Isolation and melancholy in four of Poe’s works Johan Wrangö EN3300 – English as a World Language Spring term 2008 School of Human Sciences… [619919]

C-level Essay

Poe’s Gothic Protagonist
Isolation and melancholy in four of Poe’s works

Johan Wrangö

EN3300 – English as a World
Language
Spring term 2008
School of Human Sciences Supervisor:
Anna Greek
Examiner:
Johan Höglund

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Table of Contents
Introduction ……………………………….. …………………………………………… ……………………………………. 3
Background …………………………………. …………………………………………… …………………………………… 5
Poe’s narrative style ……………………….. …………………………………………… ………………………………. 5
Melancholy …………………………………. …………………………………………… …………………………………. 6
Melancholy and Romanticism …………………… …………………………………………… ……………………… 7
Isolation ………………………………….. …………………………………………… …………………………………….. 8
The Reinvention of the Gothic ………………… …………………………………………… ……………………….. 8
The Analysis of the four works ……………….. …………………………………………… ………………………. 10
“The Raven” ………………………………… …………………………………………… ………………………………. 10
“The Fall of the House of Usher” ……………… …………………………………………… …………………….. 12
“Ligeia” …………………………………… …………………………………………… ………………………………….. 15
“Berenice” …………………………………. …………………………………………… ………………………………… 17
Conclusion …………………………………. …………………………………………… …………………………………… 21
Works cited ………………………………… …………………………………………… ………………………………….. 24

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Introduction
The way out of the prison of melancholy coincides w ith the actual creative process; the
creation of the work of art becomes synonymous with the (re-)creation of the self after the
encounter with the innermost chaos of the soul (Esp en Hammer). 1
In this study, I will analyse the male characters i n four important works by Edgar Allan Poe. Poe
is considered the inventor of the detective, scienc e fiction and Gothic horror genres in English
(Magistrale and Poger 1). However, this study will exclusively deal with the latter. The works I
have selected are one poem, “The Raven”, and three short stories, “The Fall of the House of
Usher”, “Ligeia” and “Berenice”. These texts were c hosen because they are some of Poe’s most
famous works and they are all tales of Gothic horro r. Furthermore, they feature the motifs of
isolation and melancholy which are frequent in most of Poe’s fiction. The primary objective with
this study is to compare how the protagonists of th e chosen literature relate to these motifs.
Edgar Allan Poe (1809 – 1849) was an American autho r of Gothic Romances. During his
lifetime, Poe published 50 poems and over 60 short stories and he is now one of the most famous
authors in the American history of literature (Magi strale and Poger 1). Poe was an alcoholic ever
since he was an adolescent and studied at the Unive rsity of Virginia (Reidhead 694). Since his
poems gave no profit, he turned in 1933 to writing novellas. By copying the styles of the popular
tastes at the time, Poe learned how to write, and e ventually how to improve the Gothic short
story, giving it his own style (Davidson 136-37).
“Berenice” is one of Poe’s most violent short stori es and it was first published in 1835. It
was also featured in the collection “Tales of the G rotesque and Arabesque” , published in 1840. In
1838, shortly after having moved to Philadelphia wi th his wife, Poe wrote the novella “Ligeia”.
His first steady job was as a co-editor at Burton’s Gentleman’s Magazine where he published the
short story “The Fall of the House of Usher” (1839) . In his life, Poe never achieved full reco-
gnition as a writer, but “The Raven” (1845) was the poem which established his literary career in
New York. The success of the poem also contributed to his job as a chief reviewer for the
Broadway Journal . In spite of this, although Poe worked 14-hour day s in that year of 1845, he
still struggled to make a living (Reidhead 695). Ed gar Allan Poe died four years later on October

1 This is my translation. The original in Swedish re ads: /uni201FVägen ut ur melankolins fängelse sammanfaller med s jälva
skapelseprocessen; skapandet av verket blir synonym t med (åter-)skapandet av självet efter mötet med
själens yttersta kaos”

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the 7th, 1849. It has been speculated that he died from alcohol poisoning, diabetes or rabies
(Magistrale and Poger i), and the possibility that he died of “congestion of the brain” has also
been suggested (Reidhead 695).
This paper will argue that there are similarities b etween “The Raven”, “The Fall of the
House of Usher”, “Ligeia” and “Berenice” in their t reatment of the common motifs of isolation
and melancholy, and, furthermore, that their protag onists are similar due to their relation to these
two motifs. The paper will also argue that the usag e of the motif of isolation is a strategic way for
the author to emphasise the Gothic horror. In order to support my argument, I will, firstly,
provide an outline of how melancholy, isolation an d the Gothic were understood in the nine-
teenth century. Secondly, I will demonstrate ways i n which the works are similar. By comparing
the characters’ personalities and behaviour to each other, I will illustrate how melancholy and
isolation are represented in similar ways in the wo rks of this study. Thirdly, I will show how the
motif of isolation reinforces the Gothic.

