going mad and losing one's mind. Poe may have really experienced this process as this story definitely takes a personal tone. The reader cannot help to feel the chaotic feelings that madness brings when grasping the Poe's
Despite the narrator's desperate pleas, the raven says nothing else than "nevermore." Moreover, the narrator now finds himself unable to get rid of the bird and states, "And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting/on the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;/and his eyes have all the seeming of a demons' that is dreaming,/and the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his shadow on
The gate by which this movement is issued comes in lines 7-9, as love becomes "free" and "pure," unlimited now by the "level" of the builder or the numbers of the mathematician. Now, she loves like the "saints" (12), who exist by God's grace, which she hopes shall allow her to continue to love even "after death" (14). Thus, Elizabeth incorporates a religious idea into a poem that centers
The death of a beautiful heroine always leaves someone behind, or the device simply would not work. Poe's narrator laments his loneliness as much as he laments Lenore's death. Poe writes, "Leave my loneliness unbroken! -- quit the bust above my door! / Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!" (Poe). Poe may have had very personal reasons for including the death
Poe and Detective Fiction Edgar Allan Poe's Influence on Detective Fiction While many people do not relate Edgar Allan Poe with detective fiction and is best known for his tales of the grotesque and macabre, Poe is in fact the father of modern detective fiction. Through his mystery stories, which include "The Murders in the Rue Morgue," "The Mystery of Marie Roget," and "The Purloined Letter," Poe was able to establish a
Edgar Allen Poe, Washington Irving, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Emily Dickinson, Mark Twain, Henry David Thoreau, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Harriet Beecher Stowe, James Fennimore Cooper, Mary Rowlandson, Walt Whitman) describe writing style, a discussion literary work. Edgar Allan Poe: Poe's amoral universe The American poet and short story author Edgar Allan Poe is one of the most famous mystery and horror writers of the 19th century. Contrary to many of his contemporaries, Poe
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