Poe Tone Analysis

1.      In his "The Fall of the House of Usher," Edgar Allan Poe has created clear tone. Identify the tone, then examine and provide examples of diction, details, imagery, and syntax that create the tone

During the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country, and at length found myself, as the shades of the evening drew on, within view of the melancholy House of Usher...I reined my horse to the precipitous brink of a black and lurid tarn that lay in unruffled luster by the dwelling...(with) vacant and eye-like windows.

Edgar Allan Poe From "The Fall of the House of Usher."

1. Color code the literary devices in the paragraph by using the following key:

red = diction

blue =details

purple =imagery

2. Choose three to five examples of each literary device listed above and explain connotation, and the effect of the literary device on the tone.

Ex: Diction such as " ______," " _______," "_______," and "________" offers the connotation of _________, etc. These examples help reinforce the tone because  . . .

Diction such as "oppressively," "dreary," "precipitous” and "vacant" offers the connotation of a person is in a dark and empty place. These examples help reinforce the tone because they show how the person is feeling.

Details such as  “dull, dark, and soundless day,” “clouds hung,” “low in the heavens,” “shades of the evening,” and “black and lurid tarn” offers the connotation of boredom and lonely. These examples help reinforce the tone because it creates a description of what the place looks and sound like.

Images such as “passing alone,” “tract of country,”  “melancholy House of Usher,” “unruffled luster by the dwelling,” and “eye-like windows,” offers the connotation of depression and alone. These examples help reinforce the tone because they help create images of what the person is seeing.