The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe

The Fall of the House of Usher

Typical style of Edgar Allan Poe, you can tell it was dark romanticism from the title itself. Roderich Usher, the last of his family line, suffers great depression after the death of his twin sister, the only relative he had. His friend, also the narrator comes to see him and eventually witnesses the falling of the house of Usher, the falling of the Roderick Usher himself.

One of the ideas was that the scene of the house with the zigzag crack on its wall foreshadows the future outcomes. The house was also situated on the lake, where the reflection in the water might be representing the female figure, in this case the deceased sister. The creepy Gothic element that serves as the turning point for the climax to appear is that the deceased sister comes back to life and kills the brother. In my opinion she is presenting the haunted thoughts of brother, maybe even guilt over the sins he made in his life. And the zigzag fissure opened after the blood red moon and the house of usher tumbled down.

“The radiance was that of the full, setting and blood-red moon, which now shone vividly through that once barely-discernible fissure …. in zigzag direction, to the base. While I gazed, this fissure rapidly widened …”