The two stories are set in different decades. You can see this from the different attitudes of the times. The ‘Red Room’ is set in the late 18th century. People then were considered on their appearances and what kind of jobs they had. It was a key fact back then to look good other otherwise you would be known as no one. I can tell this from ‘The Red Room’ as it states that caretakers were thought of a disgusting, “I must confess I had scarce expected these grotesque custodians”. The man was thinking this about the old people that were caretakers of the castle. You can see that this has been changed know as it is now politically correct, as people take in personalities of the people around them. Gloominess, suggested by the cold and dark, contribute to the atmosphere of oppression and neglect.
In the ‘Darkness Out There’ you can see the value of war and how it was differently judged then to know. When Mrs. Rutter is telling the children about her incident with the children you see the delight in her actions. “Mrs. Rutter licked her lips”. This you would maybe not see in our day. If you were to commit a murder as she did you wouldn’t give these sly feelings towards little children or to any one else for that matter. She let someone die, it doesn’t matter if they are Germans or not, not many people would do that now, as times have moved on from then.
The structure of both stories is rather different even though it starts pretty much the same way. The major difference is where the atmosphere is built up. At the beginning of ‘Darkness Out There’ we find out why Sandra and Kerry are visiting Nether Cottage. Whilst in the ‘Red Room’ you see how the characters are described and what they say, which is rather boring. Then comes the difference as the ‘Darkness Out There’ still carries on in a boring manner while the Red Room starts to mention the haunted room to engage the readers interest. Which is how the reader creates more tension. Then in between ‘The Red Room’ there is atmosphere, e.g. when the candles go out. Whilst on the Darkness Out There Mrs. Rutter is still telling her story to the two children. The two stories end in a similar way. As ‘The Darkness Out There’ ends as Sandra sees the truth about darkness or evil in the world and ‘The Red Room’ ends in daylight contrasting with the darkness. So both stories create atmosphere in the end with the reader left thinking about the stories.
There are three main characters in the ‘Darkness Out There’, Sandra, Kerry and Mrs. Rutter. Sandra is the first character we meet. Although this is a short story we see how Sandra changes in the course of an afternoon. Mrs. Rutter says she is pretty, while Sandra herself remarks on her attractive feet; she makes her own clothes and dreams of having a sewing machine; she judges Kerry by his first appearance, she is also superstitious about the wood.
When Kerry asked Mrs. Rutter about the war she tells him to “Shut up”. This could be because she is frightened of what Mrs. Rutter would say or she is superstitious. This can cause atmosphere as it leaves the reader in two minds of why Sandra is saying that.
Kerry Stevens seems a stereotype, he works part time in a garage, and will have a full time job there when he leaves school. There are suggestions that Kerry is not as Sandra sees him to be. For example, he is ready to spend his free time helping old people, and he asks Mrs. Rutter what she wants them to do, then gets on with it steadily. Which could cause atmosphere as Sandra is contradicting herself. Which would make the reader ask if Sandra is correct or the facts right?
Mrs. Rutter is the opposite of Kerry in a way. She looks like a stereotype of a sweet old lady, calling Sandra “dear” and asking her if she is “courting”. She seems very interested in marriage and people having children. It may be that her own childlessness is something for which she blames the Germans. She says she was a widow at thirty-nine so it seems like she would have not had children anyway. She claims, “ I’ve got a sympathy with young people”. Perhaps she quite likes young people but she does not really have sympathy with them, as she is bitter and vengeful. Gradually her real character is revealed. As she does this you can tell by her actions that she is glad she did commit this tragedy and left the German man to die. “She chuckled”, “Mrs. Rutter licked her lips”. You can see from this how Mrs. Rutter was enjoying every moment telling her story. When Mrs. Rutter is revealing her character it creates atmosphere as she is meant to be an old lady who we know has committed a murder. The writer refers to ‘the boy’ and ‘the girl’ a lot, she doesn’t always use their names as it causes tension to the reader. It could mean that they could be in the same position when there is no name.
In the Red Room, the story introduces four characters. A young man, an old man and a woman, and another old man. We never know their names, which creates atmosphere. As it gets the reader thinking that it could be them. The young man is skeptical about the red room being haunted. The three elder people believe that it is haunted and dare not even go there. Opposites views build drama and drama build atmosphere. This is the perfect example of how opposites build tension. Firstly we have the young against the old, which also symbolizes the inexperienced against the wise. There are also the ‘skeptics’ and the ‘wise’. Although they may be wise they have never dared to go to the red room. They have become wise as they have heard the stories about the room but none of them have ever had first hand experience of the room.