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Background
This chapter will deal with the motifs of isolation , melancholy and Poe’s reinvention of the
Gothic. It will also shed light on some of Poe’s id eas and how he composed his tales.
Poe’s narrative style
Although Edgar Allan Poe did not invent the Gothic Romance he did, however, make significant
contributions to the genre, thereby enhancing its d evelopment. He believed that a good narrative
needs a dénouement – a point where the story climaxes and some form of conclusion is reached
through a revelation of a crucial component of the tale. In “The Philosophy of Composition”, Poe
argues that with the dénouement in mind, the incidents of a narrative can be struc tured to unfold
in a way which will keep the reader in constant sus pense (Reidhead 749). Moreover, Poe was
convinced that “psychological truth” could be found through phantasmagoria, or specifically, the
ever-changing illusions and deceptive apparitions w ithin dreams (Magistrale and Poger 12). In
his fiction, the boundaries between the dream and t he real are blurred. That is to say, there is an
uncertainty in every event as to whether or not it is actually happening. According to Davidson,
“we can see the split in Poe’s imaginative world: t here [are] elements of reality, and there [are]
faculties of the mind or imagination. Between them there ought to be a union or a point of
coherence” (92). Thus, the symbols within Poe’s fic tion could be what unify the two extremes:
the bird in “The Raven”, the castle in “The Fall of the House o f Usher”, the teeth in “Berenice”,
and the chamber with its phantasmagorical elements in “Ligeia” (92).
Poe was convinced that “beauty” is the essence of p oetry. In The Philosophy of Comp-
osition he states that in a poem, no topic should surpass beauty (Reidhead 751). Nevertheless,
melancholy can be the most beneficial topic when it has to do with the infinite sorrow of lost
beauty. The development within Poe’s fiction surrou nds the characters’ troubled minds and their
motivations. Hence, the action within Poe’s tales t ranspires more on the psychological level than
on the physical level (Magistrale and Poger 14). As they write:
When we turn to Poe’s fiction, … it is not merely t he sadness of lost love or the abrupt
transition from or to a visionary landscape that in spires [Poe’s] deepest contemplation,
but the complex spectrum of aberrant psychological motivation—ranging from sadomas-
ochistic representations and object fixations to de lusions of grandeur and the perversity of
self-loathing. (12)

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Generally, in Poe’s fiction, there is a troubled ma le protagonist with a devious plan. The main
character is either a recluse or in some way trappe d within a confined space. For instance, in “The
Raven” and “Ligeia” the protagonists dwell inside c hambers isolated from reality and normal
social interaction, mourning the women they have lo st. As Magistrale and Frank explain, “[Poe’s]
characters develop peculiar missions or secret sche mes to escape the imprisoning realities of time
and space” (3). They strive to take revenge on or t o escape a person or an object, and when the
revenge or the escape has been fulfilled they imagine that they will acqu ire redemption which
will free them from the real or imagined isolation (Magistrale and Poger 15-16). Incidentally,
most horror events in Poe’s fiction take place at m idnight which is a fixed moment in time when
it is neither still yesterday nor yet tomorrow (Mag istrale and Poger 16). Specifically, “most acts
of criminality in Poe’s microcosm occur precisely a t midnight. [Poe’s protagonists] are
momentarily free to indulge their basest instincts, to act as though they were agents ungoverned
by forces outside themselves – society, ethics, eve n time itself” (ibid.). However, in almost every
case the protagonist is not actually liberated by h is actions. On the contrary, he gets caught,
passes away or has a full schizophrenic breakdown ( ibid.). For example, in “Berenice” the
protagonist is presumably apprehended and in “The F all of the House of Usher” the protagonist
dies when the house collapses on him and his twin s ister.
Melancholy
Melancholy is the classical term, used by Poe and h is contemporaries, for what is now under-
stood as various forms of clinical depression. It i s important to realize that the term melancholy
had no scientifically founded description and was n ot a clearly defined diagnosis before psycho-
analysis which was introduced in the 1900s (Hammer 37). The word melancholy is made up of
two parts, melas (black) and kholé (bile). According to the Greek physician, Hippocra tes, the
body contained four types of fluids: blood, phlegm, black and yellow bile. An imbalance in any
of these substances would lead to changes in a pers on’s temper or even to illness. Melancholy
was believed to occur when the spleen malfunctioned and produced an excess of black bile. By
this token, black was believed to be the colour of danger, madness and the uncontrollable; the
black bile would render its victim senseless and il l (Hammer 38-40).
According to Hammer, melancholy was believed to be a disease of the intelligent. For
instance, many superior ancient philosophers are de scribed as having been melancholic – the

J.W. 7
ailment was seen as bringing out exceptional sides in them (43). Having said that, not all
melancholic people were actually superior, but geni uses were often described as melancholic.
In the nineteenth century, people who were sufferi ng from melancholy were doomed to
living in despair and anxiety for a very long time – even for their entire lives (Hammer 42). A
melancholic person experiences a world with dull co lours and lack of motivation and strength. To
him or her, everything has lost its meaning and, us ually, a victim of melancholy has no way of
explaining why s/he is morose (ibid.). Melancholy i s just something the victim endures without
any particular aggravation towards it; due to this, melancholy is often considered as a state of
mind or a mood (ibid.). By association, the word me lancholic can also be used to describe
physical as well as abstract objects, for instance: a work of art, a house, a tree and a piece of
music, et cetera (ibid.).
In addition to the nineteenth psychological explana tions for melancholy, other reasons
may be too much contemplation, sloth and rest. Acco rding to Hammer, “Nothing causes melan-
choly quicker, increases it and represses it more t han passiveness” 2 (53). But as Hammer argues,
it seems more plausible that passive behaviour was seen as a symptom of melancholy rather than
a cause for it (54). There were many other characte ristics regarded as symptoms of the melan-
cholic person including egocentricity, paranoia, cr uelty and bitterness (Hammer 49). Yet another
symptom, which could have been mistaken for a cause , was that a victim of melancholy tended to
become obsessed with something s/he had lost (Hamme r 54). The melancholic person was unable
to let go and would therefore become immersed in so mething which may happened long ago
(ibid.).
Melancholy and Romanticism
Romanticism is quite intricate and difficult to def ine. It has evolved with the Gothic revolution
from the middle of the 1700s (Magistrale and Poger 11). At the end of the 1700s, it was not the
intellect but the emotions of the human being which were seen as essential (Hammer 65). The
romantics, especially in Germany, were concerned wi th loneliness, suffering, sorrow, desperation
and sensitivity (ibid.). Furthermore, the style of literature was concerned with the finding of the
truth and beauty of the soul. Magistrale and Poger explain that romantic poetry “was an art of
inner feeling, leading in turn to a yearning for th e infinite [and] it was attracted to subjectivity

