Examples Of Tension In The House Of Usher

“Fear is only as deep as the mind allows” -Japanese Proverb. After dinner was cleaned up I would take garbage outside. Usually, dinner was around the later afternoon or evening time, which means the sky was dark, and being that we lived in a forested area, even darker. Armed with my flashlight, I trudged out the back door around the house and scanned the area with the light in front of me. I had done this same task many times before, yet the sharp silence and shifting shadows that surrounded me built an apprehensive tension. Troubling thoughts suddenly emerged, my imagination running with a tumultuous delirium. I envisioned wolves would appear from the woods behind the house and hunt me down. My rampant thoughts soon incited me to hurry and quickly get back inside the house. Rushing to the trash cans I opened one with great haste. I dropped the bag into it, shutting it just as quickly as I had opened it. Promptly, I started
The imagination, ultimately, creates fear and tension and opens the way for a rational mindset’s downfall and eventually instills a panicked approach to a situation. In Edgar Allen Poe’s gothic story The Fall of the House of Usher, Usher permits his mind to ramble uncontrollably and unconstrained. Because of this, he perceives that Lady Madeline, his sister and twin, is dead and proceeds to bury her body. He knows fully well about her cataleptic condition and, when in this state, she might appear to be dead. He allows his imagination wander rather than rationally focusing his thoughts, looking for evidence, or finding a valid conclusion. “One evening, having informed me abruptly that the lady Madeline was no more, he stated his intention of preserving her corpse...)” (P 27) . Similar to me, Usher allowed his imagination get the best of him, and did actions that he most likely wouldn’t have done otherwise. These two portrayals provide the