As the narrator continues how Ethelred “walks up to the shield but before he can reach for it, it falls” (Poe, “The Fall of the House of Usher” 14), he hears a similar sound in the mansion. He reads on how Ethelred kills the dragon, and he hears a wild scream again in the mansion. At the same time, the narrator hears a similar voice far in the house. The sound of the cracking, splintering wood reverberates through the forest” (Cummings 6). He keenly listens until it gets to the part that “Ethelred, the hero breaks into the dwelling of a hermit by driving his spiked war club through the door. To comfort him, the narrator starts to read a “romance story, The Mad Trist” to Roderick. They open the window, but the storm is so strong that it almost sways Roderick. Soon, Roderick knocks on the narrator’s room, also so scared. At the end of one week since the death of Madeline, the narrator is so disturbed at night until he wakes up and dresses.
The fall of the house of usher summary full#
The days that follow are full of fear and agitation for both, for no apparent reasons. The narrator helps him to put her in the coffin and take her to the trunk. Later, Roderick informs the narrator of his sister’s death and his plans to first place her in the family vault for two weeks before her final burial. In attempt to cheer up his friend, the narrator starts reading the writings on the paintings aloud, but he realizes that they do not cheer him up and so he tries listening to the recordings in the guitar when he hears him humming some word like “the haunted palace” (Poe, “The Fall of the House of Usher” 4). He also notices paintings on the walls and an improvised guitar. He also learns that his twin sister, Madeline Usher, one of the “The Fall of the House of Usher” main characters, is also very ill with a terminal disease. The narrator notices change in Roderick’s appearance, probably due to his failing health. When he arrives, he notices a scary look of the setting and the lake around the house that gives an equally frightening image. The narrator receives an invitation via a letter to visit him since he has been ill for a while and needs the narrator’s help. The story commences with the narrator’s visit to the house of Usher, the one where his childhood friend, Roderick Usher, lives.
The similarities between the two stories outweigh their differences. “The Fall of the House of Usher” and “The Cask of the Amontillado” share all of the features above, as well as the main themes that exist in Edgar Allan Poe’s writing. As the narration progresses, fear arises in the reader or viewer, and finally, something horrific happens. Their setting is imaginary in an old, scary, and absurd environment that probably has never existed. In summary, the main goal of any gothic story is to arouse fear in the reader or viewer of the story.