“The Pedestrian”, understandably, is written in twentieth century English and has modern syntax and modern language. “The Pedestrian” has an historical context just like the three other stories, but unlike those stories this historical context is from the future, after the story was written, rather than being from before the story was written like “The Red Room”. The comparison “The Pedestrian” has between the first three short stories is that just as “The Red Room” is written after the time in which the story is set, “The Pedestrian” is set after the time in which it is written. This futuristic style enables the writer to take advantage of the unknown, giving him the ability to write about events or objects that are unbelievable and make them believable. For example,
“Your name?’ said the police car”
The obvious difference from ordinary language is the extract that mentions the car talking. As long as this story is set in the future then this type of language is acceptable, as talking police cars may be a normal occurrence. This type of grammatical writing is what “The Red Room”, “The Signalman” and “The Solitary Cyclist” cannot use, as their stories are written in the past. Instead of focusing on unbelievable situations, their main focus aspect is irregularity. “The Red Room’s” main focus aspect is of ghosts, which were well known about during the nineteenth century, but, were unbelievable to most people. This is exactly how H.G. Wells plays on the emotions (in this case fear) of the reader with the use of unbelievable situations (ghosts) in the same way that Ray Bradbury creates unbelievable objects (the talking car) which create a new interesting atmosphere allowing the reader to ‘escape’ reality for a time.
In “The Red Room” the main aspects that are focused on are fear, terror, horror etc. and they help progress the narrator through to the intangible use of fear, ending with the discovery of the “intruder”.
The narrator mentions at the beginning,
“It will take a very tangible ghost to frighten me,”
This shows the irony of his situation later on, as he is confronted with a very intangible ghost that does frighten him. This extract is in contrast with the ironic situations frequently found within Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s “Sherlock Holmes” series.
“It’s abduction, Watson, abduction! Murder! Heaven knows what!”
This is very ironic as no person was abducted or murdered, but it was all a plan to host a wedding, which is considered a very joyous occasion.
In “The Signalman” the communication between the narrator and the signalman is very formal and old fashioned as is the language used when the narrator from “The Red Room” talks to the elderly people or when he converses with himself (whilst trying to reassure himself), however, the language used by Dr. Watson in “The Solitary Cyclist”, despite still having its basis in early nineteenth century literature, the syntax is more modern, such as,
“You could not find a lonelier tract of road anywhere, and it is quite rare to meet so much as a cart, or a peasant.”
Here, the wording used is quite older than the syntax which is more modern. The syntax of “The Signalman” and “The Red Room” is a lot more complicated and formal. These two stories portray their language in different forms, however, to ensure the reader is compelled to read on, as the atmosphere is described in the stories style. For example, in “The Red Room” many Gothic elements are included to describe the castle in which it is set as being dark, damp and dangerous. The effect that is created gives horror, tension and suspense; all effective elements of this particular genre. “The Signalman” is not categorised as a Gothic horror, but more of a subtle version of one. The elements used in “The Signalman” are more mysterious and tense rather than the horrifying language used in “The Red Room”. The signalman is descriptively detailing past events that occurred before the beginning of the story in “The Signalman” and he does this as though he is telling a story. This is where we get the ‘story within a story’ effect which allows the reader to create their own second, imaginative picture of the environment within “The Signalman”. We then have the effects of mystery, (which, in at least one way, is portrayed in all three stories), suspense and confusion. Confusion may not be obvious within “The Signalman” as most of the story is quite understandable, but certain areas of the story are considerably bewildering to the modern reader, for example,
“However, be that as it may, I never was there, you may swear.’
‘I think I may’, he rejoined. ‘Yes; I am sure I may.”
This extract sounds difficult to comprehend, but effectively displays the intelligence of the two conversing characters. Charles Dickens included a lot of late nineteenth century syntax in his stories, to express his literature in the most intellectual way he could and this is what made his characters become real in the imagination of his readers. Charles Dickens wrote many stories including “A Tale of Two Cities” and “A Christmas Carol”. The comparison between “The Signalman” and “A Christmas Carol” is quite different. “The Signalman” is a colder story, with a more dramatic ending as the signalman is predicting his own death throughout. On the other hand, “A Christmas Carol” has a more light – hearted storyline. This shows us that Charles Dickens wrote stories under many different contexts; that he could write stories very different in contrast to each other and still use an advanced vocabulary to describe his stories in many different genres.
H.G. Wells wrote stories indirectly similar to each other. The two stories “The War of the Worlds” and “The Time Machine” are alike in many ways (such as language, writing patterns and the effects these create) but also completely different (with the genre, length and the syntax being different).
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was most famous for his Sherlock Holmes stories, who he introduced in 1887 in “A Study of Scarlet”. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote over fifty short stories for Strand Magazine about the famous detective from 1891 onwards. His writing style does not vary much throughout the “Sherlock Holmes” series, as they all use late nineteenth century language and syntax.
A subtle difference between “The Solitary Cyclist” and “The Red Room” is that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle uses dramatic irony in his story to give the same effect that H.G. Wells intends to give in “The Red Room”, except H.G. Wells does this by keeping the reader in the dark about what is happening. In “The Solitary Cyclist” the reader knows more about what is going on than Sherlock Holmes does, yet the reader doesn’t know how Sherlock Holmes is going to come to the conclusion the reader has. This is why this dramatic irony could be used to mislead the reader in to thinking they know what is happening whilst the story sends them down a different path. “The Red Room” has a completely different approach on the subject. The narrator in “The Red Room” does not know what is happening but unlike “The Solitary Cyclist”, the readers are as much in the dark as he is. This is how the Gothic elements introduced as soon as the story begins by H.G. Wells give an intense and unpredictable atmosphere.
“The Signalman” does not use either dramatic irony or keep its readers in the dark, but instead has the story build up an intense atmosphere of fear and mystery then create a shocking climax at the end. “The Red Room” also does this but it is the way that it builds up its intense atmosphere that sets it apart from the other stories. “The Signalman” does this by descriptively detailing the signalman himself, the environment around him and the events leading up to his death. This is done pedantically with only very choice words being used. For example,
“…an arm gesticulating, with the utmost passion and vehemence”
The language here has been chosen specifically to enhance the severity of it. The use of language that is nineteenth century but without nineteenth century syntax contributes to the overall effect, as it is more formal and complex, whilst nineteenth century syntax would make it seem less common.
“The Pedestrian”, being a twentieth century short story, has a more basic syntax and vocabulary but achieves the same ends by using quick, colloquial sentences that intensify the situation that the main character, Leonard Mead, is in and Ray Bradbury does this by creating an uncomfortable situation that the reader can sympathise with.
In comparison to “The Red Room”, “The Pedestrian” is a lot more comical and ironically amusing, whereas “The Red Room” is quite the opposite with a strict tense atmosphere; irony is also apart of “The Red Room” but it is not at all comical, as it is on the subject of ghosts, a regular associate of horror stories.