2 This is my translation. The original in Swedish re ads: “Inget väcker melankolin snabbare, ökar den oc h förtränger
den mer, än sysslolöshet”

J.W. 8
and the unconscious, mystery, and the imagination” (11). The melancholic poet could bring out
beauty in that which was dreary and sad (Hammer 65) . Consequently, a poet, or an artist, was
engaged in the most melancholy of activities becaus e artistic creation required them to deal with
overwhelming emotions (Hammer 65-66).
Romanticism also tried to understand the contradict ions of human nature and wanted to
unite the normal with the abnormal, the real with t he unreal, the ugly with the beautiful and so
forth (Magistrale and Poger 11). According to Magis trale and Poger, due to these dualisms the
fiction contained elements of tranquillity and wond er as well as agitation and horror (11). In
addition, Romanticism dealt with the search for inn er peace and the sorrow over lost beauty
(Magistrale and Poger 12).
Isolation
In The Philosophy of Composition , Poe writes about “the close circumscription of sp ace” for
example the state of being trapped within a confine d space (Reinhead 754). Poe was convinced
that isolation was necessary in a Gothic tale. Ther efore, the protagonists in Poe’s fiction “cannot
and do not subsist outside the physical spheres in which they dwell” (Magistrale and Poger 15).
Consequently, the plot of Poe’s fiction usually onl y takes place within designated locations, for
instance a house, a chamber, a library or any enclo sed space. However, the protagonists are not
merely physically restricted to a confined space, b ut are also socially and psychologically
detached from reality (Hammer 23). Poe believed, in terms of symbolism, that settings which iso-
lated the main character “intensified the Gothic’s configuration that linked personality and place,
supplying examples of confined and subterraneous im agery with a psychodynamic correspon-
dence to his male characters” (Magistrale and Poger 15). That is to say, the protagonists’
thoughts as well as his actions are represented as enclosed in his immediate environment.
The Reinvention of the Gothic
Before Poe’s time, the Gothic horror genre (hencefo rth referred to only as “the Gothic”) was
approximately half a century old; basically, it had almost been rendered obsolete and was scorned
(Magistrale and Poger 13). But, as Magistrale and P oger point out, “[one of] the most distin-
guishing features of the Gothic has always been its resiliency” (13). In the Gothic tradition, there
was often an invitation to psychological fear. As M agistrale and Poger describe it,

J.W. 9
The Gothic has always inspired fear and desire at t he same time: fear of and a desire for
Otherness, fear of and a desire for that which we f ind most repulsive, fear of and a desire
for the latent perversity that lurks within us all. (34)
That is to say, the tales were created not only to scare, but also to make the readers afraid of
themselves (Voller 341).
When Poe reinvented the Gothic in the nineteenth ce ntury, he made use of the traditional
themes and features but added a more profound psych ological perspective to the genre
(Magistrale and Poger 13). By incorporating this ne w approach, the characters in his fiction show
tendencies towards sadomasochism, obsession, delusi on and self-loathing. Actually, Poe called it
“the perverse”, that is “the human propensity for s elf-destruction, [and] for doing those things
which are neither healthy nor socially acceptable” (Magistrale and Poger 2). Interestingly, in
Poe’s Gothic tales, the reader can detect that the protagonist’s lunacy supersedes his affinity for
sin, and that the crimes committed are merely ways for the protagonist to rid himself of the
obsession. Before an act of perversity (in Poe’s se nse of the word), the protagonist reflects upon
his action and there is a balance of restraint and self-indulgence (Magistrale and Poger 19). In the
Gothic tradition, these contradictions of schizophr enic minds are typical. In Poe’s fiction, the
deliberation that takes place within the protagonis t’s split mind is ever-present. Thus, Poe
increased the intensity of horror in his narratives , and caused the genre to progress (ibid.). Poe
also made use of other Gothic paraphernalia such as haunted mansions, apparitions and the living
dead (Magistrale and Poger 13). A significant chara cteristic of the Gothic tradition was the male
antagonist. The antagonists were usually asocial an d sexist men with split personalities.
However, as Poe shifted the narrative’s perspective to the first person, a strange intimacy was
developed between character and the reader (Magistr ale and Poger 14-58): “Poe was the first
writer to press the relationship between monster or criminal and the reader to the point where it
came simultaneously unbearable and pleasurable” (Ma gistrale and Poger 14).

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The Analysis of the four works
In this section, the works “The Raven”, “The Fall o f the House of Usher”, “Ligeia” and
“Berenice” will be analysed and discussed under sep erate headings. The focus will be on iso-
lation and melancholy; however, each work will be i ntroduced with a few notes on the aspects of
Poe’s writing that are most applicable to the respe ctive tale.
“The Raven”
According to Poe, while passion and truth are more suitable topics in prose, beauty is the most
beneficial one in poetry (Reidhead 751). Of course, both passion and truth may be used to aid the
plot, but their involvement should not surpass beau ty, as it is the essence of the poem (ibid.).
Beauty is “the excitement, or pleasurable elevation , of the soul” (ibid.). Being a true Romantic
author, Poe also knew that beauty was closely linke d with eternal sorrow (Magistrale and Poger
12). Thus, melancholy can be the most poetical topi c if it has to do with the death of a beautiful
woman as in “The Raven” (ibid.). To accentuate the tone of beauty in the poem, the protagonist’s
room is decorated as from the 1840s, with lustrous curtains and elegant cushions (Davidson 86).
The white sculpture above the chamber door portrays Athena (the goddess of wisdom). The
narrator of “The Raven” is actually the protagonist himself. The first-person narrative derives
from the Gothic tradition and is very common in Poe ’s fiction (Magistrale and Poger 14). The
plot of the poem takes place at midnight.
The protagonist (a young student) has resorted to i solation after the death of his lover,
Lenore. Evidently, he has not yet been able to recu perate from the shock of her demise. The
student has to endure the grief in his chamber whic h is filled with memories of her. The setting
for “The Raven” is intentional as Poe thought confi nement was necessary to focus a Gothic
horror story. Hence, the protagonist in “The Raven” is secluded with no connection to the outside
world or any human interaction. Throughout the poem , he never once tries to leave the room;
instead the protagonist is trying to escape his psy chological imprisonment (Magistrale and Poger
15).
In the beginning of the poem, it becomes clear that the protagonist is tired after having
pondered the contents of his book and he is driftin g in and out of sleep. Thus, the potential for
phantasmagoria is imminent. Also, he dwells upon th e thought of his lost lover which has died
some unknown time ago. According to Hammer, the beh aviour of contemplating and resting are
signs of melancholy (53). Melancholy tended to make the victim unable to sustain the conception

