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LITR 4328: American Renaissance  |
Final Exam Essays 2015 Sample answers
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Karin Cooper
C1.
A class about American Renaissance literature would be impossible without
talking about the Gothic. The Gothic is a style of literature that can be
defined as creepy, or dark. A feature that will always be found in Gothic
literature is "a haunted space", whether it is a castle, or a forest, the Gothic
requires a place for the reader to feel scared. Poe is one of the most popular
writers who wrote solely in Gothic style. However Poe does not have the monopoly
on Gothic literature, we will also discuss the Gothic writings of Hawthorne,
Davis, and Cooper. In this essay we will discuss some Gothic literary devices,
and the ways they are used by different American Renaissance authors.
At the beginning of the semester we read
The Last of the Mohicans by James
Fenimore Cooper. The Last of the Mohicans
uses a Gothic device called the wilderness Gothic throughout the book. The
wilderness Gothic, as the Gothic style page states is used often during the
American Renaissance because the nation was still young, and there were no
castles, or abandoned mansions to set the literature in as a "haunted space".
However there were plenty of forests to use for the Gothic. A good example of
this is Cooper's The Last of the
Mohicans, in Chapter two when Alice first rides into the forest: "the slight
branches of the bushes, and to follow the runner along the dark and tangled
pathway" (Cooper). Here there is no need to have a castle passage when the
branches of the forest trees are so foreboding. Cooper is a great example of the
wilderness Gothic. However Nathaniel Hawthorne uses the wilderness Gothic as
well.
Nathaniel Hawthorne in his short story "Young Goodman Brown" uses the
wilderness Gothic, and Gothic devices such as chilling screams to make his story
Gothic. "Young Goodman Brown" is
full of wilderness Gothic, just like Cooper's
The Last of the Mohicans. Hawthorne
also uses chilling screams common in Gothic literature to create his Gothic
mood. Screams, and mysterious noises in Hawthorne's work make him similar to
both Poe, and Cooper. An example of some Gothic noises can be found in "Young
Goodman Brown" when Young Goodman Brown is in the forest: "The cry of grief,
rage, and terror was yet piercing the night" (Hawthorne). This device in Gothic
literature is meant to be scary, it is meant to make the reader get goosebumps
as they read. This exhilarating scariness, which can be found in the Gothic is
one of the reasons it continues to be written, and read. People like the way
Gothic literature makes them feel.
Edgar Allan Poe is known for making people feel scared when they read his
literature. Poe with his rich descriptions, and often formal poetry is nothing
if not Gothic. Poe can be grouped with the other authors we are examining today
as far scary noises go, but Poe also has every other Gothic device in his
writings. Poe's descriptions of Gothic buildings are models of the Gothic. In
Poe's "The Fall of the House of Usher" he starts off with a description of the
house that the writers of the popular children's television show, Scooby Doo
must have taken to heart. The description of the house in Poe's, "The Fall of
the House of Usher"is the perfect example of the Gothic: the first glimpse of
the building, a sense of insufferable gloom pervaded my spirit. ... images of
the desolate ...the bleak walls—...vacant eye-like windows—... few rank
sedges—and... few white trunks of decayed trees" (Poe). This is a creepy house
that is described with classic Gothic style. The Gothic is full of these kinds
of houses, or "haunted spaces" that one would not want to venture into alone.
Rebecca Harding Davis uses a city to create her Gothic "haunted spaces",
and makes use of the Gothic color code within the city. Davis is a more
realistic writer than the other writers we have discussed. Using the Gothic
style Davis makes her short story, "Life in the Iron-Mills" more appealing to
the average reader. Since her short story is more realistic it is more gruesome
to think it is real, this is the Gothic. She uses Gothic descriptions to
describe the city, and the Iron mill within it. However she also use the Gothic
color code. The Gothic color code focuses on the colors white, black, and red.
The color code specifically uses the contrast between the colors, and associates
them with death, blood, and gore. In "Life in the Iron-Mills", Davis uses the
color code when describing one of the rich men surveying the factory: "contour
of the white hand, the blood-glow of a red ring he wore" (Davis). Whenever
blood is used as the describing color of something it is intentionally
Gothic. Like Davis, Poe, and Cooper do not shy away from the color code in their
writings.
Davis, Poe, and Hawthorne all used the gothic in their writing. They are
not alone in doing this in the American Renaissance time period. Gothic devices
run rampant in slave narratives, and Cooper does not shy away from the Gothic in
his writing by any means. The Gothic continues to be used today in literature,
and television. It is a helpful tool as Davis uses it, to make serious material
more readable. Poe seems to just enjoy the excess of the Gothic. Hawthorne
weaves the Gothic into his writing skillfully giving the reader the heeby jeebys
as the pages are turned.
The Gothic persists because people like feeling scared when they read.
Also there are a lot of real elements in the Gothic. The color code can be used
to write about racial differences, planting a seed in the reader's mind without
making the reader so uncomfortable they will not continue reading. A skillful
author will use the Gothic as a tool to weave in important elements which might
not otherwise be in the material. The Gothic is important because it can be used
in such a diverse way. It can be used for fun, and for important issues. You
cannot say that about all literary devices, the Gothic is a great tool in
literature.
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