“…a second old man entered, more bent, more wrinkled, more aged than the first … his eyes were covered by a shade and his lower lip, half averted, hung pale and pink from his decaying yellow teeth.” The description of the second man will make the reader aware of what the three custodians’ appearance is like and the effect this can have on the story. “They seemed to belong to another age…an age when omens and witches were credible, and ghosts beyond denying” shows us that the three custodians were not from this time and seemed to be quite old fashioned in the way they looked and in what they were wearing. “…her pale eyes wide open” shows that they are ghostly people and are not from this time or era.
In a typical ghost story, the setting is one of the most crucial parts which affect the reader and the story itself. ‘The Red Room’ is set in an old, large, dark castle. “…I shut them in and walked down the chilly, echoing passage.” This shows that the castle is so old it makes the narrator shiver as he’s walking through the castle towards the haunted room that awaits him. “The long, draughty, subterranean passage was chilly and dust.” This shows that the narrator seems to be quite isolated in the story. “…and a shadow came sweeping up after me.” Wherever the narrator was, his shadow would follow him; he was beginning to get very scared and fear was getting to him by the time he got to ‘The Red Room’.
‘The Red Room’ is tense and spooky from start to finish. This can be because of cold weather or the fact that it is midnight, which is where most ghost stories begin, at the stroke of midnight. This doesn’t seem to be any different in ‘The Red Room’. The story shows that it is set on a dark night because in the story it says “…as to be invisible in the moonlight.” It shows that the sky is dark and that the moon is so bright it is beaming over the house, which gives a spooky effect on the story.
There is plenty of suspense throughout this story, which includes the three custodians’ right at the beginning of the story. They build up suspense and they draw the reader into the story which creates anticipation. The structure of ‘The Red Room’ is laid out how it should in a typical ghost story. Ghost stories are usually short so the reader can keep their attention on the story which is what has happened in this story. If it the story goes too fast and becomes too complicated the reader will get bored and switch off from the story.
The amount of events in a typical ghost story is significant to the build-up of the climax. There are five different events that happen in this story. They are: the mention of ‘The Red Room’ and how scary it is; a description of the old castle; the three custodians telling the narrator that the room will be spooky; the entrance into ‘The Red Room’; and the narrator becoming scared. In a ghost story there can only be a few main events to keep the reader involved in the story. If there are too many events, the reader will begin to get confused and it won’t be a typical ghost story if it’s too long.
In ‘The Red Room’ the author uses language such as “It’s your own choosing” and “This night of all nights”. The man with the withered arm and the old woman said this to try and scare the author from going into the room. It built up tension up to the ‘The Red Room’ as what should happen in a ghost story. When the author was walking to ‘The Red Room’ it described it as he was walking. “…walked down the chilly, echoing passage” shows exactly what it was like for the narrator as he was walking to the ‘The Red Room’. It makes you nervous for him as he is walking round to the room.
Once he had got to ‘The Red Room’ he started to believe that there was in fact a ghost there. He had to try and not think about it so the author used language such as “and to pass the time I began to string some rhymes together…a conversation with myself upon the impossibility of ghosts and hauntings.” He still wouldn’t accept the fact that there was a ghost in ‘The Red Room’ and by focussing his mind on something else he could try and lead himself to believe this.
“It was after midnight when the candle…suddenly went out….I did not see the candle go out”. The author is making another build up in the story which draws the reader right into the story as the author is doing this. “I turned my head involuntarily, and saw that the two candles on the little table by the fireplace were extinguished.” Now he was starting to believe that there was a ghost inside ‘The Red Room’. An important bit of language used in this story was, “there was a light still in the room, a red light that stayed off the shadows from me.” This shows what ‘The Red Room’ actually was, something inside the room was always going to be follow him which makes you feel petrified of being inside that room.
‘The Red Room’ also makes you feel scared at the closing moments too. As soon as the narrator came out the red room he said to the three custodians, “The worst of all the things that haunt poor mortal man…Fear!” This is important because it means that it was just a rumour about there being a ghost in ‘The Red Room’. It wasn’t a ghost that was getting to the narrator; it was all fear that was scaring the narrator and nothing else.
In some ways ‘The Red Room’ is and isn’t a typical ghost story. It could be classed as a typical ghost story because it is set in a haunted house when there is a full moon lit up in the sky and it is based on an all innocent character. It has a climax to the story and it uses very descriptive and emotive language.
The reason it wouldn’t be known as a typical ghost story is that there isn’t in fact a ghost in the story. It was fear that was behind scaring the narrator inside ‘The Red Room’. Overall, this is a typical ghost story but apart from the ending all the factors of a ghost story are included in ‘The Red Room’. It was a very clever thing to do to make the ending like this, but I did however, feel slightly let down by it. It just doesn’t make it a complete ghost story which was rather disappointing.