Part 5, The Fall of the House of Usher

[which_chick]

And here is the exciting conclusion of The Fall of the House of Usher, explicated by me.

Need the index?



27 “And have you have not seen it?” he said abruptly, after having stared about him for some moments in silence–“you have not then seen it?–but, stay! you shall.” Thus speaking, and having carefully shaded his lamp, he hurried to one of the casements, and threw it freely open to the storm.

RFM 27: “Have you seen it?” asks Roderick. I stare at him, confused. "You haven’t? Well, look at *this*!“ He dims the lamp and then goes over to the window and dramatically opens it to the storm.

This is our Very First Dialogue in the story. Seriously, we’re 27 paragraphs in and if you even NOTICED that there was no dialogue (probably you were too distracted by all the Establishing A Mood stuff going on up until now) I bet you, Poor Bastard, maybe figured dialogue was some sort of a modern invention in stories that Poe didn’t use because it hasn’t been invented yet. Not so! Dialogue is an ancient storytelling technique and Poe was well aware of it. Hell, this is the man who later writes a poem with a talking bird in it. Man can use dialogue. So, why didn’t he USE it before now? Dunno. Probably too busy Establishing A Mood.

All along this story, the only person who’s been talking to us is our narrator, and now, in the ultimate section, Roderick speaks. Finally. I kinda wish he sounded more sane, though. Note that Roderick takes time to dim the lamp before throwing upon the window so that what’s outside will look better. He’s a bit of a drama queen.

28 The impetuous fury of the entering gust nearly lifted us from our feet. It was, indeed, a tempestuous yet sternly beautiful night, and one wildly singular in its terror and its beauty. A whirlwind had apparently collected its force in our vicinity; for there were frequent and violent alterations in the direction of the wind; and the exceeding density of the clouds (which hung so low as to press upon the turrets of the house) did not prevent our perceiving the lifelike velocity with which they flew careering from all points against each other, without passing away into the distance. I say that even their exceeding density did not prevent our perceiving this–yet we had no glimpse of the moon or stars–nor was there any flashing forth of the lightning. But the under surfaces of the huge masses of agitated vapor, as well as all terrestrial objects immediately around us, were glowing in the unnatural light of a faintly luminous and distinctly visible gaseous exhalation which hung about and enshrouded the mansion.

RFM 28: There was a hell of a storm. The wind blew in a whirlwind around the house, which made the clouds circle the house almost like they were alive. I could see all of this not because of the moon or lightning flashes but because everything was "glowing in the unnatural light of a faintly luminous and distinctly visible gaseous exhalation which hung about and enshrouded the mansion."

I’m sorry to quote at you in the RFM part, but seriously, yo, our narrator here is now SEEING and DESCRIBING the miasmic veil of depressing creepitude that surrounds the house and grounds. Or, I’m sorry, maybe it’s the ”atmosphere which had no affinity with the air of heaven, but which had reeked up from the decayed trees, and the grey wall, and the silent tarn—a pestilent and mystic vapour, dull, sluggish, faintly discernible, and leaden-hued“ what we had heard about way back in P4. HE CAN FUCKING WELL SEE IT. He describes it to us. But it’s still not real…

29 "You must not–you shall not behold this!” said I, shudderingly, to Usher, as I led him, with a gentle violence, from the window to a seat. “These appearances, which bewilder you, are merely electrical phenomena not uncommon–or it may be that they have their ghastly origin in the rank miasma of the tarn. Let us close this casement;–the air is chilling and dangerous to your frame. Here is one of your favourite romances. I will read, and you shall listen;–and so we will pass away this terrible night together.”

RFM 29: “Don’t look at that!”, I say to Usher, leading him to a seat. "It’s just ball lightning, or maybe swamp gas from the pond. Sit tight and I’ll read us a story to pass the time till morning.“

Oh, Poor Bastard, I can feel a Literary Technique coming on, here. Authors do not typically put the action of the story they are telling ON HOLD to sidetrack you into someone else’s story without an ulterior motive. You pretty much NEVER get a fresh, small story in the middle of the story you’re reading without it Having A Literary Purpose.

