Poes Fall of The House of Usher Essays: Metaphoric Images :: Fall House Usher Essays

Metaphoric Images in Poes Fall of the House of Usher   The Fall of the House of Usher, one of Edgar Allen Poes most celebrated tales has captured the imagination of readers both young and old. With neat skill, Poe has metaphorically succeeded to mirror unlike objects in nature. One sewer find examples of how Poe has succeeded this throughout this short story. Among one of the first examples that one can find is ...that quaint metaphor for the body...(Montgomery 373). The ancient metaphor that one can find is that of Roderick Usher and the later being the Usher house. With some close reading of the story, one can see how these two unlike objects mirror each other. To commence an analysis of the different examples found in the story, one must get some apprise some brief background information. Roderick Usher was excessively reserved during his childhood and there after. Roderick was the product of inbreeding which had caused him to lead a rather unhealthy life. According to M agill in the book Masterpieces of World Literature, since the Usher family had left only a direct line of descendants, the family and the house had become as one, the House of Usher(291). One can repugn that this is true, but in my opinion, the relationship between the house and Roderick can be found in their descriptions. The storys narrator describes Roderick as more zombielike than human. This is due to Rodericks cadaverous seventh cranial nerve complexion large, luminous eyes, thin and very pallid lips, his nose of a delicate Hebrew model, his small molded chin, broad forehead, and his soft and weblike hair(Magill 364). throughout the story, the narrator describes Rodericks large eyes and hair with having a wild gossamer texture (Thompson 96). Rodericks unhealthy life has caused side effects to occur. They include such things as looking old for his age and at times trembling for no apparent reason (Bloom 60). The House of Usher is also similar to Roderick in their description. The houses facade, as the narrator describes, resembles a giant face or skull with its eye-like windows and the hairlike fungi that hangs on the houses facade(Magill 364). The stonework that covers the Usher house is in decay. This stonework reminds the narrator ...of old wood-work which has rotten for keen-sighted years in some neglected vault. (Bloom59). The Usher House seems so fragile that it seems its instability will cause it to fall(59).