The Pit And The Pendulum By Edgar Allen Poe

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Recommended: The Effect of Cultural and Historical Situations on American Literature

American Literature has had many periodic shifts, which often correlates with a change in society or historical events. Many of the written works written in American history share context into current themes during the time. The Romantic Period highlighted many themes, especially darkness within humans, a focus on nature, and appeals for a cultural or judicial change.
Romanticism is a movement which originated as a response to rationalism and authors moved toward more creative writings. Authors used their imaginations in romanticism, instead of writing solely about facts and important events. They valued imagination and nature much more than logic and reason. For example, the works of Edgar Allen Poe were created to show that life on earth can be as dark as what is beyond and we make the choice to stay in our hell on earth. He used vivid imagery throughout his texts and explained this by saying, “Yet not for a moment did I suppose myself actually dead. Such a supposition, notwithstanding what we read in fiction, is altogether inconsistent with real existence; – but where and in what state was I? The condemned to death, I knew, perished usually at the auto-da-fes, and one of these had been held on the very night of the day of my trial” ("The Pit and the Pendulum"). The Pit and the Pendulum shows a darker side of humans and he used his imagination …show more content…

Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote, “For, nature is not always tricked in holiday attire, but the same scene which yesterday breathed perfume and glittered as for the frolic of the nymphs, is overspread with melancholy today. Nature always wears the colors of the spirit” (Nature). Our surroundings and nature changes by day and it doesn’t become troubled with modern problems like celebrating with lavish belongings. It always is evolving. This is also a symbol of the evolving literature and cultural changes that were seen during this

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