Think about it, seriously: We’re hanging out with Roderick and the narrator, in the dead of night, in a creepy-ass house, while a tempest rages outside and Roderick’s dead sister is in a vault below. That’s the setting of this scene, plus if you flip ahead, you know we’re not very far from the end of the story. It’s time for the exciting part to happen and yet Poe has our narrator sit down for Story Time With Roderick. Wow, could anything more boring be happening? (This is sarcasm. You should be curious to see what the hell Poe is doing here.)

Also, I’d like to point out that in the 1830’s having grown-ups read to one another as entertainment was not weird, childish, or stupid. Before there was radio, television, or internet, folks used to read aloud to each other of an evening. This was A Thing and it wasn’t weird. So, our narrator offering to read aloud to Roderick was, like, a perfectly reasonable suggestion for how to pass the time until morning. (Understand the time your story was written in so that you aren’t seeing creepy where no creepy was intended.)

30 The antique volume which I had taken up was the "Mad Trist” of Sir Launcelot Canning; but I had called it a favourite of Usher’s more in sad jest than in earnest; for, in truth, there is little in its uncouth and unimaginative prolixity which could have had interest for the lofty and spiritual ideality of my friend. It was, however, the only book immediately at hand; and I indulged a vague hope that the excitement which now agitated the hypochondriac, might find relief (for the history of mental disorder is full of similar anomalies) even in the extremeness of the folly which I should read. Could I have judged, indeed, by the wild overstrained air of vivacity with which he hearkened, or apparently hearkened, to the words of the tale, I might well have congratulated myself upon the success of my design.

RFM 30: I picked Mad Trist to read – it was a trashy novel, but the only one at hand, and I hoped that reading it would calm Roderick down. Roderick seemed really into the story, so I felt like my plan was maybe working.

Poor Bastard, there is a huge “but…” at the end of that paragraph. Maybe you can’t see it, cloaked as it is in the Romulanity of mid-nineteenth century prose, but it’s there. Look at the conditional future tense Poe uses: "Could I have judged“ and ”might well have congratulated“. This is to cast doubt on what our narrator says. Look at Poe’s construct of ”hearkened, or APPARENTLY hearkened“, like maybe our narrator is mistaking Roderick’s "hearkening” to the story for enthusiasm when it’s really something else. Narrator does say Roderick is “agitated” and has a “wild overstrained air of vivacity”. That seems a bit much “enthusiasm” for a trashy novel, y'know?

And again, a side note that I pulled off the internets: There doesn’t seem to be a real story “Mad Trist” by whatsisface Canning. lt is a story of Poe’s own invention and you’re going to be sadly disappointed, Poor Bastard, if you want to read the damn thing based on the snippets that appear in House of Usher, because there isn’t any more of it. Sorry about that, but them’s the breaks.

The pretend story our narrator is reading is called Mad Trist. What the fuck is Trist? I know what a tryst is, it’s like where you sneak away to meet an illicit romantic partner for the knocking of boots. But trist? Is that the same thing? A different thing? What the fuck? The story is about Ethelred and a dragon, so I’m not really sure there’s any, y'know, romantic knocking of boots even though the story is called a ‘romance’ – you should not be thinking Harlequin, here. Ethelred, of course, has a sword and a firm purpose. If it goes as most hero + dragon stories go, there’s going to be sword penetrating dragon at the end and it’ll all end in blood. You can read that as a metaphor for knocking boots, if you want, I guess.

31 I had arrived at that well-known portion of the story where Ethelred, the hero of the Trist, having sought in vain for peaceable admission into the dwelling of the hermit, proceeds to make good an entrance by force. Here, it will be remembered, the words of the narrative run thus:

RFM 31: I got to the part of the story where Ethelred tears down the door. As you know, Bob, it goes like this:

Poor Bastard, I hope you have leveled up your Li Tra Chure skills sufficiently to recognize that when Poe has the narrator *summarize* stuff, it can be kinda ignored and when Poe has the narrator READ ALOUD WORD FOR WORD, it’s important. So, perk up yer attention and give a steady eyeball to what comes next.