There is a comparison between Kerry and ‘the young man’ in the Red Room. As the candles went out in the Red Room, the young man said, “turned my head involuntarily” as if he didn’t want anymore. He created a similar action to what Kerry did when he heard Mrs. Rutter’s story, “Dunno about you, but I’m going”. As he didn’t want to hear anymore and he just wanted to leave. Both writers hear describe true actions to reveal their fear.
Repetition is also a device used by writers to build up atmosphere. One of the most obvious examples is on the first page. “It’s your own choosing”. The old man is trying to warn the young man but at the same time he is leaving the decision to him. It is as if the three old people are ridding themselves of their responsibility of the young man. It is their duty like guardians, to warn the man of what they believe is to be his death. Another use of repetition is on page two where the old woman keeps on repeating “this night of all nights”. We never find out why that night is important but it gives the reader a ‘red herring’ question. Although we were going to find out when we read on; we want to have answers and this continues our interest into – “why was that night important?”
Penelope Lively repeated words like “spinney”, “sun” and “nervy”. By repeating these key words, the author perhaps makes them more powerful and complex, in readiness for the final paragraphs.
The title of both stories is symbolic, but of what? At first the darkness seems a simple metaphor for the unknown evil in Packer’s End. At first the reader would have thought that in the Red Room there would be something there to be scared of, but at the end of both stories the fear is known. The darkness is not evil outside in the woods and the fear is not to do with anyone in the Red Room. In ‘The Red Room’ it is the fear of your mind, nothing is actually in the room except what one believes is there. In ‘The Darkness Out There’ the fear is “out there” in the world of human experience, “in your head for ever like lines from a song…it was a part of you and you would never be without it”.
There are a few similarities in the language of both stories. But as they are set in different times the speech is different. You see in the Red Room that the speech through out the story stays pretty much the same. Using words like, “apoplexy”, “Ingoldsby fashion”, “penumbra”. These are all words used in that time and century. In the Darkness Out There the author changes her speech from standard to non- standard from time to time to create tension and atmosphere. Using non-standard phrases such as, “polleny summer grass”, “watching telly”, “its if you’re nervy you get bothered”. She moves from this kind of speech to standard English, e.g. “when she returned, the old woman was back in the armchair, a composite chintzy mass from which cushions oozed and her voice flowed softly on”. The effect is to suggest that some parts of the narrative are in Sandra’s own voice – as if the non-standard phrases are her thoughts. The more formal and controlled prose gives a more detached viewpoint.
Similes, metaphors, and personification of darkness and fear are used also to build up atmosphere in both stories. In the Red Room they use phrases like ‘little tongue of light’, meaning that there was a small glimpse of light in a very large room, creating atmosphere. Also phrases such as ‘ocean of mystery’, ‘like a ragged storm cloud sweeping out the stars’. The Darkness Out There uses phrases such as, ‘ a speck like a pin-head’, ‘his chin was explosive with acne’, and a creamy smiling pool of face’. You see in both stories that there is a comparison of different types of similes and metaphors used to build up the atmosphere.
The description of people in the Red Room builds up atmosphere, as it uses words like, “monstrous shadow”, “pale eyes” and “withered arm”. Words that describe the people in such depth it leaves the reader feeling sick just trying to picture it.
There is a certain stereotyping of the Darkness Out There. Here is an example. “Some of the old people were really nice”. This is something that reflects on the Red Room as well. As the young man at the end of the Red Room says that the old people are very nice when at the start he was describing there looks in a disgusting way.
In the Red Room the old people have a standard English vocabulary, whereas the young man is given a very upper class and stylish vocabulary. Around the epiphany of the story, the language relating to the young man’s experience is described in very short sentences with a lot of punctuation. The Darkness Out There uses high vocabulary but not all the way through the story. There is not much punctuation used in the story but there are quite a few short sentences creating tension prior to the end of the story.
From looking back at the essay I can tell that both writers have used effective methods to build atmosphere. They are two different stories but they have similarities through out both of them, which I have explained. H.G. Wells and Penelope Lively build up atmosphere to make the story interesting and keep the reader’s attention
By Mandeep Batavia
Candidate No. 8013
11Br
Ms.Potts
English
