"The Fall of the House of Usher"
1.) Roderick Usher's nervousness and weakness is caused by his now dead twin sister, Madeline Usher who is thought to be a vampire.Madeline is indeed a vampire, but not one that turns into a bat and flies off sucking blood in the middle of the night. She is a vampire because Roderick's attitude and appearance has altered since the narrator had last seen him. Madeline's death had sucked the life and joy out of Roderick. According to the narrator, "Surely, man had never before so terribly altered, in so a brief period, as had Roderick Usher!" he has never seen a man changed drastically over a death to the point where he couldn't tell who is sitting in front of him. Throughout the period that the narrator is staying with Roderick the two read books and Roderick tells the narrator that he has a particular interest in one book "His chief delight, however, was found in the perusal of an exceedingly rare and curious book in quarto Gothic—the manual of a forgotten church—the Vigilae Mortuorum secundum Chorum Ecclesiae Maguntinae." A few days after that, Roderick asks the narrator to help him with burying his sister and the narrator agrees, even though he doesn't want to. Nights after the preservation of the body, the narrator starts to feel terrified, just like Roderick, "It was no wonder that his condition terrified—that it infected me. I felt creeping upon
me, by slow yet certain degrees, the wild influences of his own fantastic yet impressive superstitions." The narrator had also observed changes in his friend after the preservation, "And now, some days of bitter grief having elapsed, an observable change came over the features of the mental
disorder of my friend. His ordinary manner had vanished. His ordinary occupations were neglected or
forgotten. He roamed from chamber to chamber with hurried, unequal, and objectless step. The pallor of his
countenance had assumed, if possible, a more ghastly hue—but the luminousness of his eye had utterly gone
out. The once occasional huskiness of his tone was heard no more; and a tremulous quaver, as if of extreme
terror, habitually characterized his utterance. There were times, indeed, when I thought his unceasingly
agitated mind was labouring with some oppressive secret, to divulge which he struggled for the necessary
courage. At times, again, I was obliged to resolve all into the mere inexplicable vagaries of madness, for I
beheld him gazing upon vacancy for long hours, in an attitude of the profoundest attention, as if listening to
some imaginary sound." One night as Usher is having problems sleeping (or roaming around the mansion) the narrator decides to read him a book. Shortly after reading a certain passage in the book, Usher goes mad saying, "“Not hear it?—yes, I hear it, and have heard it. Long—long—long—many minutes, many hours, many days, have I heard it—yet I dared not—oh, pity me, miserable wretch that I am!—I dared not—I dared not speak! We have put her living in the tomb! Said I not that my senses were acute? I now tell you that I heard her first feeble movements in the hollow coffin. I heard them—many, many days ago—yet I dared not—I dared not speak! And now—to-night—Ethelred—ha! ha!—the breaking of the hermit's door, and the death-cry of the dragon, and the clangour of the shield!—say, rather, the rending of her coffin, and the grating of the iron hinges of her prison, and her struggles within the coppered archway of the vault! Oh whither shall I fly? Will she not be here anon? Is she not hurrying to upbraid me for my haste? Have I not heard her footstep on the stair? Do I not distinguish that heavy and horrible beating of her heart? Madman!” here he sprang furiously to his feet, and shrieked out his syllables, as if in the effort he were giving up his soul—“Madman! I tell you that she now stands without the door!”After the terrible shrieking from Usher, the sister appears and she evidently kills Roderick, causing the narrator to flee in horror. In conclusion, since the sister had died from a weird disease that nobody knew how to cure, she had sapped the once happy man that the narrator knew as a boy and his sorrow eventually found its way towards the narrator, which had creeped him out. That is how Madeline Usher is considered a vampire in "The Fall of the House of Usher".
2.) The authors of the books "The Masque of the Red Death" and "Dr. Heidegger's Experiment" criticize human nature indirectly. "Dr. Heidegger's Experiment" criticizes the impatience humans have towards things that give a promise of a new start, a different life, or some other miraculous idea (The doctor's four venerable friends made him no answer, except by a feeble and tremulous laugh; so very ridiculous was the idea that, knowing how closely repentance treads behind the steps of error, they should ever go astray again.). "The Masque of the Red Death" criticizes the ego that humans have for themselves (When his dominions were half depopulated, he summoned to his presence a thousand hale and light-hearted friends from among the knights and dames of his court, and with these retired to the deep seclusion of one of his castellated abbeys.) Both stories show us those types of criticism through the King (The Masque of the Red Death) and the four eager friends who didn't give a reply back to Dr. Heidegger and were begging for more of the water (Dr. Heidegger's Experiment). The writers have a similar attitudes towards the human nature because both stories focus on a self centered person/ a group of self centered people who were wanting nothing else to do with others' well being. Both stories have people who wanted nothing to do with the outside world or the well being of each other after the experiment. The King in "The Masque of the Red Death" didn't want the Red Death to come into his castle and had summoned all the healthy and light hearted friends before taking them all to his isolated abbey. The group of friends in "Dr. Heidegger's Experiment" were already very old, and when Heidegger mentioned the Fountain of Youth water, all of them were very eager to drink the water, they didn't even bother to answer the question that Heidegger had presented to them, ""Before you drink, my respectable old friends," said he, "it would be well that, with the experience of a lifetime to direct you, you should draw up a few general rules for your guidance, in passing a second time through the perils of youth. Think what a sin and shame it would be, if, with your peculiar advantages, you should not become patterns of virtue and wisdom to all the young people of the age!" At the end of both stories the main character/s get what they were trying to keep away from them (the Red Death appears and kills the King and the four friends end up returning old but they venture out towards Florida after the experiment in search of the Fountain of Youth for themselves.
