The authors have been clever in their use of first person narrative; they have made the reader feel involved in the story. Experiencing the characters feelings gives us a better understanding of that character and what is going on. For example in ‘The Red Room’ the author builds tension through the narrator’s unease; ‘By this time I was in a state of considerable nervous tension, although to my reason there was no adequate cause for the condition’. This sentence helps us to understand the narrator’s character and in this case it tells us that he is a very logical and reasonable person.
The places in which the stories are set contribute greatly to the atmosphere. They require the reader to use his/her imagination; in ‘The Signalman’ the author describes ‘a gloomy red light’, ‘clammy stone’, and a ‘black tunnel’. The readers then picture in their minds what they think it should look like. Settings also inspire feelings in a reader, a graveyard can cause unease or a sunny beach could be comforting. In the stories (with the exception of ‘The Man with the Twisted Lip’ which is more mysterious) the places are meant to cause fear, apprehension and unease. In ‘The Red Room’ the darkness in the red room causes fear, a fear of the unknown, this is the same for ‘The Man with the Twisted Lip’ – bodies lying in the gloom just out of sight.
Sensory images often compliment first person narrative in creating an atmosphere; the readers get much more deeply involved with a character when able to know what the character is experiencing. This gets them involved with the narrator and his feelings, for example the ‘vile, stupefying fumes’ that Dr Watson walks through in ‘The Man with the Twisted Lip’. In ‘The Signalman’ the narrator smells a ‘deadly smell’ which adds to the unease and apprehension that the readers are feeling. ‘And stopped for a moment, listening to a rustling that I fancied I heard; then, satisfied of absolute silence’. This extract from ‘The Red Room’ creates tension and unease and builds a climax as the narrator enters the red room.
Each story takes place in a dark or gloomy setting; the authors have deliberately done this to make the readers uncomfortable and uneasy. The darkness sets off our primal fear of the unknown; we cannot see what could be lurking there. This technique is used in all of the three stories. In ‘The Red Room’ it is used in the climax to enhance the fear, ‘a shadow came sweeping up after me’. In ‘The Signalman’ it makes the reader feel uneasy as the narrator descends the steep path. In ‘The Man with the Twisted Lip’ it is used to cause fear and apprehension of what lies in the dark berths either side of the narrator.
In each story there is a part where the narrator has to descend - whether that is a cutting leading down to the gloomy railway, a worn set of steps down to the dark opium den or down black corridors towards the red room. In each descent it gives the idea of the narrator leaving the real world and descending into a dark, surreal hell. In ‘The Man with the Twisted Lip’ the unreal qualities of the opium den, ‘dimly catch a glimpse of bodies lying in strange fantastic poses’, adds to the feeling of descending into a surreal place. ‘The Signalman’ is the best example of descent; the narrator has to descend down a precipitous, wet zigzag path into a dark, dank cutting with a ‘black tunnel’ and an ‘gloomy red light’ where high jagged stone blocks out light. This gives the readers a growing sense of apprehension as the author describes a truly eerie and creepy place. In ‘The Red Room’ the narrator has to walk down dark corridors chased by shadows, with the feeling that he is being watched. This causes tension as the narrator gets closer to the red room.
There are unknown reasons why the authors chose these settings, what inspired them and whether they are real places, based on real places or have been invented. ‘The Signalman’ is too unreal but might be based on a real place that the author rode past on a train and has been exaggerated. ‘The Man with the Twisted Lip’ is set in the east end of London though whether this actual opium den existed we don’t know. ‘The Red Room’ was probably based on a castle the author once visited.
Each writer is successful in creating an effective setting and atmosphere in their own unique way. Charles Dickens (the author of ‘The Signalman’) creates a setting which starts an immediate sense of unease as he describes the cutting through the narrator’s eyes and nose. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (the author of ‘The Man with the Twisted Lip) does much the same but with a different setting which is just as repelling and spooky. H. G. Wells (the author of ‘The Red Room’) uses a classic castle setting to great effect. Large and dark the castle is perfect for suspense and an uneasy atmosphere. I think that ‘The Signalman’ was the best story as it is everything you expect from the suspense genre. Charles Dickens has thought about the setting and described it in great detail using words like ‘solitary’, ‘gloomy’ and ‘dismal’. Also I think that Charles Dickens did the best narration, you could feel yourself the unease in the narrator and the sounds and smells he experienced. Charles Dickens made me want to read the rest of the story, want to find out what happened to the narrator after his encounter with the strange signalman. ‘The Red Room’ had to be the strangest of the stories; the grotesque old people, the weird mirror, the shadows chasing the narrator up dark corridors all of it was a bit twisted building up to what he might find in the red room.
