Tomb or Womb: The Freudian Approach to Live Burial in Edgar Allan Poe‘s "The Fall of the House of Usher" and "The Premature Burial"

Tomb or Womb: The Freudian Approach to Live Burial in Edgar Allan Poe‘s Author: Gaj Tomas
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
ISBN: 3640983912
Category : Literary Collections
Languages : en
Pages : 26

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Book Description
Seminar paper from the year 2011 in the subject American Studies - Literature, grade: A, University of Graz, language: English, abstract: There is a certain clever rhetoric from the buried protagonist in the introduction ―The Premature Burial‖, Edgar Allan Poe‘s tale: ―The boundaries which divide Life from Death, are at best shadowy and vague. Who shall say where the one ends, and the other begins?― (Poe 322), as he finds himself ―buried‖ in what he believes to be a coffin, as the story starts to intrigue us with one of the most terrifying and arguably uncanny experiences – live burial. The narrator is obsessed, a walking ―dead man‖, who eventually saves himself from the terrifying experience and exaggerated fear, but not from the uncanny feeling. It is as much dreadful as when we as readers perceive the buried-alive Lady Madeline Usher breaking the vault steel door of her coffin, uttering eerie sounds and appearing bloody at her brother Roderick‘s door in Poe‘s even more gruesome tale, ―The Fall of the House of Usher‖. The protagonists too are quite different, as are the representations of the motive of live burial in both stories – one hand we deal with, as this essay will try and prove, an evident incestuous relationship and perhaps Roderick‘s certain repressed wishes, and on the other hand the exaggerated, almost satiric general fear of a seemingly cataleptic state and death.

Tomb or Womb: The Freudian Approach to Live Burial in Edgar Allan Poe‘s "The Fall of the House of Usher" and "The Premature Burial"

Tomb or Womb: The Freudian Approach to Live Burial in Edgar Allan Poe‘s Author: Gaj Tomas
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
ISBN: 3640983912
Category : Literary Collections
Languages : en
Pages : 26

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Book Description
Seminar paper from the year 2011 in the subject American Studies - Literature, grade: A, University of Graz, language: English, abstract: There is a certain clever rhetoric from the buried protagonist in the introduction ―The Premature Burial‖, Edgar Allan Poe‘s tale: ―The boundaries which divide Life from Death, are at best shadowy and vague. Who shall say where the one ends, and the other begins?― (Poe 322), as he finds himself ―buried‖ in what he believes to be a coffin, as the story starts to intrigue us with one of the most terrifying and arguably uncanny experiences – live burial. The narrator is obsessed, a walking ―dead man‖, who eventually saves himself from the terrifying experience and exaggerated fear, but not from the uncanny feeling. It is as much dreadful as when we as readers perceive the buried-alive Lady Madeline Usher breaking the vault steel door of her coffin, uttering eerie sounds and appearing bloody at her brother Roderick‘s door in Poe‘s even more gruesome tale, ―The Fall of the House of Usher‖. The protagonists too are quite different, as are the representations of the motive of live burial in both stories – one hand we deal with, as this essay will try and prove, an evident incestuous relationship and perhaps Roderick‘s certain repressed wishes, and on the other hand the exaggerated, almost satiric general fear of a seemingly cataleptic state and death.

Tomb Or Womb

Tomb Or Womb PDF Author: Gaj Tomas
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
ISBN: 3640984129
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 29

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Book Description
Seminar paper from the year 2011 in the subject American Studies - Literature, grade: A, University of Graz, language: English, abstract: There is a certain clever rhetoric from the buried protagonist in the introduction ―The Premature Burial‖, Edgar Allan Poe's tale: ―The boundaries which divide Life from Death, are at best shadowy and vague. Who shall say where the one ends, and the other begins?― (Poe 322), as he finds himself ―buried‖ in what he believes to be a coffin, as the story starts to intrigue us with one of the most terrifying and arguably uncanny experiences - live burial. The narrator is obsessed, a walking ―dead man‖, who eventually saves himself from the terrifying experience and exaggerated fear, but not from the uncanny feeling. It is as much dreadful as when we as readers perceive the buried-alive Lady Madeline Usher breaking the vault steel door of her coffin, uttering eerie sounds and appearing bloody at her brother Roderick's door in Poe's even more gruesome tale, ―The Fall of the House of Usher‖. The protagonists too are quite different, as are the representations of the motive of live burial in both stories - one hand we deal with, as this essay will try and prove, an evident incestuous relationship and perhaps Roderick's certain repressed wishes, and on the other hand the exaggerated, almost satiric general fear of a seemingly cataleptic state and death.

The Premature Burial

The Premature Burial PDF Author: Edgar Allan Poe
Publisher: SAMPI Books
ISBN: 6561330781
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 33

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Book Description
In Edgar Allan Poe's "The Premature Burial", a man obsessed with the fear of being buried alive recounts known cases of premature burial. His fixation drives him to extremes to avoid his fate, until he confronts the reality of his greatest phobia in a shocking way.

