Tension in The Red Room, The Cone and The Superstitious Man's Story

Tension in The Red Room, The Cone and The Superstitious Man's Story

'The Red Room', The Cone' and 'The Superstitious Man's Story' are all

short stories which were written before 1914. 'The Red Room' and 'The

Cone' were both written by H.G. Wells and 'The Superstitious Man's

Story' was written by Thomas Hardy. All three of these stories were

written in Victorian Times (1837-1901). These were years of great

scientific and technological developments. The authors of the three

stories show us a diminishing belief in superstition and supernatural.

The authors of 'The Red Room' and 'The Superstitious Man's Story' have

written the stories in the style of a gothic one, although they don’t

end up being supernatural. However, 'The Cone' has been written with

no gothic features, but it shows technological development as the

title itself contains the word 'Cone' which is part of industrial

terminology. Also, the setting is industrial and shows the

development.

'The Red Room' is about a man who goes to a house and in particular a

room which is seen to have ghosts in it and, therefore, no one goes in

that room. However, this man goes in to prove there is no existence of

a ghost. We find out that no ghost is present in the room and there

never has been and it's just that fear has overcome the person.

'The Cone' is about a man and woman who are having an affair. Tension

is created as the man and woman who are having an affair are not sure

whether the woman's husband has found out about what is going on. At

the end the woman's husband kills the other man and then after

throwing him off a bridge on top of the hot, melting iron at the

bottom, he realises he has done something terribly wrong. In contrast

'The Superstit...

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...nd creates more tension, whereas if it was daytime people

wouldn't be as scared, although it may influence the readers as

creating tension. Feelings of characters creates tension in all

stories, as it puts us in the place of the character and the

description makes us feel, how the character is feeling. This creates

tension and also maintains it, as we don’t know what will happen next.

Imagery such as metaphors, similes and personification maintains the

tension during the stories. It makes us create a flamboyant picture,

of what is going on. Sentence structure also gives us a sense of

tension as the build up of sentences tells us an important part is

coming up, which creates anticipation for the readers.

The work of H.G. Wells and Thomas Hardy has been successful and the

way in which all three pre 1914 stories create tension and the way it

is maintained.