Line #14 Literature/TheFallOfTheHouseOfUsher


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/usher.jpg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:''"And the deep and dank tarn closed silently over the fragments of the House of Usher."]]''
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4	"The Fall of the House of Usher" is one of the most famous stories written by the father of GothicHorror (in America, at least), Creator/EdgarAllanPoe. It was originally published in September 1839.
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6	An unnamed narrator arrives at a creepy, dark, decaying old castle to visit his friend Roderick, one of the last two descendants of the house of Usher. He finds that the Ushers are not well: Roderick is feverish and has extreme anxiety, and is also experiencing [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperesthesia hyperesthesia]] (overly acute senses). His twin sister Madeline is also chronically ill and subject to attacks of catalepsy. While he is still visiting, Madeline dies, and he and Roderick put her body in the family crypt. Still, a creeping dread continues to hang over Roderick Usher...
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8	"The Fall of the House of Usher" is one of Poe's best remembered stories. It has been adapted many times for film, including [[Film/TheFallOfTheHouseOfUsher1928USA a 1928 American silent short film]], a [[Film/TheFallOfTheHouseOfUsher1928France 1928 French feature film]], and a [[Film/HouseOfUsher famous 1960 production]] directed by Creator/RogerCorman and starring Creator/VincentPrice.
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10	Raul Garcia created and directed an anthology of five stories, including ''"The Fall of the House of Usher"'' narrated by Creator/ChristopherLee, called ''Extraordinary Tales''.
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12	In collaboration with Creator/{{Netflix}}, Creator/MikeFlanagan wrote [[Series/TheFallOfTheHouseOfUsher2023 an eight-episode limited series]] and directed half the series, with the other half directed by his regular cinematographer, [[Film/ToAllTheBoysPSIStillLoveYou Michael]] [[Film/ToAllTheBoysAlwaysAndForever Fimognari]].
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14	Bethany Griffin based her 2014 book ''The Fall'' on this short story.
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16	----
17	!!''I tell you that she now stands without the tropes!!''
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19	* AndIMustScream
20	** Madeline's catalepsy causes Roderick to think she's dead and bury her alive. She spends an indeterminate amount of time clawing her way out when she comes back to her senses.
21	** Roderick himself, whose hyperacute senses tell him that Madeline is alive in her coffin, is unable to say anything, or go release her, or do more than suffer under the knowledge that she is going to get out eventually.
22	* AstonishinglyAppropriateInterruption: While the narrator is reading "The Mad Trist" to Roderick, they both hear strange sounds that happen to match the story -- a loud metallic ''clang'' when a shield falls off the wall, for example.
23	* BadMoonRising: As the narrator flees the house, he sees the light of the "full, setting, and blood-red moon" shining through the crack in the structure just before it collapses entirely.
24	* BittersweetEnding: The narrator sees the last two Ushers die and their mansion suddenly collapse into the lake, leaving nothing of the House of Usher (in any sense of the term) behind. He barely escapes himself. However, the 'taint' on the house is gone with its passing, and Roderick and Madeline are finally at peace.
25	* BlessedWithSuck: Roderick has very acute senses... which are a massive inconvenience for him.
26	* BloodSplatteredWeddingDress: It isn't a wedding dress, but rather funeral robes; still, Madeline's white clothes are stained with blood from the exertion of climbing out of her coffin.
27	* BrotherSisterIncest[=/=]IncestSubtext[=/=]{{Twincest}}: Roderick's unnatural fixation on his sister and the unusual closeness between them strongly hint at this, and Website/TheOtherWiki notes that many literary scholars have interpreted this to be the author's intent. Some adaptations, like the 2006 Gruselkabinett radio drama, outright state that this is the case.
28	** Brother-sister incest is more or less explicitly stated to also be a tradition in their family:
29	-->''I had learned, too, the very remarkable fact that the stem of the Usher race, all time-honored as it was, had put forth, at no period, any enduring branch; in other words, that the entire family lay in the direct line of descent, and had always, with very trifling and very temporary variation, so lain.''
30	* BuriedAlive: Roderick attempts to ''prevent'' this by placing Madeline's body in the family vault for two weeks before her final burial, but with the coffin lid screwed down and the door sealed, the effect is the same.
31	* ChekhovsGun: Roderick's hyperacute senses. He reveals at the end that he's been hearing Madeline scratch away at her coffin for some time. And see below under Foreshadowing.
32	* CompositeCharacter: The footman and valet are composed into one character, Briggs, in the German radio drama.
33	* DiseaseBleach: The narrator describes the stricken Roderick's hair as "gossamer", which can mean both 'ultrafine' and 'light colored.' The 'texture' definition is supported elsewhere in the text, but there's room to assume that Roderick's hair has gone white as well as thin.
34	* DoNotGoGentle: Madeline spends her final hours struggling out of her coffin and making her way to her brother. She dies embracing him, and he dies of fear in her arms.
35	* DoubleMeaningTitle: The story is about the downfall of the House of Usher (that is, the aristocratic Usher family), and about the literal ''fall'' of their ancestral mansion, which collapses and sinks into the lake.
36	* EmpathicEnvironment: A storm strikes on the night that Madeline climbs out of her coffin.
37	* FauxDeath: Madeline goes into a death-like trance and is buried. The narrator even observes how remarkably lifelike her 'corpse' is.
38	* {{Foreshadowing}}:
39	** As he approaches the house, the narrator notices a hairline crack extending from top to bottom.
40	** The narrator finds Madeline's corpse disturbingly rosy and healthy-looking as he assists at her burial. She turns out to be [[BuriedAlive still alive]].
