19th century shot stories

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How effectively do the writers of the nineteenth century short stories you have read, develop the sense of mystery and fear to intrigue and entertain their readers?

The stories I have read are, the Man with the Twisted Lip, The Red Room and The Signalman.  The stories are all based around the theme mystery; however they are different types of mystery.  There is a missing man mystery, ghost mystery and another ghost/ mystery story.

        The Man with the twisted lip is about a missing man which Sherlock Holmes and Watson are sent to investigate.  They end up finding out that the man is leading a double life.  People of the time would have liked the Sherlock Holmes story as he was a private detective who could get results unlike the police force, who were unpopular of the time, who couldn’t catch the infamous Jack the Ripper.  The readers of the time would like the supernatural stories as they were in a phase of believing in the supernatural.  The Red Room is about a room which people think is haunted.  A man who is thought to be the new Duke investigates this. The story concludes that the room is not actually haunted by a ghost, but by the human conscience.  The signalman is about a man interested in railways who goes down to meet a signalman and learns of the visions he has been seeing.  It turns out that the visions are showing what is going to happen in the future, one even predicts the signalman’s death.  

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        There are four characters in the Red Room. These include the man with the withered arm, the old woman, the man with the shade and the main character who we do not know the name of, but who could be a duke as the previous duke is referred to as his predecessor.  The three characters who seem to be named by disabilities add mystery by not being named and acting very peculiar.  “It’s your own choice” the man with the withered arm says several times.  This adds to the sense of mystery, as it’s as if he knows that ...

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