Discuss How H.G Wells Uses Structure, Character, Setting and
Imagery to Create and Sustain an Atmosphere of
Suspense and Tension.
The author H.G Wells wrote “The Red Room” during the Victorian era. This story belongs to the tradition of Victorian gothic mysteries. The Victorian gothic genre is a type of romantic fiction that was popular in English literature in the late 18th and the early 19th century. The setting of this genre is usually a ruined gothic castle or abbey. The gothic novel is emphasised by mystery and horror, which is done by using ghost-haunted rooms, underground passages, and secret stairways. This story “The Red Room” features many of these characteristics of gothic writing such as an old derelict house, spiral staircases, a haunted room and the “subterranean” passages suggest darkness and create mystery in the readers mind. The story focuses on a young, over confident, naive man who defies the warnings from the “grotesque” housekeepers and spends a night in a haunted room. He has to confront his own fear and ends the ordeal in the care of the old housekeepers. The man learnt an important lesson he learnt that fear is in his own imagination and learns to respect older, wiser individuals. In this essay I will examine how H.G Wells uses character, structure, setting and imagery to create and sustain an atmosphere of tension and suspense in “The Red Room”