41	* GeniusLoci: Roderick believes that his house is alive, that the moss and masonry have combined to create a living organism. The ending suggests that he's right.
42	* GothicHorror: "I had so worked upon my imagination as really to believe that about the whole mansion and domain there hung an atmosphere peculiar to themselves and their immediate vicinity — an atmosphere which had no affinity with the air of heaven, but which had reeked up from the decayed trees, and the gray wall, and the silent tarn — a pestilent and mystic vapor, dull, sluggish, faintly discernible, and leaden-hued".
43	* GratuitousFrench: Opens with an epigraph in French that translates as "his heart is a suspended lute, as soon as it is touched, it resounds".
44	* GraveRobbing: Roderick insists on securing his sister's body in the mansion for a couple weeks instead of burying her immediately, at least in part to save her corpse from this.
45	-->''The brother had been led to his resolution (so he told me) by consideration of the unusual character of the malady of the deceased, of certain obtrusive and eager inquiries on the part of her medical men, and of the remote and exposed situation of the burial-ground of the family.''
46	* HatesBeingTouched: Roderick, due to his SuperSenses, to the point that he can only tolerate extremely soft fabrics in his clothes.
47	* HereditaryTwinhood: Madeline and Roderick are HalfIdenticalTwins. One interpretation is that this sets up the twist that the Ushers are "all one line"; they were ''all'' born from BrotherSisterIncest between twins and the "taint" upon their house is as a result of this.
48	* ImpoverishedPatrician: The Ushers have a large house, but the place has fallen into severe disrepair.
49	* ItRunsInTheFamily: It's strongly implied that some inherent defect in the Usher blood, probably also causing the failure of other branches of the family tree to endure, is what has brought them to this.
50	* ItsGoingDown: The collapse of the Usher mansion, which ends the story.
51	* LetThePastBurn: The narrator sees the Usher manor break in two and fall into the shallow lake that surrounds it, as if its own life were tied to the stricken Usher family.
52	* LoadBearingBoss: Once the last of the Usher bloodline is dead, their mansion falls apart.
53	* LongHairedPrettyBoy: A dark example. The narrator makes it clear that Roderick is very pretty, describing such details as "lips [...] of a surpassingly beautiful curve", "delicate" features and "large, liquid and luminous" eyes... or at least he ''would'' be very pretty, if he wasn't also sickly, frail, and rather unnerving. His hair is long and even described as soft and "silken", but also seems to be rather unkempt.
54	* LooksLikeCesare: Roderick is described as having deep-set eyes and a generally gaunt appearance. He is very pale, though his hair colour is not specified (some interpret the gossamer comparisons to mean it's white, while others assume that only refers to its texture and have illustrated him as an EeriePaleSkinnedBrunette).
55	* MeaningfulName: To "usher in" something means to welcome something new (like a new era) and move it forward. The Ushers are an old family of {{Impoverished Patrician}}s, with Roderick and Madeline representing the last vestiges of a dying aristocracy. When their ancestral mansion collapses, it symbolizes the EndOfAnAge (and hopefully the beginning of a new one).
56	* MyGodWhatHaveIDone: Roderick's reaction when he realizes he's buried Madeline alive.
57	* NoNameGiven: For the narrator. Adaptations tend to name him Philip.
58	* NoOntologicalInertia: The Usher house (the building) falls apart once the Usher house (the family) is gone.
59	* OnlyFriend: Roderick has summoned the narrator to the house for company even though they last saw each other as boys; the narrator is probably the only person he has to call upon.
60	* PlainPalate: Roderick Usher has a condition called "generalised hyperesthesia", with one symptom being a palate that's so sensitive he can only tolerate bland food.
61	* PsychologicalTormentZone: The Usher mansion and its grounds are sunless, dank, and gloomy. The narrator thinks that even the house has gone a bit crazy under the circumstances.
62	* SanitySlippage: Roderick's mind slowly degenerates and finally collapses under his awareness that something horrible is about to happen to him.
63	* SatelliteCharacter: The narrator has no real personality other than being an innocent, sensitive NiceGuy, and serves only as a foil for Roderick.
64	* ScrewThisImOuttaHere: The narrator flees when Madeline and Roderick die in front of him. It saves his life, since he has barely escaped the house before it collapses for good.
65	* SensoryAbuse: Pretty much all of life, to Roderick. Bright lights, loud sounds, and heavy textures are intolerable to him, and he hasn't left the Usher mansion in years.
66	* StylisticSuck: Story-within-a-story "The Mad Trist" is hopelessly trite and stilted. Notably, it's actually acknowledged as terrible in-universe, and the narrator thinks to himself that he's only reading it because it was literally the first book he touched.
67	* SuperSenses: Roderick suffers from hyperacute senses, which are portrayed as always a burden, never an advantage.
68	* TogetherInDeath: The last two Ushers die at the same time, and their mansion falls apart moments later.
69	* TrashTheSet: The story ends with the Usher castle breaking apart and the remains sinking into the lake as the narrator runs to save himself.
70	* UncannyAtmosphere: The Usher castle is established from the beginning as standing on a creepy, unsettling, fogbound moor. The narrator is nervous as soon as he arrives.
71	* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: The footman and valet that greet the narrator are afterward forgotten. We also never hear what became of the narrator's horse.
72	* WildHair: Roderick's hair is said to be so thin and fine in texture that it floats around his head.
73	* YourDaysAreNumbered: Roderick Usher seems aware that he is going to die, and the anxiety wears on him until it is all he can think about.

Context Literature / TheFallOfTheHouseOfUsher