The Rat In The Walls Analysis

Frankenstein written by Marry Shelly follows the story of Victor Frankenstein and the consequences he faces after creating a terrible monster. “The Rats in the Walls” a short story written by H.P. Lovecraft the Narrator discovers the horrifying secret city under his family home. These works are both classified as gothic literature following many reoccurring themes from the genre. Secrets and madness are seen throughout both Frankenstein and “The Rats in the Walls”. Frankenstein after creating his monster tells no one out of fear of being seen as mad. Even when he knows the true killer of his brother Frankenstein rather have Justine, an innocent women sent to death than reveal his creation, “Thus I might proclaim myself a madman, but not revoke the sentence passed upon my wretched victim” (P. 60). The Narrator becomes victim of his own family curse hearing imaginary rats in the walls of his home and eventually killing and eating his friend Capt. Norrys when he is lost while exploring the city underneath his home. Eventually the Narrator is found by his companions, “crouching in the blackness over the plump, half eaten body of Capt. Norrys, with my own cat leaping and tearing at my throat”(P.404). The Narrator at long last discovered his family secret only as a
After creating the monster Frankenstein is overcome by terror and fear, “Sometimes my pulse beat so quickly and hardly that I felt the palpitation of every artery”(p. 36). He often becomes ill when faced with tragedy and horror, retreating into himself and into solitude. The Narrator and his companions are horrified by what they discover under his home, “a subterraneous world of limitless mystery and horrible suggestion”(P.401) and “Horror piled on horror as we began to interpret the architectural remain”(P.402). The grotesque monster of Frankenstein’s and the horrible past of the Narrators ancestors result in feeling of terror and