When a Stranger Comes and Causes your House to Fall

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Is it possible that two stories in the same genre can have completely different settings, but still end in similar ways? The two stories The Fall of the House of Usher and Where is Here? are both gothic stories. In The Fall of the House of Usher by: Edgar Allen Poe, the story begins with the narrator going to visit his old friend in an isolated house built on a swamp. In Where is Here? by: Joyce Carol Oates, the story is set in a quiet, residential neighborhood, then a stranger comes to visit. Although The Fall of the House of Usher and Where is Here? are both gothic pieces of literature, the settings in both stories have a clear difference, but have ending that are similar.
Even though the two stories The Fall of the House of Usher and Where is Here? are both gothic pieces, they begin in ver different ways. In the beginning of The Fall of the House of Usher the visitor is also the narrator. This gives information that that he has come to meet Roderick Usher in time of distress because he was Roderick's only friend growing up. "During the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day... when the cloud hung oppressively low in the heavens... as the shades of evening drew on... and at length found myself... within view of the melancholy House of Usher" (Poe, 293). The narrator (the visitor) explains in this quote the mood of the House of Usher, and the setting around it. He also shows the depression, and isolation that must come from living in a place like this. In the story Where is Here? the setting begins completely differently. It opens up with a normal family, living a normal life, in a normal neighborhood. "...They had lived in their in a quiet, residential neighborhood" (Oates 325). Tis quote really shows that this f...

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...swamp it was built on. The ending of Where is Here? is similar because of the fact that the house went back to its original eerie, depressing ways. "...The lights were flickering..., the pattered wallpaper seemed drained of color..., the robust green of the carpeting looked faded... In the kitchen the lights were dim and an oder of sourish smoke, subtle but unmistakable, made her nostrils pinch." (Oates, 332). From this quote it is easy to tell the depressing mood that comes after the stranger left. Even the same sort of pain that had once occurred in the house, fell upon the new family.
The two stories The Fall of the House of Usher and Where is Here? have obvious differences in setting, but end in similar ways. So is this true with all gothic pieces of literature? The answer is yes, if you count that all gothic literature ends in a depressing, or an eerie way.

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