Throughout the story there are a lot of different types of words used to create different sorts of atmospheres. Whenever the author refers to the dream more dark and warped words are used; words like ghost, danger, strange, curious, scanty, murder and alone. I think by this clever use of words the author creates a very dark and strange atmosphere that matches the mood of Isaac’s uncertain future. This allowed the reader to interact with Isaac a lot more and lets the reader almost sympathise Isaac’s uncertain way of life.
When the woman Isaac marries is introduced to the story we know there is something dark and sinister by the way she wishes to purchase poison from the chemist, and also by the dark evil surrounds in which Isaac and the woman meet.
The second story I am going examine is the ‘Old Nurses Story’ written by Elizabeth Gaskell, she is a known author who rote a lot of stories about the poor working class in the Victorian times, I feel this is why the story is told by the view of a maid.
The nurse in this story is called Hester, and it is she who narrates the story fro us, and tells it from her point of view. The story is that of an orphaned child and her carer or nurse, who have to go and live with distant relations of the orphaned child in a place, called Furnivall Manor where the story takes place.
Old manors are a traditional place in which you expect the supernatural to occur, and so immediately this is an example of how the author is creating the atmosphere in the story. As expected, early on in the story we find that mysterious things appear to be happening in the old manor, the most noticeable is the old organ which appears to playing by itself with no explanation and a little girl outside in the snow crying, who leaved no footprints, the old inhabitants of the manor appear to deny all supernatural happenings in the house also creating a suspicious atmosphere.
The mystery is finally foretold and we find that it is the spirit of Lord Furnivall who is playing the organ, he is the previous owner of the grand manor and appears to be a troubled spirit. Lord Furnivall had two children called Grace and Maud. Both of the daughters fell in love with the same man but only one could have him, Maud however had a secret child with this man and Lord Furnivall evidently found out about the child, and banished his daughter from the house, Maud and her daughter are cast out into the snow and evidently die, causing these troubled spirits to roam the house still after there deaths.
The old nurse’s story has a somewhat slow plot structure as it builds up a mysterious and suspicious atmosphere. Hints are dropped as the story goes on, and it climaxes at the end of the story where the mystery of the old manor is revealed.
The story creates a typically ghostly atmosphere as it is set in a stereotypical setting of an old haunted manor that has been in the same for generations, ‘gnarled thorn-trees, and old oaks, all white and peeled with age’ is an example of the type of wording used to describe the old manor. The story is written in a very archaic way, with use of such words as, ‘parsonage and durst.’
The author in this story spends a lot of time describing the old manor in great detail, allowing the reader to get a strong mental image of the old manor in there heads, and therefore allowing the reader so become much more involved in the story.
The adventure of the Engineer’s thumb is the third story and is written by a famous author-Arthur Conan Doyle, famous for his stories about Sherlock Holmes. A lot of his stories were written in the same era as Jack the Ripper, this was a time when the police weren’t trusted by the public, and so the stories are written about a private detective who would b much more trusted in the times this story was written. The doctor whom the engineer goes to see about his amputated thumb narrates this story.
Mr Victor Hatherley is an engineer who is the main character within the story; he goes to a doctor for some help regarding his amputated thumb. The doctor recognises the wound, and concludes that the man must have been stuck with a sharp object causing the loss of his thumb. The engineer goes onto tell his story to the doctor and claims that he was nearly killed. The doctor asks for the engineer to go and see a trusted private detective he no’s, a certain Sherlock Holmes.
The engineer explains his story to the detective, he tells him how he was involved with fixing a machine for a group of suspicious individuals, he goes on to tell Sherlock Holmes how the people how strange these people he worked for appeared to be. The employers of the engineer tried to kill him by throwing him into the press machine that he was working on. He manages to escape however by jumping free out of the window. When he jumps from the window he hangs for a brief moment on the window ledge before, it is within this time that one of the strange men comes and strikes at his hand with a sharp object, causing the loss of his thumb.
This story starts off with a fast beginning, and creates almost straight away a strangely mysterious atmosphere, which invited the reader to read on. The first thing mentioned is the engineer going to the doctor, obviously injured in some way.
We know immediately that something sinister has happened when the engineer says to the doctor ‘it was a murderous attack’ we realise here it is no accident the engineer has lost his thumb and therefore some sort of mystery must have happened.
The author builds up tension by the way he inquires about how the engineer has lost his thumb,
“An accident, I presume?”
“By no means”,
“What, a murderous attack?”
The author shows the engineer’s obviously fear at what has happened, because he doesn’t appear to want to re-live the account of how he lost the thumb, and when he does he explains the study very hurriedly suggesting fear and anxiousness.
