LITR 4232: American Renaissance
University of Houston-Clear Lake, spring 2003
Student Presentation Summary

Thursday, 13 March 2003: Poe, “Ligeia” 2390-2400; “The Fall of the House of Usher” 2400-2413.
Reader: Robert S. Andresakis
Discussion notes: Kristine Vermillion

Poe creates a depressive, decaying, atmosphere where our fears and morals are put to the test. In the entirety of his stories, objective 2(… “Romanticism” the narrative genre of “romance”, and the related styles of the “gothic” and “the sublime”.) can be seen. To bring out these elements within Poe’s short story all one has to do is read, for the stories over flow with these elements. Where most stories might read in color, Poe’s use of these elements in his stories place our minds in a black and white world and shows us characters that are weaved with Romanticism.

All one has to do is put their fingers on a passage in Ligeia and the Fall of Usher to find example of objective 2. I would like to highlight a few great examples by concentrating on the main characters of Ligeia and Roderick Usher

Poe describes Ligeia, found on page 2391, as tall and thin, with a tall forehead.  Here skin is pale and cold “…rivaling the purest ivory”. Her temples are pronounced or protruding gently from the side of her head. In contrast her hair is raven black with waves of perfect tresses. Her nose is perfectly large with it’s “.. delicate outlines” and nostrils that speak. Her small upper lip turns at the corners and her bottom lip is thick and voluptuous, while her teeth sparkle with “…ever ray of the holy light that fell upon them.” She has a Greek chin which I can only conjecture to be a strong chin both pronounced and sturdy. Yet, her chin is not just any chin it is the chin “…revealed but in a dream…” by the god Apollo. Her eyes are as huge orbs of black pools. Larger than  “...gazelle eyes…” with long black eye lashes and black irregular eyebrows. She is the epitome of the narrator's beuaty “And at such moments was her beuaty – in my heated fancy thus it appeared perhaps- the beauty of beings either above or apart form the earth- the beauty of the fabulous Houri of the Turk”.

Poe uses the interplaying contrasts of light and dark. Her black hair verse her cold white skin. The dark black orbs of her eye and the and her lips that had “color that spoke”. She is tall and parts of her body seem to comparable to the gothic arches, the tall gangly figures of Ichabod Crane and Natty Bumpo, and the long reaching trees present in American Romance that we have studied before.

In the House of Usher Roderick is described as a man with a “remarkable face.”(2403) His face is white, cadaverous in completion, with large liquid eyes and thin-palled lips. A nose that is compared to a “Hebrew model” that curves slightly with air that floats in front of the face rather than falling. Poe uses the same interplay on light and dark with the face of Roderick. He is constantly referred to as being wan, or pale. His hair becomes the shadows, or, darkness, of the gothic motif.

In class Tuesday we discussed the aspect of gothic that included the dead not staying dead. Ligeia is a prime example of this for, she dies in a sudden manner and comes back to life in the end of the story. In House of Usher Madeleine Usher is beseeched with a cataleptic disease that in essence leaves her more often in a death like state then alive. Roderick buries her in this catatonic state, most presumable on purpose, to rid himself of the constant mental sickness of, ironically, having to lose her. Both Madeleine and Ligeia herself are innocent bystanders to conditions and circumstances. They become endeared to us because of there innocent plights, Ligeia dies because of a strange malady and Madeleine dies figuratively every time she goes into a cataleptic state.

Like the element of light dark interplay Poe uses an elements of the unknown to intrigue us within the story. Ligeia has no last name. The abbey where they stay is a secret location with no name. Roderick message to the narrator is mysterious and intrigues the narrator.

Question 1:  To me, Poe’s writing is amazing. His use of language is just challenging enough to stimulate the mind and make the reader wonder, but easy enough that his ideas do not become a burden to read. His use of images awakens the imagination and his themes seem to question some basic moral foundations forcing us to think about ourselves.

Part A) Does Poe inspire you and why?

Response to Question 1A: Does Poe inspire you?

Dr. White opened by saying he didn’t think the word inspire was the most appropriate word to use for Poe’s writing.  Then Claire defended that criticism by saying that Ligea’s profession of love had inspired her to declare her love to her loved one’s more often, so that it wouldn’t be such a spectacular event at her death.  Sandra responded to the question by saying that she didn’t find it to be inspiring at all because his work is full of contradictions.  A contradiction that she mentioned were Liega’s supposed good looks but at the same time she is said to have “strange eyes.”  Throughout the conversation this question of contradiction posed by Sandra came up again and again.  With these three comments, Robert confessed that he asked this particular question because he had always been influenced and inspired by Poe’s writings for as long as he has been reading. 

Part B) Val Harpster asked the question last year: “Is there a distinction between popular and classic in Poe’s writings?” I believe that there are definite elements of each present within. However, the question becomes: why do you think that Poe has survived the tests of both intellectual critique and popular consumer consumption? What elements that exist in Poe’s writing that make it so?