J.W. 11
of time. Specifically, the victim does not care – o r does not know – what day or year it is. The
yearning is constant and the victim cannot let go o f the grief for what s/he has lost. In one
passage of the poem, the protagonist wants to try a nd forget with a drug, called “Nepenthe”, that
causes oblivion:
Respite—respite and Nepenthe from thy memories of L enore!
Let me quaff this kind Nepenthe and forget this los t Lenore!
(“The Raven” 700)
In the poem, the student is suddenly aware of rappi ng noises coming from the door and later the
window pane. As the student explores the rapping so unds, he is once again reminded of his lover
as the quote suggests:
But the silence was unbroken, and the darkness gave no token,
And the only word there spoken was the whispered wo rd, “Lenore!”
(“The Raven” 698)
As Hammer argues, a melancholic person becomes egoc entric and obsessed with the past as the
protagonist in this poem (54). At first, when the r aven enters from the window and perches upon
the sculpture above his chamber door, he believes t he bird to be his lover’s embodied spirit.
However, he quickly dismisses it for the notion tha t the raven might be an omen sent from an
underworld called “Plutonian”, and he wants to know its name (Davidson 87). Davidson argues
that, at this time, the protagonist has difficulty in distinguishing the real from the unreal because
he fails to exercise precaution (ibid.). At first h e was extremely frightened, but now he finds the
raven amusing:
Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance i t wore,
“Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,” I said, “art sure no craven,
Ghastly grim and ancient raven wandering from th e Nightly shore—
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night’s Plut onian shore!”
Quoth the raven “Nevermore” (“The Raven” 699)
The stanza marks the end of the first half of the p oem. Subsequently, the protagonist seems to get
more disoriented and his obsession grows even stron ger. According to Davidson, the raven’s

J.W. 12
constant reply of the word “nevermore” will eventua lly draw him further away from reality and
the melancholy will suppress his common sense:
The questions which the student asks and the one-wo rd answer he receives are not “real”
at all, that is, they are not voiced; they are elem ents in an interior psychic debate going
forward in the young man’s mind. What the Raven rep lies is merely what the student
himself wants to hear, must hear as more and more h e enters the dark, subliminal regions
of his melancholy. (88)
In effect, the protagonist is letting the melanchol y take over his mind. The student thinks he is
asking the raven if there is a cure for his agony a nd if there is life after death, but he is actually
speaking to himself (ibid.). In nineteenth century beliefs, melancholy often lead to despair and
misery; and in Poe’s fiction, there is a constant b alancing of restraint and self-indulgence within
the protagonist’s psyche (Hammer 42; Magistrale and Poger 19). Consequently, the lack of
restraint has led the protagonist down the path of insanity (Davidson 88). He has lost the
conception of reality and the more he asks the more distant he gets. According to Hammer, in the
mind of a melancholic time has been forever fixed o n the event or person (54). In the end of “The
Raven”, there is a moment in the last stanza when t he student’s madness is inevitable and when
he realizes that he will never be rid of his obsess ion (Davidson 89):
And the raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;
And his eyes have the seeming of a demon that is dreaming,
And the lamp-light o’er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted—nevermore! (“The Raven” 700)
“The Fall of the House of Usher”
A significant issue of romantic symbolism is: “what is the relation between reality and the mind’s
ideas about reality?” (Davidson 90). In the ninetee nth century, this was a central question. Nature
and mind may interact but they may also be separate d (ibid.). There is a difference between
consciously trying to understand the world, and usi ng the imagination to see it (ibid.).

J.W. 13
So long as the response between reality and imagina tion, on the one hand, and that betwe-
en the mind and imagination, on the other, could be maintained, the romantic artist found
expressive means of rendering ideas and experience in vivid, determinable ways. (ibid.)
In the novella “The Fall of the House of Usher”, th ere is a passage where the narrator believes the
house and its immediate vicinity are separated from the rest of the world because of its frighten-
ing appearance. At this point, it should be emphasi sed that the word “house” can also denote
“family”, thus suggesting from the outset a connect ion between the decaying building and the
degenerate family. The narrator says, “shaking off from my spirit what must have been a dream, I
scanned more narrowly the real aspect of the buildi ng” (“House of Usher” 715). Overgrown with
minute fungi, the ancient, decaying house of Gothic architecture represents the state in which its
proprietor, Roderick Usher, himself is in. “[His] p sychological deterioration, as well as the
dissolution of the Usher lineage is mirrored in the decaying physical structure of the house”
(Magistrale and Poger 15).
As the antagonists of the Gothic tradition, Poe’s characters are asocial human beings and
isolated from the outside world. The Gothic tale of ten takes place within the confines of an
abbey, a chamber, a turret or suchlike. Nonetheless , isolation does not only imply the state of
being trapped in a confined space, but to be social ly and psychologically detached as well
(Hammer 23). Roderick is a recluse who has become v ery agitated and morose and he has
secluded himself in his mansion. He and his twin si ster, Madeline, are the last two heirs to the
Usher’s lineage. Although Roderick is surrounded by people (the narrator, his sister, a doctor and
servants) he is still socially disconnected. Roderi ck never tries to break free of his isolation,
instead he becomes more and more detached from real ity.
The term melancholy can be associated with a perso n’s psyche and with an object or a
place. Romantic authors were aware of the paradoxic al nature of dualism, for instance the
beautiful can only be beautiful because there is ug liness, the good is defined by which is not, and
within the beautiful there is a fragment of the ugl y. The romantics, and especially Poe, were con-
vinced that what is ugly and sad can be beautiful a s well (Magistrale and Poger).
The novella begins when the anonymous narrator appr oaches the house on horseback, and
he is struck by despair at the sight of the melanch oly scenery:
I looked … upon the mere house, and the simple land scape features of the domain—upon
the bleak walls—upon the vacant eye-like windows—up on a few rank sedges—and upon

