1. WHAT IS ONE OF THE THEMES OF THIS PIECE? DESCRIBE AND GIVE AT LEAST TWO EXAMLES OF EVIDENCE OF THIS THEME:
The main theme of the text is, of course, THE FEAR and this is because he is never seeing or describing us a specific creature, in fact, he is just trying to don’t believe what had been told to him, but despite he is always saying that it is not scared we can identify that he, in fact, is really surprised and scared about the situation. We also, as readers, can share his feelings and fears because all the descriptions correspond with what has been taught to us to identify as horror stuff.
can identify FEAR in these two quotes of the text:
- “<em>By this time I was in a state of considerable nervous tension, although to my reason there was no adequate cause for my condition”.</em>
- <em>“I must confess that the oddness of these three old pensioners in whose charge her ladyship had left the castle, and the deep-toned, old-fashioned furniture of the housekeeper’s room, in which they foregathered, had affected me curiously in spite of my effort to keep myself at a matter-of-fact phase”</em>
2. HOW WELL DO YOU THINK THE AUTHOR CONVEYED THIS THEME 'EXPLAIN, USING SUPPORT FROM READING.
I think the author conveyed the theme masterfully because when he is telling the story makes us, as readers, to feel what he is feeling. To make it possible he describes a lot the atmosphere that he is experimenting and this is why he never incorporates a specific terror figure; instead of doing that he allows us to imagine, which works really good.
there is an example of the descriptions that the author use to makes us part of the scary moment:
<em>" I entered, closed the door behind me at once, turned the key I found in the lock within, and stood with the candle held aloft surveying the scene of my vigil, the great Red Room of Lorraine Castle, in which the young Duke had died; or rather in which he had begun his dying, for he had opened the door and fallen headlong down the steps I had just ascended.”</em>
<em> 3. </em>WHY IS THE NARRATOR IN A STATE OF "CONSIDERABLE NERVOUS TENSION" AFTER HE SURVEYS THE ROOM?
He is feeling like that not because he had already seen some ghost by that moment, but the atmosphere of the red room added to all the things the elderly said to him provokes the sensation of being uncomfortable and a little scared. He describes his feeling as it follows despite what he is, in fact, thinking and feeling:
<em> “My mind, however, was perfectly clear. I postulated quite unreservedly that nothing supernatural could happen, and to pass the time I began stringing some rhymes together, Ingoldsby fashion, concerning the original legend of the place.” </em>
As we can see he tries, in every moment, to be quiet and not feeling fear or pain, but it is really hard for him to achieve it.
4. WHAT DOES THE MAN WITH SHADED EYES MEAN WHEN HE SAYS HE KNEW THAT IT WAS "A POWER OF DARKNESS" THAT WAS HAUNTING THE ROOM?
When the old man with shaded eyes said he knew that it was “a power of darkness” who was haunting the room he refers to all that haunts that was living by this moment at that room, but probably he could refer to th<u>e force that takes the man into the ghosted house </u>because, as the man said at the beginning of the text he felt like those 3 elderlies didn’t belong to his time. Of course, the power of darkness can change according to everyone beliefs, but if one thing is certain is that they warned him to not enter.