Dark Romantic Use of Poetic Techniques free essay sample

The Blackness of eternal night encompassed me. I struggled for breath. † (Poe). One can barely stand being alone, blinded by the darkness in a place one knows, imagine somewhere that one is completely clueless of what lays ahead! This quote describes how the narrator from the pit and the pendulum feels that the darkness that completely surrounds the narrator oppress and suffocate the narrator. Besides the â€Å"Pit and The Pendulum† by Edgar Allan Poe, â€Å"The Devil and The Tom Walker† by Washington Irving focus the story around the main character committing mistakes, and whether the main character fix them or inevitably leads to their death. Both stories share dark romantic characteristics that exemplify dark romantic genre. While both â€Å"The Pit and the Pendulum† and â€Å"The Devil and Tom Walker† exemplify the genre of dark romantic, each story is unique in its use of dark romantic characteristics to establish a suspenseful mood. Both stories begin with an eerie setting to draw the reader into a suspenseful moo. In â€Å"The Devil and Tom Walker† tom decides to walk alone in a â€Å"†¦ill-chosen route. The swamp was covered with great gloomy pines and hemlocks†¦ It was full of pits and quagmires. Partly covered with weeds and mosses, where the green surface often betrayed the traveler into a gulf of black†¦Ã¢â‚¬  (Irving). This quote describes the loneness and creepiness of the forest as Tom walks alone in the forest, making the forest a threatening environment. The reader then has the expectation that in a threatening environment like that, something bad will happen; keeping the reader on full alert. On the other hand â€Å"The pit and The Pendulum† eerie setting is in a dark ominous cell in which the narrator is jailed in during the inquisition. The cell is completely dark, giving of a threatening environment since the looming threat of torture by the inquisitors lie ahead. Even though the environment is threatening the narrator behaves calm, thus having the reader calm to but jumping at every small change. The eerie setting set in each story are similar in the way that both characters are vulnerable to attacks but differ in where they take place, setting a different tone of suspense. A poetic technique Irving and Poe imply well to their short stories are sensory details to make their stories more suspenseful. In â€Å"The Pit and the Pendulum† as the narrator is strapped down helplessly the narrator describes in horror the pendulum, â€Å"†¦ I counted the rushing vibrations of the steel! Inch by inch-line by line-with a descent only appreciable at intervals that seemed ages-down and still down it came†¦ it swept so closely over me as to fan me with its acrid breath. The odor of the sharp steel forced itself into me nostrils†¦ I grew frantically mad and struggled to force myself upward against the sweep of the fearful scimitar. †- (Poe). The narrator’s descriptintion of the descending pendulum give of the idea that a slow painful death awaits the narrator but still hopeful that the narrator might escape since he has time. This hope adds intensity to the story by one anticipating if the narrator is or is not going to die. In the same manner, â€Å"The devil and Tom Walker† tom encounters the devil and describes him â€Å" a great black man †¦ neither negro nor Indian †¦ a shock of Corse black hair that stood out his head in all direction and bore an ax on his shoulders† (Irving). This description alone is intimidating, the fact that this man is the devil furthermore it adds intensity to the encounter between the devil and tom. The different graphic detail on both stories has the reader sitting on the edge of their seats For the most part throughout both stories many chilling event occur in an effort to establish a suspenseful mood. In one of the punishments from the judges from â€Å"the pit and the pendulum† the narrator has to decide between being squished by the cells movable walls or jumping into the well both resulting in death. At the realization of this the narrator describes his horror â€Å"it burned itself upon my shuddering recently – oh! For a voice to speak – oh! Horror – oh! Any horror but this! With a shriek I rushed from the margin and buried my face in my hands – weeping bitterly† (Poe). This quote not only states that the narrator has lost the hope of making it out alive but also makes the reader wonder â€Å"is this really it. He has made it through so many punishments. Is he really going to die? † The narrator’s confrontation with this reality makes the chilling events set a suspenseful mood. In contrast in â€Å"the devil and tom walker† tom walker’s wife disappears after she informs tom that she will make a deal with the devil. The mysterious disappearance of Tom’s wife leaves the reader with nervousness. These chilling event leave the reader nerve-wrecked in different ways. In especially character development in bot stories helps builds suspense. In â€Å"The Devil and Tom Walker† Tom goes from an average guy to a wealthy men through ill- gotten wealth from the devil. With this development in mind, the reader realizes the story has a deeper meaning, a moral lesson to teach. This realization leads the reader to anticipate something bad to Tom. Controversially, in â€Å"The Pit and The Pendulum† the narrator begins the story with the decision to survive, giving the reader hope that the narrator will live. As the narrator goes through the various punishments imposed by the judges the narrator slowly loses hope. This shred of hope is what kept the narrator alive, losing it means certain death. Generally speaking the reader most certainly does not wish the narrators death, making the reader become anxious as the narrator shows signs of losing hope. The character developments in each story leads reader to not only feel suspense for the characters surroundings but also for the character in various ways. In the final analysis, the authors’ implication of an eerie setting, sensory details, chilling events, and character development achieved a suspenseful mood. Each of these dark romantic characteristics triggers certain emotions such as agitation, nervousness, and anxiety eventually leading to create a suspenseful atmosphere. Both stories use each dark romantic characteristic differently to establish this suspenseful atmosphere. â€Å"The Pit and the Pendulum† by Edgar Allan Poe and â€Å"The Devil and Tom Walker† by Washington Irving establish a suspenseful mood by using the same Dark romantic characteristics differently.