me, by slow yet certain degrees, the wild influences of his own fantastic yet impressive superstitions." The narrator had also observed changes in his friend after the preservation, "And now, some days of bitter grief having elapsed, an observable change came over the features of the mental
disorder of my friend. His ordinary manner had vanished. His ordinary occupations were neglected or
forgotten. He roamed from chamber to chamber with hurried, unequal, and objectless step. The pallor of his
countenance had assumed, if possible, a more ghastly hue—but the luminousness of his eye had utterly gone
out. The once occasional huskiness of his tone was heard no more; and a tremulous quaver, as if of extreme
terror, habitually characterized his utterance. There were times, indeed, when I thought his unceasingly
agitated mind was labouring with some oppressive secret, to divulge which he struggled for the necessary
courage. At times, again, I was obliged to resolve all into the mere inexplicable vagaries of madness, for I
beheld him gazing upon vacancy for long hours, in an attitude of the profoundest attention, as if listening to
some imaginary sound." One night as Usher is having problems sleeping (or roaming around the mansion) the narrator decides to read him a book. Shortly after reading a certain passage in the book, Usher goes mad saying, "“Not hear it?—yes, I hear it, and have heard it. Long—long—long—many minutes, many hours, many days, have I heard it—yet I dared not—oh, pity me, miserable wretch that I am!—I dared not—I dared not speak! We have put her living in the tomb! Said I not that my senses were acute? I now tell you that I heard her first feeble movements in the hollow coffin. I heard them—many, many days ago—yet I dared not—I dared not speak! And now—to-night—Ethelred—ha! ha!—the breaking of the hermit's door, and the death-cry of the dragon, and the clangour of the shield!—say, rather, the rending of her coffin, and the grating of the iron hinges of her prison, and her struggles within the coppered archway of the vault! Oh whither shall I fly? Will she not be here anon? Is she not hurrying to upbraid me for my haste? Have I not heard her footstep on the stair? Do I not distinguish that heavy and horrible beating of her heart? Madman!” here he sprang furiously to his feet, and shrieked out his syllables, as if in the effort he were giving up his soul—“Madman! I tell you that she now stands without the door!”After the terrible shrieking from Usher, the sister appears and she evidently kills Roderick, causing the narrator to flee in horror. In conclusion, since the sister had died from a weird disease that nobody knew how to cure, she had sapped the once happy man that the narrator knew as a boy and his sorrow eventually found its way towards the narrator, which had creeped him out. That is how Madeline Usher is considered a vampire in "The Fall of the House of Usher".
2.) The authors of the books "The Masque of the Red Death" and "Dr. Heidegger's Experiment" criticize human nature indirectly. "Dr. Heidegger's Experiment" criticizes the impatience humans have towards things that give a promise of a new start, a different life, or some other miraculous idea (The doctor's four venerable friends made him no answer, except by a feeble and tremulous laugh; so very ridiculous was the idea that, knowing how closely repentance treads behind the steps of error, they should ever go astray again.). "The Masque of the Red Death" criticizes the ego that humans have for themselves (When his dominions were half depopulated, he summoned to his presence a thousand hale and light-hearted friends from among the knights and dames of his court, and with these retired to the deep seclusion of one of his castellated abbeys.) Both stories show us those types of criticism through the King (The Masque of the Red Death) and the four eager friends who didn't give a reply back to Dr. Heidegger and were begging for more of the water (Dr. Heidegger's Experiment). The writers have a similar attitudes towards the human nature because both stories focus on a self centered person/ a group of self centered people who were wanting nothing else to do with others' well being. Both stories have people who wanted nothing to do with the outside world or the well being of each other after the experiment. The King in "The Masque of the Red Death" didn't want the Red Death to come into his castle and had summoned all the healthy and light hearted friends before taking them all to his isolated abbey. The group of friends in "Dr. Heidegger's Experiment" were already very old, and when Heidegger mentioned the Fountain of Youth water, all of them were very eager to drink the water, they didn't even bother to answer the question that Heidegger had presented to them, ""Before you drink, my respectable old friends," said he, "it would be well that, with the experience of a lifetime to direct you, you should draw up a few general rules for your guidance, in passing a second time through the perils of youth. Think what a sin and shame it would be, if, with your peculiar advantages, you should not become patterns of virtue and wisdom to all the young people of the age!" At the end of both stories the main character/s get what they were trying to keep away from them (the Red Death appears and kills the King and the four friends end up returning old but they venture out towards Florida after the experiment in search of the Fountain of Youth for themselves.
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