american lit final
TRANSCRIPT
Short Story: The Fall of the House of Usher
Edgar Allan Poe
Film:The Shining
1980
Basis of Comparison
I chose to compareThe Fall of the House of Usher,
by Edgar Allan Poe, and the 1980’s film, The
Shining, because they both share the same theme:
isolation.
The Fall of the House of
Usher
Main Characters:
Narrator- The narrator never had a name, but was childhood friends
with Roderick Usher. He goes to the Usher house to help Roderick,
who was claiming to be physically sick.
Usher twins- Roderick Usher, and his twin sister Madeline Usher were
the last two living of the Usher family. The family never “branched out”
to keep the family name around. Roderick throughout the story
becomes more and more, as what the reader could describe, mentally
ill.
The Fall of the House of Usher
Conflicts:
Internal conflicts- The narrator wants to help his
friend, but his friends’ illness, and the way his home
looks creates a conflict in the narrators mind.
There is also an internal conflict between the
narrator and his friend. Both of them have drastically
changed since childhood, and so neither of them
knew who their old friends had really become.
The Fall of the House of Usher
Plot:This short story written by Edgar Allan Poe. The story
only has three characters: the narrator, who never
gets a name, Roderick Usher, and his twin sister,
Madeline Usher.
The story starts off with the narrator riding up to a
house on horseback that he describes as dark and
dull. Roderick Usher, the man living in the house,
sent him a letter saying that he needed company. As
the narrator enters the house, he describes walking
through many dark hallways looking for Roderick.
The Fall of the House of Usher
Plot (cont.)
When he finds Roderick, he describes him as pale, and less
energetic than he ever was. Roderick tells the narrator that
he is suffering from fear, that he’s afraid of his house. His twin
sister, Madeline, has become sick with catalepsy, or the loss
of control of the limbs in your body. The narrator spends
many days trying to cheer up his old childhood friend.
Eventually, Madeline dies. Roderick decides to bury her in the
tombs under the house, so that the doctors will not try to take
her body for scientific research.
The Fall of the House of Usher
Plot (cont.)
One night, neither characters could sleep, so the narrator
begins reading Roderick a story. As he’s reading, he
begins hearing noises that correspond with the story.
Roderick claims that he’s been hearing these noises ever
since they buried Madeline.
The wind blows open, and Madeline is standing behind the
door. She is bloody from the struggle of getting out alive.
As she’s dying, she attacks Roderick. Roderick dies from
fear, and the narrator runs away from the house. As the
narrator leaves, the house collapses behind him.
The Shining
Throughout the plot summary, the shine will be
referred to a lot.
The “shine” is actually the ability to communicate
telepathically with other who share this ability.
The Shining
Main Characters:
Jack Torrance- Jack is the husband of Wendy Torrance, and the
father of Danny Torrance. Jack is a writer, and a recovering
alcoholic who is asked to watch over the Overlook Hotel during the
winter. He eventually goes insane due to cabin fever, and attempts
to murder his family.
Danny Torrance- Danny is the son of Jack and Wendy who goes
with his family to help watch over the Overlook Hotel. He soon
discovers from a hotel chef while receiving a tour that he has a
special ability which is know as “shining.” He basically has the ability
to communicate telepathically with others who have this special
ability.
The Shining
Main Characters:
Mrs. Wendy Torrance- Mrs. Torrance is the wife of Jack Torrance. She
is a very loving and caring wife and mother. She displays these
characteristics throughout the movie a number of times. She is always
checking up on her husband and son to make sure they are ok.
Dick Hallorann- Mr. Hallorann was the chef at the Overlook Hotel
during the hotel’s open season. While he was showing Mrs. Torrance
around the kitchen with Danny, he telepathically asks Danny if he
wants ice-cream, sparking a conversation about how they both share
the same “power.”
The Shining
Conflicts:
Jack Torrance begins to develop cabin fever and
goes insane. His cabin fever causes him to attempt
to kill his family.
