Analysis Of The Night Circus, By Erin Morgenstern

Drama: And The Consequences That Follow It

        Fantasy literature has always idolized by the classic gothic elements. It is simple in most works to find such themes within the genre of mythical storytelling. The Night Circus, by Erin Morgenstern, is a novel that contains several gothic elements within its chapters; these include blood, death, and entrapment. The “Masque of Red Death,” by Edgar Allen Poe, “The Devil and Tom Walker,” by Washington Irving, and the “Feather Pillow,” by Horacio Quiroga, are more examples of stories that also include a specific unique element within each of their original lores. In fact, within Morgenstern, Poe, Irving, and Quiroga’s gothic pieces, certain gothic elements can be compared and are emphasized: Death,

blood, and entrapment.
    Death- a popular gothic element found in many gothic stories- has a common theme in both The Night Circus and “Feather Pillow,” despite the different methods that each piece goes about the theme.

Within Quiroga’s writing, Alicia- an innocent girl who wanted nothing more than the attention and love from her husband- becomes the victim to a nasty parasite that secretly ends her fleeting life, “bleeding [it] away day by day, hour by hour,” until it kills her (Quiroga 1). Similarly, within Morgenstern’s novel, innocent people die because of the secret magic of the circus. Tara Burgess is the first to succumb to the detrimental madness induced by magic while she had embarked in her search for answers over the lack of aging within the circus among other magical elements that could not be explained with science, consequently finding herself in her final predicament, by “not [seeing] the train,” that murders her in cold blood (Morgenstern 234). The next to fall: Herr Thiesen is another innocent who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time; he is due to Chandresh’s insanity, the result of another sabotaged person from the apathetic magic of the magicians who began the entire competition. With Celia’s father driving Chandresh crazy, his “[interference] got [Herr Thiesen] killed,” (Morgenstern 426). Both works’ innocent victims were unable to escape their fate as the pawns to another’s game, dying in only a matter of time. Their death’s playing significant roles on the

impact of the surround character’s left to cope with the emotional turmoil of their demise, each story goes on with the effects of the fallen reminiscent in each future event until each writing’s conclusion.
    Moreover, another gothic element that is found shared between another short story and the novel literature is the element of blood. Within The Night Circus as well as Poe’s “Masque of Red Death,” it is a theme that provides heavy symbolism in contrasting ways between the pieces. In The Night Circus, blood is represented as strength, of the ability to heal and manipulate, of pushing the boundaries within the magical realm. This is shown when Celia- without hesitation- drives a dagger through her hand.She further “[removing] the dagger,” and manipulating the wound to heal itself by the “droplets of blood [beginning] to [roll] backwards, seeping into the gash [she caused] on her palm,” displaying her impressive control over her own body and her near invulnerability (Morgenstern 281). In contrast, within “Masque of Red Death,” the gothic element of blood is seen as the final symbol of a disease that has taken over it’s victim’s tainted body and succumbing to it through death moments later. Describing in a grotesque manner how “[the] scarlet stains upon the [victim’s] body, especially upon the face,” displaying visibly the weakness of the individual whom further is “[terminated by] the disease” within “half an hour,” (Poe 446). The blood represented in each story an indicator of control the person has over it as Celia heals her wounds in a matter of minutes, whereas the victim of the Red Death die within minutes of having their pores flushing with their own blood.
    Finally, the last gothic element that can be compared in the included pieces is the element of entrapment.

Between both The Night Circus and “The Devil and Tom Walker,” characters are required to make commitments that greatly influence their lives. In The Night Circus, the entire novel is wrapped around the competition of Celia and Marco, who are permanently bound to the contest until a winner was found. Each protagonist obtaining a ring that “thins and fades, leaving only a bright red scar around” both of their fingers to exemplify their commitment to the game (Morgenstern 21). The competition they’re forced to participate in only concluding once one of them dies, greatly impacting their lives as it defines their entire life’s purpose. Whereas in “The Devil and Tom Walker,” Tom makes an irrefutable deal with the devil, and of course “there [is] one condition, generally understood in all cases where the devil grants favors,” in which he takes Tom’s soul (Irving 328). The influence only later shown in the story how inescapable his deal was with Tom’s futile attempt to break free from his contract only to be shut down when he is “come for,” and the devil takes his life as a result of the fruitless rebellion (Irving 331). Both stories exhibit the significance of the deals made through symbolism and cause and effect, entrapping the characters in unbreakable ways until death or some other loophole provides an alternative to such

living.
    In conclusion, gothic elements can greatly impact a storyline. They can become symbols, be used for effects, and impact the character’s in their own rights; the components further developing the literature of the novel and short stories past their previous state. Therefore, the themes of death, blood, and entrapment provided in the previous examples of text focus on enhancing the narrative and allow for connections to be made between said pieces because of the commonalities shared among them. These connections allow for the reader to increase their own understanding of the original stories, linking personal experiences along with different literatures to go along with them. Gothic elements develop literature further and demand for its reader to articulate each element’s meaning in order to increase his thoughtforms about the ideas over the stories himself.