What is it about?
In many of Poe's short stories women are beautiful, sickly and die young, usually at the hands of an insane gentleman. This article explores three such deaths as featured in 'Berenice', 'Ligeia' and 'Fall of the House of Usher'. Each is a story exploring an unbalanced man's attempts to contain that which drives him mad.
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Why is it important?
Unlike reality, in his tales Poe was able to resurrect the objects of his obsessions, and thus the female figures comprising the monstrous loves of his male protagonists. However, this essay also questions the extent to which such resurrections and containment are successful within each narrative, and how far Poe's delineations of the feminine monstrous and unheimlich sexuality can be read as interrogations of compromised masculinity.
Perspectives
I hope that this article encourages readers to explore Poe's stories from a different perspective to that which they might otherwise have done.
Tracy Hayes
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Poe, insanity, and containing the feminine monstrous, Palgrave Communications, May 2020, Springer Science + Business Media,
DOI: 10.1057/s41599-020-0486-4.
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