J.W. 14
a few white trunks of decayed trees—with an utter d epression of soul which I can
compare to no earthly sensation more properly than to the after-dream of the reveller upon
opium—the bitter lapse into common life—the hideous dropping off of the veil. (“House
of Usher” 714)
A person cannot word why s/he is melancholic becaus e it is a psychological state in which the
victim is rendered miserable for no apparent medica l reason. There are no specific features which
can define melancholia; therefore each case is uniq ue. As the family physician’s diagnosis of
Madeline: “a settled apathy, a gradual wasting away of the person, and frequent although
transient affections of a partially cataleptical ch aracter” (“House of Usher” 718). However, there
is often something in the victim’s past which will crop up in melancholy. In Roderick’s own case,
he is deeply concerned with the disease of his sist er, and that is also why the narrator is
summoned to the house. In the short story, the prot agonist (Roderick Usher) is sometimes
referred to as “hypochondriac” by the narrator alth ough he can see a drastic change in his old
friend’s face. According to himself, Roderick is il l but he cannot explain why. He is very
superstitious and agitated, and he first foretells his inevitable death and, shortly after Madeline
dies, her oncoming resurrection. To lift Roderick’s spirits, the narrator and he paint and read
together, but Roderick’s melancholy prevents him fr om living a normal life:
[Roderick] suffered much from a morbid acuteness of the senses; the most insipid food
was alone endurable; he could wear only garments of certain texture; the odors of all
flowers were oppressive; his eyes were tortured by even a faint light; and there were but
peculiar sounds, and these from stringed instrument s, which did not inspire him with
horror. (“House of Usher” 717)
When Roderick’s sister eventually dies he persists they keep her in a tomb in the house’s vault. A
few days after the temporary entombment, they both are aware of noises coming from the tomb
and the narrator is struck with fear. Roderick call s him “madman” although his own illness has
taken a turn for the worse. Earlier, the narrator h ad observed a change in Roderick’s behaviour.
Evidently, the fear caused by his melancholy has po isoned his mind and his detachment from
reality is expanding: “His ordinary occupations wer e neglected or forgotten. He roamed from
chamber to chamber with hurried, unequal and object less step” (“House of Usher” 723). Roderick
and his sister are the last two in the Usher’s line age, thus, at the dénouement when Madeline falls
upon Roderick, the house seems to collapse with the m since the bloodline is forever broken.

J.W. 15
Three main questions are left unanswered in “The Fa ll of the House of Usher”. First of
all, the “cruel” secret between Roderick and Madeli ne is never revealed: “There were times,
indeed, when I thought his unceasingly agitated min d was labouring with some oppressive secret,
to divulge which he struggled for the necessary cou rage” (“House of Usher” 723). Although the
secret are never revealed it suggests that Roderick and Madeline had been intimate. There are
sexual indications hidden within Poe’s Gothic ficti on: “more often than not, Poe combines the
sexual urge with violent energies, so that the two become almost indistinguishable” (Magistrale
and Poger 60). Secondly, the reader can never actua lly be sure whether Madeline – when she is
reanimated – is trying to save or kill Roderick (Ma gistrale and Poger 43). Finally, although the
narrator is successful in his escape from the colla psing house, what is his fate? According to
Magistrale and Poger, the overwhelming powers of th e Gothic tales were either of a sexual or a
psychopathic nature, but in Poe’s fiction these are interchangeable (13).
“Ligeia”
In many of Poe’s works, there are elements that can induce phantasmagoria. For instance, in this
short story the protagonist is addicted to opium, a victim of melancholy and possessed by his lost
wife, Ligeia (which also is the title of the tale). Also, there are physical elements in the turret’s
chamber where the dénouement will take place: on the wall hangs a heavy tapestr y, the ceiling of
oak is arched and decorated with grotesque creature s of the semi-Gothic, and the window is
partially covered by drapery of gold with strange f igures. “These figures partook of the true
character of the Arabesque only when regarded from a single point of view. … The
phantasmagoric effect was vastly heightened by the … strong continual current of wind behind
the draperies” (“Ligeia” 710). Poe knew that a cert ain aspect of truth lay within dreams; therefore
many of his stories do not concern to separate what is real from what is not. Accordingly, in this
short story, the protagonist has difficulty disting uishing between the real and the imagined since
he is under the influence of opium and suffering fr om melancholy. Furthermore, the chamber
with its furniture and decorations contribute to hi s delusion and fuels the imagination.
As in all of Poe’s Gothic tales, there are a certa in state of isolation which forces the
protagonist to face the horror and the psychologica l stress. However, in “Ligeia”, the actual state
of isolation is introduced later into the tale when the protagonist has re-married and is living in a
high turret of an abbey. His sense of abandonment m ade him resort to a remote part of England to
live in this building which bleak and dismal condit ion is mirrored in his melancholy (“Ligeia”