Before we do that, though, let us look at Ethelred’s story as a metaphor for fucking. Ethelred has asked politely to get into the hermit’s house (“sought in vain peaceable admission”) and been denied, so now he’s gonna rip the door off and push his way in anyway. Your takeaway: If you can’t get what you want by asking nicely, take it by force. I’m kinda sensing the Invisible Hand of the Patriarchy in this narrative, but you can think what you like. Maybe it’s not really as rape-y as it sounds. :)

Okay, so then, ready for our Important Part? Here it is:

32 “And Ethelred, who was by nature of a doughty heart, and who was now mighty withal, on account of the powerfulness of the wine which he had drunken, waited no longer to hold parley with the hermit, who, in sooth, was of an obstinate and maliceful turn, but, feeling the rain upon his shoulders, and fearing the rising of the tempest, uplifted his mace outright, and, with blows, made quickly room in the plankings of the door for his gauntleted hand; and now pulling therewith sturdily, he so cracked, and ripped, and tore all asunder, that the noise of the dry and hollow-sounding wood alarmed and reverberated throughout the forest.

RFM 32: Ethelred, who's about half in the bottle and also drunk on his own testosterone like a pro football player, got tired of being out in the weather and asking politely to be let in so lifted his mace and beat a hole in the door. Ethelred then proceeded to tear the door to pieces with his hands, the wood cracking and ripping apart loudly.

Okay, full disclosure time. I have read this story before, but not ever in a line-by-line fisking such as this. And now, looking at it in slow-mo, the Ethelred thing is kinda like an extended metaphor for sex. I mean, have you seen a mace? It’s a stick with a knob on the end. Kinda looks like a dick. Ethelred, who is drunk-ish, gets tired of asking politely "to be let in" and raises his dick-like weapon to beat in the door. No, that's not rape-y AT ALL.

To help you draw parallels between the story Mad Trist and House of Usher, note that Poe has a tempest (the weather) going on in both Mad Trist and in House of Usher. You're supposed to be connecting the two, in your mind, you are.

33 At the termination of this sentence I started, and for a moment, paused; for it appeared to me (although I at once concluded that my excited fancy had deceived me)--it appeared to me that, from some very remote portion of the mansion, there came, indistinctly, to my ears, what might have been, in its exact similarity of character, the echo (but a stifled and dull one certainly) of the very cracking and ripping sound which Sir Launcelot had so particularly described. It was, beyond doubt, the coincidence alone which had arrested my attention; for, amid the rattling of the sashes of the casements, and the ordinary commingled noises of the still increasing storm, the sound, in itself, had nothing, surely, which should have interested or disturbed me. I continued the story:

RFM 33: I paused here in my reading because I thought I heard a cracking and ripping sound (like was in the story I was reading) but totally it was the rattling of the windows, I’m sure. Totally. I went back to reading aloud.

Oh, narrator! You keep trying to look for reasonable explanations to stuff. It's cute how hard you try. Here, you think the SUSPICIOUSLY TIMED CRACKING AND RIPPING SOUND is the windows rattling in the storm and not, for example, anything creepy that might be going on down in the vault.

Poor Bastard, we can now tell that the Literary Technique I spoke to you of back in the discussion of P29 is Parallel Structure on the macro scale. (Parallel structure on a sentence-level scale is having items in a series all match. This isn't that. This is macro-scale parallel structure -- the events in our pretend story Mad Trist are going to match up, piece by piece, with the events in our real story House of Usher.) Our man Poe is going to use the narrative Mad Trist to develop the rising action in House of Usher -- stuff is going to happen in Mad Trist as our narrator reads it to us, and then it's going to happen in a similar way in House of Usher where our narrator, swimming deep in a river in Egypt, is going to react to it with less and less successful attempts to “reason” it away.

(I am here employing my predictive skills vis a vis this story. Part of engaging with literature is trying to figure out how the story comes out. Like, you're supposed to read along and try to guess what's going to happen. Persons who play literature think this is a good idea, but I have found from personal experience that if you pull this shit while your mother is reading aloud to you The Swiss Family Robinson, you will never get another book read aloud to you by your mother. If you again do it about a third of the way through the movie version of A Tale of Two Cities, your mother will TURN OFF THE MOVIE and pout at you, visibly, for a week. So, benefit from my hard-learned lessons. If predicting the story outcome is a skillset of yours, do not share it with other people except for the purposes of Interpreting Literature.)

