The Pit and the Pendulum
The Pit and the Pendulum is written by Edgar Allen Poe. The main character of the story is a man who is nameless. The man is sent to the prison of Toledo for being a committing a crime against the crown most likely a religious one.
“Yet, for a while, I saw; but with how terrible an exaggeration an exaggeration! I saw the lips of the black-robbed judges…I saw that the decrees of what to me was Fate was issuing from those lips. I saw them writhe with a deadly locution.”
The author mentions judges which indicate that he is on trial. He is sentenced to death when he mentions “I saw what the decrees of what to me was Fate”; fate of course is his life. He also mentions the word “deadly” which again supports the idea that he is sentenced to death.
As evidence that it was a religious crime is that he mentions seven candles.
“And then my vision felled upon the seven tall candles upon the table.”
How the number seven is important is that there are seven deadly sins in the Catholic religion, this indicates that he is Protestant. The narrator also uses the phase “I saw” several times throughout the passage. He uses that phase to emphasize his horror of what is occurring in his life at the moment. Edgar Allen Poe also uses ethos when he describes certain actions taken by the character.
“I had swooned; but will not say that all of consciousness was lost.”
The narrator faints a lot throughout the story. This demonstrates that he has a somewhat delicate character. Edgar Allen Poe also uses other different examples of ethos to show off the other character traits of the narrator.
“Up to the period when I fell, I had counted fifty-two paces, and, upon resuming my walk, I had counted forty-eight paces—when I arrived at the rag.”
By counting the cell the narrator is demonstrating curiosity. Any other prisoner will had just sat there lamenting his doom fate. Edgar Allen Poe wrote using Gothicism. Gothicism is dark and depressive, and it usually looks at the negativity of life. Edgar Allen Poe demonstrates this throughout his story.
The blackness of the eternal night encompassed me, I gasped for breath. The intensity of the darkness seemed to oppressed and stifle me. The atmosphere was intolerably close.
Edgar Allen Poe uses blackness, night, and darkness. Those words are often link to evil or negative energies. They are also used to emphasize the narrator’s current state of negativity. With those words Edgar Allen Poe links to Gothicism. At the end of the Pit and the Pendulum the narrator is rescued by the French.
“There was a loud blast as of many trumpets! There was a discordant hum of human voices! There was a harsh grating of a thousand thunders! The fiery walls rushed back!”
In this quote Edgar Allen Poe uses syntax. How he uses syntax is that he uses several exclamation points and the sentences are somewhat short. He uses exclamation point to emphasize the narrator’s disbelief and happiness of being rescued.