The Premature Burial

The Premature Burial PDF Author: Edgar Allan Edgar Allan Poe
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781521111604
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 87

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Book Description
How is this book unique? Font adjustments & biography included Unabridged (100% Original content) Illustrated About The Premature Burial by Edgar Allan Poe The Premature Burial is a horror fiction by Edgar Allan Poe. In "The Premature Burial", the first-person unnamed narrator describes his struggle with things such as "attacks of the singular disorder which physicians have agreed to term catalepsy," a condition where he randomly falls into a death-like trance. This leads to his fear of being buried alive ("The true wretchedness," he says, is "to be buried while alive."). He emphasizes his fear by mentioning several people who have been buried alive. In the first case, the tragic accident was only discovered much later, when the victim's crypt was reopened. In others, victims revived and were able to draw attention to themselves in time to be freed from their ghastly prisons. The narrator reviews these examples in order to provide context for his nearly crippling phobia of being buried alive. As he explains, his condition made him prone to slipping into a trance state of unconsciousness, a disease that grew progressively worse over time. He became obsessed with the idea that he would fall into such a state while away from home, and that his state would be mistaken for death. He extracts promises from his friends that they will not bury him prematurely, refuses to leave his home, and builds an elaborate tomb with equipment allowing him to signal for help in case he should awaken after "death".

The Premature Burial

The Premature Burial PDF Author: Edgard Allan Poe
Publisher: MB Cooltura
ISBN: 9877448432
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 41

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Book Description
In The Premature Burial, the first-person unnamed narrator describes the horror caused by the danger of being buried alive. The theme gives rise to an ingenious exercise in sustained tension and offers an extraordinary warning: each one is a craftsman of his own hell. The genius of Edgar Allan Poe molds a perfect, claustrophobic, intriguing story to enjoy until the last word.

The Premature Burial

The Premature Burial PDF Author: Edgar Allen Poe
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781515116592
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 34

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Book Description
"The Premature Burial" is a horror short story on the theme of being buried alive, written by Edgar Allan Poe, (1809-1849), and published in 1844 in The Philadelphia Dollar Newspaper. Fear of being buried alive was common in this period and Poe was taking advantage of the public interest. The story has been adapted to a film.In "The Premature Burial", the first-person unnamed narrator describes his struggle with things such as "attacks of the singular disorder which physicians have agreed to term catalepsy," a condition where he randomly falls into a death-like trance. This leads to his fear of being buried alive ("The true wretchedness," he says, is "to be buried while alive."). He emphasizes his fear by mentioning several people who have been buried alive. In the first case, the tragic accident was only discovered much later, when the victim's crypt was reopened. In others, victims revived and were able to draw attention to themselves in time to be freed from their ghastly prisons.The narrator reviews these examples in order to provide context for his nearly crippling phobia of being buried alive. As he explains, his condition made him prone to slipping into a trance state of unconsciousness, a disease that grew progressively worse over time. He became obsessed with the idea that he would fall into such a state while away from home, and that his state would be mistaken for death. He extracts promises from his friends that they will not bury him prematurely, refuses to leave his home, and builds an elaborate tomb with equipment allowing him to signal for help in case he should awaken after "death".The story culminates when the narrator awakens in pitch darkness in a confined area - he has been buried alive, and all his precautions were to no avail. He cries out and is immediately hushed; he realizes that he is in the berth of a small boat, not a grave. The event shocks him out of his obsession with death.

The Pit and the Pendulum

The Pit and the Pendulum PDF Author: Edgar Allen Poe
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
ISBN: 9781522863960
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 40

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Book Description
Classic Horror Stories - The Pit and the Pendulum & The Premature Burial - Edgar Allen Poe - Edgar Allan Poe (January 19, 1809 - October 7, 1849) was an American writer, editor, and literary critic. Poe is best known for his poetry and short stories, particularly his tales of mystery and the macabre. Widely regarded as a central figure of Romanticism in the United States and American literature as a whole, he was one of the country's earliest practitioners of the short story. Poe is generally considered the inventor of the detective fiction genre and is further credited with contributing to the emerging genre of science fiction. He was the first well-known American writer to try to earn a living through writing alone, resulting in a financially difficult life and career. Poe and his works influenced literature in the United States and around the world, as well as in specialized fields, such as cosmology and cryptography. Poe and his work appear throughout popular culture in literature, music, films, and television. A number of his homes are dedicated museums today. The Mystery Writers of America present an annual award known as the Edgar Award for distinguished work in the mystery genre.

The Premature Burial: Large Print

The Premature Burial: Large Print PDF Author: Edgar Allan Poe
Publisher: Independently Published
ISBN: 9781798452394
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 28

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Book Description
Poe's short horror story on the theme of being buried alive, which was a common fear in this period and Poe took advantage of the public interest. The first-person unnamed narrator describes his struggle with "attacks of the singular disorder which physicians have agreed to term catalepsy," a condition where he randomly falls into a death-like trance. This leads to his fear of being buried alive ("The true wretchedness," he says, is "to be buried while alive."). He awakens one morning to find his worst fears realized!

The Premature Burial

The Premature Burial PDF Author: Edgar Allan Poe
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781544096285
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 28

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Book Description
The short story "The Premature Burial" features the theme of being buried - alive! The unnamed narrator describes his struggle with "attacks of the singular disorder which physicians have agreed to term catalepsy," a condition where he randomly falls into a death-like trance. This leads to his fear of being buried alive ... The fear of being buried alive was common in Poe's period and the author was taking advantage of the public interest. The story has been adapted to film.

Buried Alive

Buried Alive PDF Author: Jan Bondeson
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 9780393322224
Category : Burial
Languages : en
Pages : 324

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Book Description
During the 1800s, stories filled medical journals as well as fiction (Poe's "The Premature Burial") of people being buried before they actually died. Canvassing medical records of the time, the author presents an engrossing and witty history of the fear and facts of being buried alive. Illustrations.