34 "But the good champion Ethelred, now entering within the door, was sore enraged and amazed to perceive no signal of the maliceful hermit; but, in the stead thereof, a dragon of a scaly and prodigious demeanour, and of a fiery tongue, which sate in guard before a palace of gold, with a floor of silver; and upon the wall there hung a shield of shining brass with this legend enwritten--

Who entereth herein, a conquerer hath bin; Who slayeth the dragon, the shield he shall win;

and Ethelred uplifted his mace, and struck upon the head of the dragon, which fell before him, and gave up his pesty breath, with a shriek so horrid and harsh, and withal so piercing, that Ethelred had fain to close his ears with his hands against the dreadful noise of it, the like whereof was never before heard."

RFM 34: Ethelred goes into the hermit's house, where there is no hermit but a DRAGON that's guarding a palace of gold with a floor of silver. There's a shield on the wall, too, a prize for whoever kills the dragon. Ethelred whacks the dragon on the head with his mace and the dragon dies with a horrible sound.

I think it's funny that Ethelred has to put his hands over his ears against the sound of the dragon dying. I also think it's funny that he broke down the door expecting a hermit and got a dragon instead. Probably I am doing this wrong and amusement is not the correct response at this juncture. Oh, well.

People interested in literaryness can look at things like "gold palace" and "silver floor" and how they harken back to the copper-n-iron of the vault in which Madeline was stowed. Is Madeline the dragon? Is Roderick Ethelred? What about the shield?

35 Here again I paused abruptly, and now with a feeling of wild amazement--for there could be no doubt whatever that, in this instance, I did actually hear (although from what direction it proceeded I found it impossible to say) a low and apparently distant, but harsh, protracted, and most unusual screaming or grating sound--the exact counterpart of what my fancy had already conjured up for the dragon's unnatural shriek as described by the romancer.

RFM 35: I paused again, this time because I really did hear a distant, harsh, protracted screaming OR GRATING sound, just the kind of sound I'd imagined the dragon had made as it died.

Our narrator here has given up on reason and Explaining Away The Creepy. He is all "there could be no doubt whatever" and "I did actually hear..." and I find this kind of refreshing. Note that the sounds our narrator is hearing are described as "apparently distant" and that he doesn't know what direction they are coming from. That's true here, in p35 and also p33 for the first one, which is described as coming from "some very remote portion of the mansion" and being a "stifled and dull" sound. I expect (and you, Poor Bastard, should ALSO expect) that the reason these sounds are apparently distant and somewhat muffled is that they are coming from the vault in which Madeline was stowed.

36 Oppressed, as I certainly was, upon the occurrence of the second and most extraordinary coincidence, by a thousand conflicting sensations, in which wonder and extreme terror were predominant, I still retained sufficient presence of mind to avoid exciting, by any observation, the sensitive nervousness of my companion. I was by no means certain that he had noticed the sounds in question; although, assuredly, a strange alteration had, during the last few minutes, taken place in his demeanour. From a position fronting my own, he had gradually brought round his chair, so as to sit with his face to the door of the chamber; and thus I could but partially perceive his features, although I saw that his lips trembled as if he were murmuring inaudibly. His head had dropped upon his breast--yet I knew that he was not asleep, from the wide and rigid opening of the eye as I caught a glance of it in profile. The motion of his body, too, was at variance with this idea--for he rocked from side to side with a gentle yet constant and uniform sway. Having rapidly taken notice of all this, I resumed the narrative of Sir Launcelot, which thus proceeded:

RFM 36: This second sound-effect coincidence weirded me out a lot but I kept cool so Roderick wouldn't notice. I don't think he was hearing the sounds but he'd... gotten worse while I was reading. He'd turned his chair to face the bedroom door and was staring at it while rocking back and forth and mumbling to himself. I kept reading.