The Shining
Plot:
Jack Torrance receives a job interview for the Overlook
Hotel as a winter caretaker, which must close from
November to May due to heavy snow falling every winter.
He plans on using this as a quiet time to sit and work on
writing. While in the interview, the manager tells him about
the last caretaker, who developed cabin fever, and went
insane. Right after going insane, the man killed his wife,
two daughters, and then killed himself. Mr. Torrance tells
the manager that he is not worried, that he is positive he
will be able to maintain his sanity and be able to care for
the hotel while working on his writing.
The Shining
Plot: (cont.)Jack receives a job as a caretaker at the Overlook Hotel in the
mountains, which closes down during the winter due to terrible
snow storms.
On the last day the hotel was open, the family was given a
tour of the hotel. Mr. Hallorann, the chef, is giving Mrs.
Torrance and Danny a tour of the large hotel kitchen, and
discovers that Danny shares the same telepathy power that he
has. This is when Danny is offered ice-cream telepathically.
Danny then begins to ask questions about the hotel, and then
room 237. Room 237 is the room that the previous caretaker
had stacked the dead bodies in. Danny is warned to stay out
of that room.
The Shining
Plot: (cont.)Danny and his mother continue exploring the hotel, as
Jack’s writing still has not gone anywhere after a month.
There is a huge hedge maze that Danny and his mother
explore before the snow gets bad. Over time, Jack begins
to get very frustrated with his writing. He begins to have
random outbursts of violence and screaming.
Wendy and Danny become more and more afraid of Jack,
as these random outbursts become to get more and more
violent, as well as more often. Eventually Wendy becomes
so scared that she carries a bat with her when she goes to
check on him.
The Shining
Plot: (cont.)
One day Jack hits the peak, and goes on a
rampage. He attempts to attack Wendy. She hits
him with a bat and knocks him unconscious. She
drags him into the food closet in the kitchen, and
locks him in there. When he escapes the closet, he
chases them down. Jack disconnects all phone line,
and radio networks from the hotel so that no one
can get in touch with them.
The Fall of the House of Usher
Hero’s Journey:
Short Story- This story never shows the narrator in
his natural habitat.
Movie- Danny and his family are living happily, and
Danny’s father is taking this job so that he has time
to work on his writing career.
Short Story- The narrator receives a letter from an
old childhood friend requesting company. There he
gets on his horse and heads over there.
Movie- Danny moves into the hotel for the winter.
The narrator doesn't refuse the call, the story does
imply that he does debate on whether or not to go
inside.
Danny doesn’t refuse the call, he goes expecting a
huge place that he can run and play.
The narrator doesn’t meet anyone. Instead, he is
the mentor to his friend.
Danny meets the head chef, who he finds out also
has this telepathy power. The chef then tells him
about the hotel, and what not to do.
The narrator enters the dark house looking for his
friend.
The hotel closes, and Danny and his family are left
there for the winter.
The narrator finds that his friend has drastically
changed, but he is still a friend.
Danny begins to bond with his mother, and drift
from his father.
The narrator begins to adjust to helping his insane
friend.
Danny begins to adjust to being on his own, and
doing whatever he wants.
The narrator helps bury his friends sister under the
house. At this point, the friend becomes even more
insane like. The sister then comes back and kills
her brother.
At this point, Danny is trying to escape death with
his mother after his father has developed cabin
fever and gone insane.
The narrator escapes the house, and the house
crumbles down after he gets out.
Danny escapes death, and leaves his father to die
in the snow.
After the characters in both the story and movie
escape death, they both end. I assume they all
went back to normal life, with some few obvious
adjustments.
Works Cited
Poe, Edgar. The Fall of the House of Usher.
Prentice Hall Literature Florida The American
Experience.
Ed. Grant Wiggins. Upper Saddle River:
Pearson, 2010. 293-310
The Shining. Dir. Stanley Kubrick. Perf. Jack
Nicholson. Warner Home Video, 2010. DVD.