I don't like biting off people (term used for copying in breakdancing) but in this case I guess I have to. Edgar Allen Poe, one magnificent writer of his time in which I naturally respect. He has a freaking NFL football team named after him! Baltimore was pretty obsessed with his stuff and why wouldn't they be? He's freaking genius!
As for myself, I like to write and most of the time I like to write poetry and fictional stories. Admiring Poe's use of many things within "Fall of the House of Usher," he creates a mysterious and eerie feel to his haunted house story. A few things that I would respectfully take from him is the way he uses personification, creating the setting, someone coming back to life, the ability for the narrator to live and of course one scary ass house! All perfect elements for the concoction of evil and fear.
Personification, ah so many things just having life to it no matter what object or thing it is. The way Poe uses this in this short story is simply the house. As he's in the house he discretely describes the furniture as if they were people. In the part of the story when he's in his room and cannot sleep because of the "unexplained" noises and movement of his bed which shows the bringing of life of the objects in his room. The way he creates the setting is with no doubt just freaky. As he approaches the house he feels that some gloomy feeling pervaded his spirit automatically giving you the weird feeling of, "how can a house do that?" Everything he describes in the house has some kind of dark twisted thing about it and makes the setting just full of horror and "what the heck is this?!" Also bringing someone back to life. Oh man when does that ever happen? OH YEAH WHEN THERE'S A HORROR STORY WITH A ZOMBIE, GHOST, GHOUL, ETC. That's always creepy. How would you feel if someone you put in a coffin YOURSELF and later find out they're back to life? HAH I'd be pretty scared or maybe happy if it was someone I loved, but more scared. It's all perfect things to add to this concoction. *devil emoji*
So, a house that's pretty big just falls down out of no where because the scary sister/wife/lover/what ever the heck she is comes back to life and haunts them. But OF COURSE the narrator gets out alive. The hope of the person we've been following to live is one thing that makes a horror story. We want them to live because we've made a "connection" to them and have seen what they have. We want them to live, unless you just like illogical people and reading them die then that's you. It gives a sense of hope and sympathy for how naive he is. Lastly the house, what doesn't make a haunted house story with a nice house with a picket fence and green lively grass? Not a good one for sure. It has to be dirty, run down, scary trees with "no branches" (haha), the dark feeling with the moon behind the clouds and wolves howling in the distance. That makes an awesome haunted house.