Our narrator has boarded the creep-train and it's leaving the station. Hooray! Roderick, for his part, has gone nearly cataleptic what with the mumbling, rocking, and staring. Smart money says Roderick knows something is up even if our narrator is still hoping Roderick hasn't noticed the alarmingly coincidental sound effects.

37"And now, the champion, having escaped from the terrible fury of the dragon, bethinking himself of the brazen shield, and of the breaking up of the enchantment which was upon it, removed the carcass from out of the way before him, and approached valorously over the silver pavement of the castle to where the shield was upon the wall; which in sooth tarried not for his full coming, but fell down at his feet upon the silver floor, with a mighty great and terrible ringing sound."

RFM 37: Ethelred shoved the dead dragon out of the way and bestrode his bad self over to the shield, which fell off the wall to land, ringing loudly, at his feet right when he got there because his manly heroicness was so awesome even a brass shield could see it.

I am exaggerating for effect a little. It is not much of a stretch to make "approached valorously" into "bestrode his bad self" but probably I did cross a line of some sort by mocking how the brass shield fell to the floor at his approach. I don't have a whole lot more to add here besides the mockery, sorry.

38 No sooner had these syllables passed my lips, than--as if a shield of brass had indeed, at the moment, fallen heavily upon a floor of silver–I became aware of a distinct, hollow, metallic, and clangorous, yet apparently muffled reverberation. Completely unnerved, I leaped to my feet; but the measured rocking movement of Usher was undisturbed. I rushed to the chair in which he sat. His eyes were bent fixedly before him, and throughout his whole countenance there reigned a stony rigidity. But, as I placed my hand upon his shoulder, there came a strong shudder over his whole person; a sickly smile quivered about his lips; and I saw that he spoke in a low, hurried, and gibbering murmur, as if unconscious of my presence. Bending closely over him, I at length drank in the hideous import of his words.

RFM 38: As I read about the shield clanging to the floor, I heard a clangy noise in the house. I startled, but Roderick kept rocking like he didn’t notice so I went to check him out. He was kinda rigid and staring, mumbling steadily like he didn’t know I was there. I leaned over and listened to what he was saying.

Again, not much for me to add. We’re getting down to the wire here and the story is moving along pretty nicely.

39 “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 footsteps 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!”

RFM 39: Roderick says, “I’ve spent days listening to my not-dead sister struggle to get out of the tomb. You know my hearing is really good, right? Dude, we stuck her in there while she was still alive and I couldn’t say it, couldn’t admit it, and it’s been days. DAYS. Then tonight you started reading the damn Ethelred story and the sounds… the hermit’s door, death of the dragon, and clanging shield were REALLY the sounds of her breaking her coffin, opening the vault door, and struggling out of the vault. And now she’s coming up the stairs. She’s coming to get me for putting her there, for LEAVING her there – I can hear her heart! Jesus Fuck, she’s right outside the door!”

I should not have to point this out, but Poor Bastard, Roderick is losing his shit. Recall way back in P11, Roderick says “In this unnerved—in this pitiable condition—I feel that the period will sooner or later arrive when I must abandon life and reason together, in some struggle with the grim phantasm, FEAR.” Remember that? That paragraph where Roderick tells us THREE TIMES that he’s going to die of fear? Right. And Roderick also helpfully told us that it wasn’t going to take a whole lot to tip him over the edge. Even the most trivial incident, remember, would be enough to send him to his maker. So, y'know, his not-dead sister breaking out of the vault he stuffed her in, after a he’s spent a good week of listening to her working at it, and coming up the stairs to confront him about why he stuck her in there when she wasn’t REALLY dead… that might be enough to set Roderick off, right? That kind of shit would probably upset even a fairly-stable person, so I’m betting it can do for Roderick, too.