J.W. 16
709). According to Hammer, isolation can symbolize both the physical confinement and the
social detachment of a person (23). Although the pr otagonist is living with his new wife and they
have servants there is no – or very little – human interaction. Furthermore, there is a distance
between the turret and the main part of the convent which also augment the sense of isolation. As
the climax builds up near the end of the novella th e protagonist becomes more and more isolated
and socially detached:
The turret was altogether apart from the portion of the Abbey tenanted by the servants—
there were none within call, and I had no means of summoning them to my aid without
leaving the room for many minutes—and this I could not venture to do. (“Ligeia” 712)
In the beginning of the short story, a considerable number of pages are dedicated to the unnamed
narrator’s description of his dead wife. Apparently , the protagonist cannot recall exactly how or
when they first met, but he remembers every little aspect of her beauty and intelligence. He
mourns her as he illustrates her person with an ext reme sense for detail. For instance, the prota-
gonist states “in beauty of face no maiden ever equ alled her. It was the radiance of an opium
dream—an airy and spirit-lifting vision more wildly divine than the phantasies which hovered
about the slumbering souls of the daughters of Delo s” (“Ligeia” 705). Interestingly, obsession for
something which has been lost is not a cause of mel ancholy, but rather a symptom displayed by
the melancholic person. In other words, a person wo uld not necessary fall victim to melancholy
because of his/her loss, but could begin developing an obsession after the melancholy has set in.
A victim of melancholy does not actually know s/he is melancholic, instead, the person
lives in a bleak condition with low ambition, paran oia, egocentricity and cruelty. Magistrale and
Poger argue that Poe’s characters often want to rev enge or escape a person or an object (15). In
this case, the protagonist actually hates his new w ife as the quote clearly states “I loathed her
with a hatred belonging more to demon than to man” (“Ligeia” 710). His new bride has done
nothing wrong, but his illness is taking hold of hi m. Since he cannot deal with his melancholy it
is allowed to manifest upon his mind. Immediately a fter his statement quoted above, the prota-
gonist is struck with the remembrance of his beauti ful dead woman, as he will be repeatedly
throughout the novella. The protagonist’s mind is f ixed upon Ligeia and the obsession grows
stronger by the day.
In the tale, the protagonist’s new wife, lady Row ena Trevanion of Tremaine, is unhappy
with her husband’s obsession and temper, and she do es no longer love him as much as she did.

J.W. 17
Eventually, she falls ill with an unknown afflictio n (similar to the one of Ligeia). Seemingly, the
protagonist takes care of her and for some time she first recuperates, but then, when she is once
again struck by the illness, it leads to her death. Obviously, the protagonist saw Rowena merely
as an obstacle he had to deal with, and her death d oes not agonize him since “Poe’s compulsive
lovers … always appear to embody sadomasochistic ur ges: they receive a particular admixture of
terror and excitement from … the situation they hav e invariably helped to create (Magistrale and
Poger 17). In the short story, the protagonist is s uddenly aware of noises coming from Rowena’s
death bed. There are minor signs of life on Rowena’ s face, but they always vanish. In Poe’s
fiction, the women resurrect to take revenge on a h usband, a lover or a brother for their faults
(ibid.). Accordingly, in “Ligeia”, the tale takes a turn when finally the protagonist is faced with
what he believes is Rowena:
And now the eyes opened of the figure which stood b efore me. “Here then at least,” I
shrieked aloud, “can I never—can I never be mistake n—these are the full, and the black,
and the wild eyes of the lady—of the lady Ligeia!” (“Ligeia” 714)
“Berenice”
Figuratively, as Poe “revived” the Gothic genre, he changed the narrative’s perspective to the
first-person. In effect, he was able to force the r eader to a more intimate contact with the psyche
of the protagonist. In short stories such as this o ne, the main character acts as an “unintentional”
antagonist. To clarify, Poe’s protagonists may be h omicidal – hence villains – but their intention
is to free themselves from the burden of monomania in any way possible (Magistrale and Poger
15). Moreover, in this Gothic short story, the self -destructive main character is unable to fully
recollect his appalling actions. What is more, in a ccordance with dualism, the protagonists are not
completely vicious; the balance between restraint a nd self-indulgence is constantly in play within
their psyches. However, the protagonist in this tal e differ from the ones in other works analysed
in this study, in the one aspect that he is homicid al. Besides that, he is also an isolated, socially
disturbed victim of melancholy which are the reason s for his pathological obsessiveness. Mono-
mania is the obsession a melancholic person has for a single object. In this case, the protagonist is
obsessing about his dead cousin’s perfect set of te eth.
As in Poe’s other tales, the motif of isolation is omnipresent. If not realized as physical
seclusion, it is certainly always present in the ps ychological and social separation of the chara-
cters. The narrator (and protagonist) of this novel la is named Egæus, and he is living in a dreary

