Roderick Usher Supernatural

Most Edgar Allen Poe stories contain a haunting and eerie tone and this short story proves no exception. “The Fall of the House of Usher” revolves around the narrator's childhood friend, Roderick Usher. Roderick suffers from an undisclosed mental illness and Roderick’s sister, Madeline, is near death, when introduced. When Madeline appears to be dead Roderick decides to bury her in an underground vault. The days following this incident Roderick’s normal countenance fades and he goes mad. Afterwards, Madeline escapes from the vault, kills Roderick and the house splits down the middle and sinks into the ground. In Edgar Allen Poe’s, “The Fall of the House of Usher”, various critics argue that the story contains supernatural influences demonstrated
by vampire characteristics which portrays one’s easily deluded mental state, and others see it as conveying fear as a factor that accelerates one’s downfall, the story mainly serves to convey the psychological effects of having a destructive relationship.
Poe demonstrates Roderick’s vampire characteristics through the suggestion that when excluding people from the general population, they become easily deluded to supernatural powers. This postulate is understood through his vividly described sensibilities, his attachment to his house and the house’s human like features.
Roderick Usher suffers “much from a morbid acuteness of the senses; the most insipid food was alone endurable; he could wear only garments of certain texture...” (Poe). Poe clearly depicts Roderick Usher with vampire qualities, and the use of an asyndeton stresses the many health issues that evince his vampirism. Throughout the story there are many other accounts that expresses Roderick’s vampire qualities and how they are affected by his mental state. Because of this situation Roderick remains vulnerable to Madeline’s supernatural influence and the Usher family curse. His inability to handle certain fabrics and his sensibility to light relate to traditional vampire characters. Another characteristic of Usher is “...his unceasingly agitated mind was laboring with some oppressive secret, to divulge which he struggled for the necessary courage” (Poe). This epithet demonstrates how his secret controls his mind, which amplifies the sensitivity of his health and easy deluded manner. There a specific secret that Usher hides from the narrator provides explanation to his odd character and unstable mind. His secret takes control of his character almost driving him to insanity allowing supernatural forces to take over his mind and transform him
with unearthly characteristics. Bailey notes “this sensibility would make Roderick an easy prey to psychic or supernatural influence” (63). Bailey clearly states how Roderick’s situation of never leaving his house has developed his illness and made him prone to attachment to the house, a trait prominent in many vampire situations. The house’s “features of a human head” infers a evil, living spirit of the house holding Roderick down to the house (Bailey 63). As the Usher’s have a long residential past in the house, the house has come to be part of the family, or the family has become part of the house. Roderick also admits to the narrator of his “invisible foe” which the narrator brushes off (Bailey 63). An example of how spirits hold the ability to influence, perhaps possess Roderick. Roderick’s mental state is constantly being challenged through his perception of reality and supernatural forces, his development of sensitivity to certain items, and the overpowering influence of the ancient mansion.