NAME- PRATEEK BHANDARI
CLASS- 11C
GCSE ENGLISH COURSEWORK
Outline how H.G.Wells and W.W.Jacobs builds an atmosphere of tension, fear and suspense.
Tension means ‘the state or degree of being tense’ and suspense means ‘a state of anxious uncertainty.’ This shows that when we are suspicious, we are likely to be tense and when we are tense we feel fearful of what is going to happen next. Therefore all the three are words are related. ‘The Red Room’ by H.G.Wells and ‘The Monkey’s Paw’ by W.W.Jacobs have mysterious titles. The word ‘Red’ in ‘The Red Room’ symbolises danger or blood whereas the word ‘monkey’s paw’ gives us an idea of the story being something related black magic or exoticness. Both the writers build an atmosphere of tension, fear and suspense throughout in many ways.
Short story writers, especially mystery and horror, have to keep the attention of their readers throughout. In most of these texts, readers would have noticed, writers building in more tension to make the story more interesting. The awareness of the tension being built in ‘The Red Room’ is immediate, for example ‘I can assure you’ is the first line said by the writer himself and then he carries on by saying ‘it will take a very tangible ghost to frighten me.’ These lines give the readers an instant thought that the story would be very thrilling and terrifying since it is related to ghosts. Therefore the tension builds within the readers. W.W.Jacobs on the other hand, builds tension gradually. That way the readers are given constant setbacks after certain intervals for example, ‘In the brightness of the wintry sun next morning as it streamed over the breakfast table Herbert laughed at his fears’ this is where the tension reduces after some terrible experiences that had happened last night. Therefore, the contrast of building of tension in both the stories is quite different, but at the same time the atmosphere made keeps a constant impact on the readers.