How Does H.G Wells convey the experience of fear in ‘The Red Room’?

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English Coursework                By Michael Horwood

How Does H.G Wells convey the experience of fear in ‘The Red Room’?

H.G wells creates the sense of fear by creating an eerie situation that creates an overwhelming sense of darkness in the mind of the narrator. Consequently this causes him to be very fearful himself. He also uses a first person narrator, which makes the turn of events more immediate. He personifies objects and keeps the atmosphere of the story very tense by often using very short and simple sentences. Another essential way of conveying the fear is the delayed release of certain information. Throughout the story, many questions are raised in the thoughts of the reader, which are not answered until a few paragraphs or even pages later. However, some questions are not answered at all.

Wells uses the title ‘The Red Room’, which is quite a mysterious title: it makes the reader wonder, “What is the red room?” and “what relevance does it have to the story?” The Red Room has connotations of blood, which then makes one think that something such as a murder could happen. Red is also the colour of danger and fear.

 The opening line is a statement by the narrator:

“I can assure you’, said I, ‘that it will take a very tangible ghost to frighten me.’”

The author uses adumbration: the reader suspects that the narrator will encounter some kind of ghost. We also learn that the narrator is a very arrogant, non-superstitious individual. This builds up a lot of fear because, when the narrator becomes scared, it shows that it must have taken a great deal of dread to frighten him.

We then meet the only other characters in the story. They are all old and irregular, and we are reminded of this throughout the encounter:

        “The old women sat staring hard into the fire, her pale eyes wide open…”

The ‘old’ women seems to be in a daze, as if the fire is the only thing she cares for. Her ‘pale’ eyes, suggest she is very old and almost dead, since ‘pale’ colour skin has no blood flowing through it. The fire is also important, as it shows familiar light, and dispels any darkness, which later fuels the narrator’s fear. Darkness symbolises the unknown: as we cannot know what is there we expect the worst, which consequently creates fear. The reader is then introduced to a man with another physical defect:

‘Its you’re own choosing,’ said the man with the withered arm once more.

This is repeated once more, which creates a build up of tension and fear for the reader, as it makes one wonder why does he keep warning him. In spite of that, we see the confidence and arrogance of the narrator again, when he does not heed the warning. We suspect that the narrator does not really understand these people, who are in stark contrast to him:

‘I must confess I had scarce expected these grotesque custodians.’

The narrator does not really feel at ease with these people at first, mainly because when he arrives, there is a strange hatred between them:

        ‘The three of them made me feel uncomfortable, with their gaunt silences, their bent carriage, their evident unfriendliness to me and to one another.’  

It appears that there is some kind of dispute between the old people. This creates an atmosphere of fear, yet again, it never explains why. This is a vital part of creating fear, and also keeps the reader interested. By slowly revealing more of the storyline, and answering some, but not all, the questions that are asked, the reader is kept involved in the story. He seems to dislike them mainly because of their age, which consequently makes them not stand straight, and also the silence between them. Silence often means that there is thought going on, and this creates fear because it makes the reader wonder what the older people are thinking about. . The old women also says:

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‘This night of all nights’

This tells us at the time of the day the story is set: It is some time during the evening, approaching the night, when the castle is at its darkest. The reader may wonder, what is wrong with this night? Nevertheless, this is another statement that is explained much later into the story. One last time before the narrator leaves the room, the man with the withered arm repeats, for the fourth time ‘its your own choosing’. This reminds the reader about the horrors that may come later in the story.

The ...

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