J.W. 18
mansion with his cousin Berenice (as the tale’s tit le). The perspective from which the tale is
written, never allows the reader to lose the sense of isolation, although the protagonist actually
leaves the confines of his home once. Poe believed that the motif of isolation was crucial to the
Gothic tale to maintain suspense and, therefore, th e protagonist does not actually want to leave
his home, but does it unconsciously to violate his cousin’s grave. Egæus was actually born in the
library in which he has spent all of his time ponde ring, day-dreaming and reading obscure Latin
works.
Melancholy is immensely diverse and difficult to de fine since there are no required
factors which have to be present in a victim for th e disease to be manifested. However, sloth, rest
and too much contemplation were factors which would lead to melancholia. According to
Hammer, symptoms of melancholia include idleness, l ack of motivation and malice. In the tale,
Egæus explains that he is addicted to – what he cal ls – “the most intense and painful meditation”
and his description suggests it is a multi-faceted effect of his illness (“Berenice” 146; Hammer):
[I would] muse for long unwearied hours, with my at tention riveted to some frivolous
device on the margin or in the typography of a book ; to become absorbed, for the better
part of a summer’s day, in a quaint shadow falling aslant upon the tapestry or upon the
floor; to lose myself, for an entire night, in watc hing the steady flame of a lamp, … to
dream away whole days over the perfume of a flower; to repeat, monotonously, some
common word, until the sound, by dint of frequent r epetition, ceased to convey any idea,
… to lose all sense of motion or physical existence , by means of absolute bodily quies-
cence”. (“Berenice” 147)
Egæus and Berenice grew up very differently but yet together in the mansion. He quickly became
socially and emotionally detached and ill with an u nknown disease, while she was “agile, grace-
ful, and overflowing with energy, [and] roaming car elessly through life, with no thought of the
shadows in her path or the silent flight of the rav en-winged hours” (“Berenice” 146). Before her
illness Berenice possessed a flawless beauty. Unfor tunately, as the disease got worse her appear-
ance deteriorated; her body and face became unhealt hy, bleak and emaciated. Although Egæus
had never loved Berenice he asked her to marry him because she loved him.
A symptom of melancholia is monomania: the obsessio n over an object or person lost in
time. In most of Poe’s Gothic tales, the protagonis ts believe that only when they are liberated of
the obsession they will be blessed with redemption. Accordingly, Egæus believes that the pos-

J.W. 19
session of his cousin’s teeth will redeem him from his burden. One afternoon before the wedding,
as Egæus is sitting in his library, an apparition o f her appears before him in a reverie. When the
reverie eventually dissipates, her teeth are still lingering in front of him and he realizes his
obsession:
“The teeth!—the teeth!—they were here, and there, a nd everywhere, and visibly and palp-
ably before me; long, narrow, and excessively white , with the pale lips writhing about
them, as in the very moment of their first terrible development. Then came the full fury of
my monomania , and I struggled in vain against its strange and i rresistible influence. In the
multiplied objects of the external world I had no t houghts but for the teeth. (“Berenice”
150)
At length, she dies of epilepsy and thus Egæus own disease takes a turn for the worse. A few
days after her death, he is filled with horror and paranoia as he is struck with a faint memory of a
woman’s scream. He turns his attention to the famil y physician’s box of instruments upon the
table: he is uncertain how it got there, and as the tale progresses the dénouement is imminent.
Egæus is told that there had been a disturbing cry from Berenice’s grave, when they arrived they
had seen that it had been violated and that she was still alive.
In Poe’s Gothic tales there sometimes exists a sub liminal sexual connotation. Poe found
ways to disguise sexual urges with violence. Magist rale and Poger explain:
Obessed with Berenice’s mouth and teeth, the narrat or’s erotic fascination increases in
proportion to the pain the woman experiences as she is ravaged first by epilepsy and then
the narrator’s rape of her mouth, pulling teeth fro m her jaw even as her screams protest
against the thirty-two-step oral extraction”. (60)
According to Magistrale and Poger, the novella “Ber enice” is considered one of Poe’s most
horrible short stories with “shocking and repulsive descriptions of masculine aggressiveness”
(60). Magistrale and Frank argue that the protagoni st violent act may represent his inferiority
towards Berenice (63). That is to say, threaten by her sexuality he felt forced to marry her and
was compelled to punish her (ibid.). According to M agistrale and Frank, a Freudian interpretation
would suggest that Berenice’s mouth symbolises her vagina, and consequently, breaking the teeth
would represent the ravishing of her body: “the nar rator’s assault [of] vaginal violation and

J.W. 20
destruction of the mother [are] the narrator’s symb olic mutilation of the entrance to the womb”
(63).
Egæus believed that if he possessed Berenice’s teet h it would bring him peace, “I felt that
their possession could alone ever restore me to pea ce, in giving me back to reason” (“Berenice”
150). Whether or not this is actually true is never confirmed. However, the servant who informs
Egæus of the violation of Berenice caught him with dirt upon his clothes and a spade by the wall.
Furthermore, at the very climax, as Egæus’s hands t remble – shocked by his revelations – the
physician’s box falls to the floor, opens up and th e teeth are scattered all over.

J.W. 21
Conclusion
At a glance, it might seem that the works which hav e been analysed in this study are indisputably
similar. However, there are a few important differe nces.
First of all, the vicious protagonist in “Berenice” differs from the ones in “The Raven”,
“Ligeia” and “The Fall of the House of Usher” since these three are but mournful, infatuated
men. The protagonist in “Berenice” is – as I have s hown above – acting as an antagonist. Never-
theless, in Poe’s fiction his antagonists are not in fact traditional villains. In the selec ted works,
all of Poe’s protagonists are sensitive men with to rn psyches on the verge of falling into deep
melancholy. Moreover, at first the protagonists – i ncluding the one in “Berenice” – do not act in
total madness with no disregard for moral values; i nstead, they always try to exercise a sort of
self-control. As Magistrale and Poger explain “with in the tormented psyches of Poe’s prota-
gonists, the Gothic’s emphasis on a contradictory a nd divided self is omnipresent” (19).
Secondly, in “The Raven” and “Ligeia” the protagoni sts were obsessed with their departed
lovers. In “The Fall of the House of Usher” the pro tagonist loses his twin sister whom – although
this is not confirmed – he might have been intimate with. Furthermore, in “Berenice” the
protagonist firmly states that he has never loved h is cousin, but was about to marry her anyway
since she loved him. It can be argued that the prot agonist felt both intimidated by her sexuality
and forced to marry her. Thus, as he was metaphoric ally raped, he returned the offence by pulling
out the teeth from his cousin’s mouth which – in tu rn – he might perceive as her threatening
vagina. Thirdly, “The Raven” and “Ligeia” concern t he protagonists’ loss of their lovers while
the women in “The Fall of the House of Usher” and “ Berenice” are in the former, the
protagonist’s twin sister, and in the latter, the c ousin. Nevertheless, there are sexual tensions
between them as in the tales of actual lovers. Four thly, in all works except for in the poem “The
Raven”, the women refuse to stay dead. For example, in “Ligeia” the corpse of the protagonist’s
new wife is somehow replaced by Ligeia and seems to have resurrected to haunt him. As
mentioned above, the women seem to come back to lif e to punish the men for their sins without
any clear reason. Accordingly, in Poe’s tales while the men are sensitive and emasculated “[the
women] by contrast, are the active agents who retur n to haunt or punish their conscience-stricken
men” (ibid.). However, in “The Raven” the lover wil l never emerge except in the protagonist’s
memory. In the beginning of the poem, the protagoni sts believes the bird to be his lover’s em-
bodied spirit, but as the poem progresses he realiz ed that this is not the case. Lastly, opposed to