And here we get more grist for the mill of incest – if Roderick could HEAR his not-dead sister being all not-dead down in the coffin for a week, why the hell didn’t he grab the narrator and hustle down there to let her out? Shit, I’m pretty sure a "Wow, sis, sorry about that! We thought you were a goner. Our bad.” would have covered it, unless SOMETHING ELSE was going on. Maybe Roderick didn’t want her around anymore. Maybe Madeline was pregnant. I got fuck-all for that but I do think it’s sort of strange that Roderick could HEAR Madeline down there (and he could, he told us so) and didn’t try to get her back out, so…

40 As if in the superhuman energy of his utterance there had been found the potency of a spell–the huge antique panels to which the speaker pointed, threw slowly back, upon the instant, their ponderous and ebony jaws. It was the work of the rushing gust–but then without those doors there DID stand the lofty and enshrouded figure of the lady Madeline of Usher. There was blood upon her white robes, and the evidence of some bitter struggle upon every portion of her emaciated frame. For a moment she remained trembling and reeling to and fro upon the threshold,–then, with a low moaning cry, fell heavily inward upon the person of her brother, and in her violent and now final death-agonies, bore him to the floor a corpse, and a victim to the terrors he had anticipated.

RFM 40: At that point, the doors blew open (from the wind) to reveal the Lady Madeline standing there in white, bloodied up from her struggles to get out of the coffin and vault. She stood there a bit, shaking, then fell (while dying) inward onto Roderick. They both hit the floor dead, Roderick having died of fright like he told us he would.

You have to ask yourself, here, why the Lady Madeline is wearing white. I mean, she’s come back FROM THE GRAVE (or at least from a coffin and vault) and I hardly think the most remarkable thing about her is her fucking burial shroud. I mean, come on. Our Corpse be walkin’ and Poe wants to talk about her clothes? Seriously? My personal explanation for the white robes is so that the blood will show up better. :)

The house has doors that Poe calls “ponderous and ebony jaws,” an image that reinforces it as a living thing (it also has window-eyes, remember) with malicious intent. Oh, and the wind, apparently, has a sense of narrative drama because it picked the perfect moment to blow the doors open.

41 From that chamber, and from that mansion, I fled aghast. The storm was still abroad in all its wrath as I found myself crossing the old causeway. Suddenly there shot along the path a wild light, and I turned to see whence a gleam so unusual could have issued; for the vast house and its shadows were alone behind me. The radiance was that of the full, setting, and blood-red moon which now shone vividly through that once barely-discernible fissure of which I have before spoken as extending from the roof of the building, in a zigzag direction, to the base. While I gazed, this fissure rapidly widened–there came a fierce breath of the whirlwind–the entire orb of the satellite burst at once upon my sight–my brain reeled as I saw the mighty walls rushing asunder–there was a long tumultuous shouting sound like the voice of a thousand waters–and the deep and dank tarn at my feet closed sullenly and silently over the fragments of the “House of Usher”.

RFM 41: After all that, I left, in the middle of the storm. As I was going across the causeway, a light shot out and lit up the previously barely-perceptible fissure in the house, which widened and grew until the whole house collapsed into the pond, thus ending the House of Usher.

The language here is pretty impressive. Wild light, vivid moon, fierce breath of the whirlwind, mighty walls rushing asunder, tumultuous shouting, voice of a thousand waters. Wow. If this story were a piece of music, this part would have both kettle drums and cymbals. But, it’s writing and all we get are symbols.

*sigh*

And then the pond water closes sullenly and silently over the whole affair, kind of a little death there at the end.

Question for the reader: Did the house commit suicide once the Ushers who inhabited it were all dead? Did the narrator think to grab his horse as he fled aghast, or did he leave it behind? Were the stables affected in the collapse? INQUIRING MINDS WANT TO KNOW!

I’d like to thank all of you Poor Bastards who stuck with this to the end. :)

Poe’s honestly a pretty decent writer and he more or less Wrote The Book on Gothic horror. He’s an exemplar for students learning about how stories are told because he writes with lots of things for a student to see and they are not typically too subtle for students to catch. As with this tale, even people who are just beginning to play Spot The Foreshadowing can usually tell where Poe is going before he gets there, especially with a little help from a textbook or instructor.

Anyway, it’s been fun. If you liked this Poe story, you might try The Cask of Amontillado, The Pit and the Pendulum, or The Tell-Tale Heart, which are some of his other efforts.