From the collection of short stories you have read, discuss the ways in which the writers succeed in creating a sense of tension and suspense

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Nicky Pearson 10s        21 October 2003

From the collection of short stories you have read, discuss the ways in which the writers succeed in creating a sense of tension and suspense.

Support your discussion with examples from the stories.

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In this assessment I am going to discuss the ways in which a selection of writers build suspense and tension through their stories. I will use two stories from before nineteen fourteen and two from after nineteen fourteen. I will use ‘The Red Room’ by H.G Wells because it is from before nineteen fourteen. The story is about a man who stays in a room in an old castle to disprove the alleged existence of a ghost. Also from before nineteen fourteen is ‘The Signalman’ by Charles Dickens, it is about a man who visits a signal man and hears how he has had supernatural encounters with someone or something. A story from after nineteen fourteen is ‘Man from the South’ by Roald Dahl. In this story a sailor bets his finger for a sports car. Finally I will discuss ‘Farthing House’ by Susan Hill. Like in ‘The Signalman’ someone encounters supernatural experiences, but in an old peoples home.

        In ‘The Red Room’ tension is built up immediately by the presence of the old people.

“the man with the withered arm…

…the man with the shade…

...the old woman sat staring into the fire, her pale eyes wide open.”

The old people continue to build a presence of uncertainty about them by repeating phrases through out the conversation with the man.

“It’s your own choosing…

…on this night of all nights.”

This makes the reader uncertain about the sanity of the old people and what they are doing in a big old castle anyway.

        In a similar way to ‘The Red Room’ the characters at the start of ‘The Signalman’ create suspense. A stranger goes to see a signalman. We don’t know why he goes to see him, which adds to the suspense of the stranger. When he shouts to the signalman, the signalman looks up at him as if he was frightened.

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“He looked up at me without replying, and I looked down at him pressing him to soon with a repetition of my idle question.”

This makes us weary of both characters that build up the tension. When they meet the tension decreases because they seem to be normal.

        ‘The man from the South’ uses more characters than any other story that I am discussing. However, one character seems to create the suspense more than any other.

“A small, oddish man walking briskly around the edge of the pool. He was immaculately dressed in a white suit ...

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