 Response to Question 1B:  Popular or Classic in Poe?

Doug used the longevity of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s writing, though not highly intellectual and full of characteristics of the popular, as a comparison to Poe’s writing to defend the premise that Poe is both a popular and a classic writer.  Like Stowe, Poe’s writing is saturated with elements of popular writing, and yet its longevity and its sustained meaning to readers over the years make it also a classic.  Deterrean stated that the language that Poe uses raises his work’s intellectual stature, as his vocabulary challenges our vocabulary.  Dawn attributed the constant give and pull of the story and the building of the plot and the climax of the story make it classical.  The climactic effect is so well done that it has to be classical in this area.  Then Jody talked about the differences between the two women, the dark woman and the light woman and their contribution to the story.  Then one last comment was offered which stated that Poe is popular because his works are fast and easy reading, but his work is also popular because the meaning in his stories never leaves.

Question 2: The poem “The Conqueror Worm” found in Ligeia was published in Graham's Magazine (January 1843) and then added into Ligeia as part of the Broadway Journal revision (1845) Two previous publications of Ligeia, Baltimore American Museum (18 September 1838), and Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque (1845) did not contain the poem. Why do you think that Poe added this poem to the short story? Do you think the poem adds value overall to the story? Why?

Response to Question 2: Does the poem in “Ligeia” fit?

Sandra opened this discussion by her comment that the poem serves to further her view of the imbedded contradictions in Poe’s stories.  Then Robert agreed with her sentiment that the poem was out of place and doesn’t fit into the story.  Doug then defended the poem by saying that it gives emotional insight into the character Ligeia because it is supposedly her actual words and reflective of her personality, while the rest we know about her is just gained through description.  Deterrean thought it has value because is gives the reader a break from the horrible fate that he knows is coming, and Dr. White seconded this statement.  Dawn then made a comment about Poe’s view on death and how there is nothing serene about it.  His idea of death and dying is grotesque and anything but redeeming. 

Question 3: Towards the end of The Fall of the House of Usher, the narrator is reading a story to Roderick. As he reads the story events are unfolding that are parallel to the story that he is reading. Do you think that this parallel between the experience of the narrator and the stories actions are to coexist with a parallel between us, the reader, and Poe’s story The Fall of the House of Usher?

Response to Question 3: Poe’s Style?

Sandra opened this discussion by stating the she thinks that Poe intends for his reader to experience all that his characters are experiencing.  Deterrean noted that his use of the first person narrative aids readers in identifying Poe as the actual narrator (i.e. making it hard to separate Poe’s life from his writings).  Dawn then said that his writing gives a fantastic notion dealing with watching and being watched.  Dr. White ended the conversation by talking about the parallel experiences going on in Poe’s stories (i.e. Narrator and Roderick; Roderick and his twin; situation of the reader the same as single people in the story – as they watch, we the reader watch too).  

Romantic:

Journey: (2395) “…weary and aimless travel”

Seclusion: (2395) “…in one of the wildest and least frequented portions of fair England”

Duty: (2399) “… Yet a sense of duty finally operated to restore my self -possession”

Gothic:

2390 “… she was tall, slender, and in her later days, even emaciated.”

2395 “…verdant decay…”

2398 “…brilliant and ruby colored fluid…”

2398 “…the bed of ebony- the bed of death”

2399 “… aroused, and again gave myself up to passionate waking visions of Ligeia”

2396 “… so that the rays of either the sun or the moon, passing through it, fell with a ghastly luster on the objects within.”

2400 “… I shrieked aloud…”

2401 “…mansion of doom…”

2404 “The windows where long, narrow, and pointed, and at so vast a distance from the black oaken floor as to be altogether inaccessible from within. Feeble gleams of encrimsoned light made their way through the trellised panes and served to render sufficiently distinct the more prominent objects around; the eye, however, struggled in vain to reach to remoter angles of the chamber, or the recesses of the vaulted and fretted ceiling. Dark draperies hung up the walls. The general furniture was profuse, comfortless, antique, and tattered. ... I felt that I breathed and atmosphere of sorrow. An air of stern, deep, and irredeemable gloom hung over and pervaded all.”

2402 “…gothic archways of the hall…”

Sublime:

2890 “In beauty of face no maiden ever equaled her.”

2395 “…Crushed into the very dust with sorrow”

2398 “…indefinite shadow of angelic aspect…”

2397 “To one entering the room, they bore the appearance of simple monstrosities…”

2397 “The phantasmagoric effect …“

2401 “ … the unredeemed dreariness of thought which no goading of the imagination could torture into aught of the sublime.”

2402” Shaking off from my spirit what must have been a dream...”

2403 “…connect its Arabesque expression with any idea of simple humanity.”

Representative:

2393 “…rendered vividly luminous the many mysteries of the transcendentalism”…