Young Goodman Brown Fall Of The House

Young Goodman Brown, Fall Of The House Of Usher, Rip Van Winkle Summaries Essay, Research Paper

In the early eighteen hundreds, literature in the Americas started a revolution of style in upcoming authors. Authors started to look towards nature for symbolism and society as a source of sin. The underlined meaning in most of these stories was meant to leave the reader with a new perspective of their personal lives and society as a whole. Three stories that use this particular technique are Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “Young Goodman Brown,” Edgar Allen Poe’s “Fall of the House of Usher,” and Washington Irving’s “Rip Van Winkle.

“Young Goodman Brown”, by Nathaniel Hawthorne, is a story of a man named Goodman Brown, who is of strong Puritan belief. Goodman Brown leaves his wife, Faith, to travel into the depths of the woods one dark night led by a stranger. Goodman Brown is led to some secret meeting in the woods, where some of his fellow villagers are present. At this point in the story Goodman brown discovers that he is about to unravel hidden parts of the villagers’ lives. “This night it shall be granted to you to know their secret deeds…”(946).

Goodman Brown feels out of place and worried that his fellow Puritans would have secret hidden sins. The conflict for Goodman Brown comes in his decision whether he should join in the circle of sin and be like the rest of his village or hold true to his beliefs and reject any attempt to be persuaded. The climax of the story comes when Goodman Brown decides to stick by his religion and not to enter the circle of sin even though his wife, Faith, is a part of the sinning group. “Faith! Faith!…look up to heaven and resist the wicked one”(947). The denouement of Goodman Brown is tragic in an off beat sense. Goodman Brown holds to his beliefs like most people would be expected to, but his beliefs reflect the way he feels towards others in his society. The only person that felt any different from that night in the woods was Goodman Brown. As he entered the village he saw Faith gazing anxiously forth any sign of him.. Once she saw him, she burst into such joy at sight of him that she skipped along the street and almost kissed her husband before the whole village. But Goodman Brown looked sternly and sadly into her face, and passed on without a greeting”(947). Goodman Brown is then punished the rest of his life, due to his unrealistic belief that everyone is perfect and no one sins. Goodman Brown is very distrustful to everyone in his community and ironically creates his own hell.

“The Fall of the House of Usher”, by Edgar Allen Poe, is about a man named Roderick Usher and the insanity that he experiences after the death of his sister Madeline. The narrator of the story is an old friend of Roderick and visits him in his time of grief and misery.

On the night the narrator arrives, Roderick’s sister Madeline finally passes away. Roderick is very disturbed by his sister’s death. Roderick begins to go insane after the burial of his sister. Stricken with guilt, he starts to believe that she is still alive in her tomb. The narrator tries to calm Roderick by reading him a story entitled “Mad Twist.” This story is very ironic to the situation that the narrator is resolving. “It was, however, the only book immediately at hand: and I indulged a vague hope that the excitement which now agitated the hypochondriac, might find relief (for the history of mental disorder is full of similar anomalies) even in the extremes of the folly which I should read”(774). As the narrator reads deeper into the story, Roderick believes even stronger that his sister is coming from the grave to get him. It is at this point in the story that the narrator starts to get spooked by Roderick’s insanity. “No sooner had these syllables passed my lips, than –as if a shield of brass had indeed, at the moment, fallen heavily upon the floor of silver –I became aware of a distinct, hollow, metallic, and clangorous, yet apparently muffled reverberation”(776). The conflict that the narrator has is to resist being pulled into Roderick’s insanity and misery about his dear sister, Madeline.

The Climax of the story comes when the deceased Madeline bursts through the windows of Roderick’s study and attacks Roderick. The narrator at this point in the story runs to save himself. The question that is often debated over is whether the narrator was running away from the corpse of Madeline or if it was the insanity of Roderick Usher. The denouement of the story is the narrator standing outside the House of Usher thinking of the sad fate that both Roderick and Madeline suffer as the house crumbles on top of them. “While I gazed, this fissure rapidly widened –there came a fierce breath of the whirlwind –the entire orb of the satellite burst at once upon my sight –my brain reeled as I saw the mighty walls rushing asunder –there was a ling tumultuous shouting sound like the voice of a thousand waters –and the deep and dark tarn at my feet closed sullenly and silently over the fragments of the House of Usher”(777).

Washington Irving’s story “Rip Van Winkle” is about a simple village man that lives his life under the rule of the British. His everyday activities consist of conversing with other villagers in a local Inn. “The children, too, would shout with joy whenever he approached”(621).

Rip Van Winkle’s wife Dame Van Winkle unfortunately nagged him to