Name: Polestico, Irish Den M.
Course: EDUC 5
Year/Program: BSED-ENGLISH 3rd Year Date: 10-10-23
Remembering
● Enumerate the characters of the given story.
Understanding
● Describe the themes of the story.
Applying
● Demonstrate how each character feels in the story.
Analyzing
● Compare and contrast how the characters view life.
Evaluating
● Critique the ending of the story.
Creating
● Formulate a new plot of the story based on how you want it to be.
The Fall of the House of Usher
By: Edgar Allan Poe
An unnamed narrator approaches the house of Usher on a “dull, dark, and soundless day.”
This house—the estate of his boyhood friend, Roderick Usher—is gloomy and mysterious. The
narrator observes that the house seems to have absorbed an evil and diseased atmosphere from
the decaying trees and murky ponds around it. He notes that although the house is decaying in
places—individual stones are disintegrating, for example—the structure itself is fairly solid.
There is only a small crack from the roof to the ground in the front of the building. He has come
to the house because his friend Roderick sent him a letter earnestly requesting his company.
Roderick wrote that he was feeling physically and emotionally ill, so the narrator is rushing to
his assistance. The narrator mentions that the Usher family, though an ancient clan, has never
flourished. Only one member of the Usher family has survived from generation to generation,
thereby forming a direct line of descent without any outside branches. The Usher family has
become so identified with its estate that the peasantry confuses the inhabitants with their home.
The narrator finds the inside of the house just as spooky as the outside. He makes his way
through the long passages to the room where Roderick is waiting. He notes that Roderick is paler
and less energetic than he once was. Roderick tells the narrator that he suffers from nerves and
fear and that his senses are heightened. The narrator also notes that Roderick seems afraid of his
own house. Roderick’s sister, Madeline, has taken ill with a mysterious sickness—perhaps
catalepsy, the loss of control of one’s limbs—that the doctors cannot reverse. The narrator spends
several days trying to cheer up Roderick. He listens to Roderick play the guitar and make up
words for his songs, and he reads him stories, but he cannot lift Roderick’s spirit. Soon, Roderick
posits his theory that the house itself is unhealthy, just as the narrator supposes at the beginning
of the story.
Madeline soon dies, and Roderick decides to bury her temporarily in the tombs below the
house. He wants to keep her in the house because he fears that the doctors might dig up her body
for scientific examination, since her disease was so strange to them. The narrator helps Roderick
put the body in the tomb, and he notes that Madeline has rosy cheeks, as some do after death.
The narrator also realizes suddenly that Roderick and Madeline were twins. Over the next few
days, Roderick becomes even more uneasy. One night, the narrator cannot sleep either. Roderick
knocks on his door, apparently hysterical. He leads the narrator to the window, from which they
see a bright-looking gas surrounding the house. The narrator tells Roderick that the gas is a
natural phenomenon, not altogether uncommon.
The narrator decides to read to Roderick in order to pass the night away. He reads “Mad
Trist” by Sir Launcelot Canning, a medieval romance. As he reads, he hears noises that
correspond to the descriptions in the story. At first, he ignores these sounds as the vagaries of his
imagination. Soon, however, they become more distinct and he can no longer ignore them. He
also notices that Roderick has slumped over in his chair and is muttering to himself. The narrator
approaches Roderick and listens to what he is saying. Roderick reveals that he has been hearing
these sounds for days, and believes that they have buried Madeline alive and that she is trying to
escape. He yells that she is standing behind the door. The wind blows open the door and
confirms Roderick’s fears: Madeline stands in white robes bloodied from her struggle. She
attacks Roderick as the life drains from her, and he dies of fear. The narrator flees the house. As
he escapes, the entire house cracks along the break in the frame and crumbles to the ground.