J.W. 22
the other tales, in “The Fall of the House of Usher ” the unnamed narrator actually leaves the
isolated mansion at the dénouement when Roderick’s sister appears.
Despite these differences, the tales are arguably s imilar if not thematically identical.
There always seems to be a certain state of isolati on in Poe’s tales. As illustrated throughout the
study, the protagonists are recluses or in some way stuck in a confined space: a house, a chamber
or a turret. For instance, in “The Fall of the Hous e of Usher” and “The Raven” the protagonists
are recluses. Poe used the isolation motif to inten sify the horror and at the same time focus the
story. If the protagonists left their confinement a t the point of climax to run away or to seek help
the tension he had built up would have been for not hing. Perhaps it is due to Poe’s excellent
story-telling that as a reader, one does not want t he protagonist to leave his confinement. For
instance, in “Ligeia” when the protagonist detects signs of life on his dead wife’s face. He
proclaims that the turret – in which they reside – is in a remote part of the abbey, and although
the abbey has servants he cannot go there at this t ime. In “Berenice” the protagonist has spent
almost his entire life in his library. Although he actually leaves it once to violate Berenice’s
grave, the protagonist does not remember it. Furthe rmore, the isolation does not only concern
physical restrictions of the protagonists, but the social and psychological as well.
Another similarity between the works is melancholy . All the protagonists suffer from
melancholy to a certain degree. They are isolated, troubled and obsessed with something in the
past. The protagonist in “The Fall of the House of Usher” has an unspoken affliction whilst the
narrator in “Berenice” has a more explicit case of melancholy. Nevertheless, they are extremely
fixated with their illnesses and are unable to func tion normally. In “The Raven” and “Ligeia” the
protagonists’ monomania concerns their lost women. They are obsessing over their women’s
beauty and want nothing more than have them back. W hat is more, the main characters do not
seem to realise that their behaviour is strange. In stead, they proceed to daydream and are further
consumed by the monomania.
Poe combines the motif of isolation with the Gothi c horror genre and thus, he enhances
the horror. Through the first-person narrative the reader is confronted with the innermost work-
ings of the protagonists’ thoughts. The Gothic elem ents, which should be distinguished from the
Gothic horror features, are an additional method to increase the horror. For instance, in “The Fall
of the House of Usher” and “Ligeia” the Gothic elem ents include dreary, dark and frightening
buildings, architecture and environments which in a state of phantasmagoria can seem to come
alive. The house in “The Fall of the House of Usher ”, the curtains in “The Raven” and the

J.W. 23
tapestry in “Ligeia” are a few examples of physical details which influence the protagonists’
disoriented psyches.
Isolated both socially and mentally, the protagonis ts do not engage in much social inter-
action and they are – in a sense – trapped within t heir own minds. In their solitude, they plan to
redeem themselves in any way possible. What is more , Poe’s Gothic protagonist “first look upon,
idealize, and feel with the mind, hollowing out the beloved image, and then turn on the object of
their affections, only to suffer retribution for th eir conversion” (Magistrale and Poger 17).

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Works cited
Primary sources
Poe, Edgar Allan. “Berenice.” Edgar Allan Poe: Comp lete Tales and Poems . Ed. Edward H.
O’Neil. New York: Dorset Press, 1989. 145-51.
– – -. “The Fall of the House of Usher.” The Norton Anthology of American Literature . Ed. Julia
Reidhead. New York: Norton, 2003. 714-27.
– – -. “Ligeia.” The Norton Anthology of American L iterature . Ed. Julia Reidhead. New York:
Norton, 2003. 704-14.
– – -. “The Raven.” The Norton Anthology of America n Literature . Ed. Julia Reidhead. New
York: Norton, 2003. 697-700.
Secondary sources
Davidson, Edward H. Poe – A Critical Study . Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1980
Voller , Jack G and Frederick S. Frank. Ed. Douglass H. Th omson. Gothic Writers: A Critical and
Bibliographical Guide . New York: Greenwood, 2001
Hammer, Espen. Melankoli – En Filosofisk Essä . Göteborg: Daidalos, 2006
Magistrale, Tony and Sidney Poger. Poe’s Children . New York: Lang Publishing, Inc., 1999
Magistrale, Anthony S and Frederick S. Frank. Poe E ncylopedia . New York: Greenwood, 1997
Poe, Edgar Allan. “The Philosophy of Composition.” The Norton Anthology of American
Literature . Ed. Julia Reidhead. New York: Norton, 2003. 748-5 6.
Reidhead, Julia. Ed. The Norton Anthology of Americ an Literature . New York: Norton, 2003