The author creates a strange, almost unreal atmosphere when describing the house the engineer worked in, words such as, ‘darkness, silent, science, clock ticking loudly’ create an atmosphere that suggests they should not be there, that the house should b left alone, the house is empty but a presence is felt, creating a very eerie atmosphere. The house is situated in the middle of the countryside, a peaceful place that contrasts greatly from the eerie house. The house is deadly quite and the ticking of a clock shatters the silence, adding to the eerie atmosphere inside the house.
The Signal Man by Charles Dickens is the forth story which I shall examine, this story was very modern for its time, it is a story based about the railways which was a new invention in the time the story was written.
Charles Dickens wrote this story for a specific reason being that he was involved in a train accident himself in the same year that he wrote this short story, obviously portraying his unease at this latest invention. The signalman in the story is considered to be a working class man who is highly dedicated to his job.
The character in the story sees the signalman working on the railways far below him; this immediately suggests a class difference between the 2 characters. The signalman upon closer inspection looks disturbed and hostile to the narrator of the story. The character begins to ask the signalman why he looks so troubled, the signal man goes on to explain his chilling account.
He says that he has a seen a strange vision which appears to be some sort of warning, but although the vision appears to him whenever danger is near, the vision does not help him prevent the for coming accident. The signalman sees the ghost a few times throughout the story and each time the ghost is standing in the same position shouting and waving and each time predicting a terrible tragedy which is soon to happen on the railway, he is troubled as he cannot be sure what this vision wants from him and one night as he goes out onto the line, possibly to see the vision again, the signalman is hit by a train and killed.
In this story Charles Dickens uses lots of complex language and a very archaic style of language because of the time it was written, using words such as thus.
The author hints throughout the story that something sinister is going to happen to the signalman, for example, the odd figure standing in the same stance, waving exactly the same and shouting the exact same things, predicting a tragedy which we only find out at the end of the story.
The use of a sprit warning the signal man immediately creates a highly eerie atmosphere that suggests the supernatural is going to happen. The story in general highlights the difference between the working and upper class in the Victorian times, more than hinting at the super natural, the signal is just a working class man while the people riding on he train are obviously upper class, I feel this is the hidden message beneath the supernatural story. The narrator then goes on to say how there is hardly any light shining in the trench below where the signalman is working, for example, ‘steeped in the glow of an angry sunset’ creating a very bleak view of the signalman’s life and also showing how his living conditions are poor, creating a dark dank setting for the story to be told in.
I feel the story is based very much on the supernatural, and also an atmosphere is created to be wary of trains, suggesting Charles Dickens didn’t agree with the changing time and technology.
The final story I am going to examine is ‘The Red Room’ by George Wells. This is the story of a man who is challenged to stay one night in a haunted house. The three eerie inhabitants of the house believe there is a ghostly room within the house, and they warn the man of the horrors of the room before he takes up his bet and enters the room.
The inhabitants of the house are not given names throughout the whole story; they are therefore recognised by each of their distinctive features such as the man with the withered hand, this adds to the eerie atmosphere within the house. The man sets out to uncover the supposed haunted ‘red room’ in the house. The man arrives in the room to find the room in darkness, adding to the already eerie feel of the room, he therefore begins to light the candles scattered variously around the room however mysteriously the candles keep going out themselves without any form of draft present in the room. This continues to happen and the candles continue to extinguish themselves, the man panics and in the end in a state of confusion and fright falls over something hidden in the shadows of the murky room and bangs his head, falling unconscious. He wakes the following morning surrounded by the three old inhabitants of the house, where they inquire if the rumour that the room is haunted is true, the man proclaims that no such ghost haunts the room, only the fear of the supernatural.
From the very beginning of the story we can tell that an unnatural atmosphere is created. The author explains almost immediately the sinister plot of the story and the reader knows immediately what to expect. The story builds up a lot of tension as the reader expects something supernatural to occur, however tension is mounted as the story goes on and nothing significant happens. The unnatural atmosphere is created within the first sentence of the story, where a ghost is immediately mentioned.
The author builds of this within the first two pages, using a vast amount of dark and twisted words such as, ‘ Ghost, fire, withered arm, staring, old, mirror, bent wrinkled, hang, pale.’ Each of these words creates a picture in the reader’s mind of an old haunted manor, a traditional setting for the supernatural to happen, and very old-fashioned style of room. This could be an excellent setting for a ghost story; very stereotypical however it allows the audience to create there own view on what the settings should look like. The description of the characters also adds to the dark twisted atmosphere, making me feel these people have lived in this house forever. The description given to the house creates the same type of atmosphere as the description on the characters living in it, both of them adding together to create a unique evil presence within the house. The words are dark and complex, ‘a glimpse of myself, abbreviated and broadened to an impossible sturdiness.’ This is a twisted shape of a person, adding to the sick and twisted atmosphere given off by the house, it also fits in well with the people who live in the house. The atmosphere in this story is a stereotypical haunted house, and I feel the story is built up a lot on what is supposed to happen, but however never does happen, the seeing of a ghost.
