Literary Analysis Of The Pit And The Pendulum

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The Pit and the Pendulum Like many stories written by Edgar Allan Poe, “The Pit and the Pendulum” creates an eerie atmosphere with an unknown character. This story focuses mainly on the distinct detail on the surroundings that seem to enhance the senses due to the character’s current state of blindness in the present environment. With little information presented of the character’s reason in being there, the experience seems to be the main focus of this short story. “Poe places the narrator of “The Pit and the Pendulum” in just such a crucible of painful sensations, which force him to grapple with an ultimate state of horror.” (Kent Ljungquist) As stated in an analysis by Kent Ljungquist Poe does place the narrator in this threshold of fear ,but interesting enough in this story compared to his other works seems to revolve around the sense of hope. The story begins with the main character’s apprehension having already taken place. The entities that apprehend this character are unknown and are not labeled. “I WAS sick -- sick unto death with that long agony; and when they at length unbound me, and I was permitted to sit, I felt that my senses were leaving me. The sentence -- the dread sentence of death was the last distinct accentuation which reached my ears.”(The Story) With this text you can conclude that the narrator was …show more content…

When starting the story the narrator says “ I WAS sick... I saw that the decrees of what to me was fate... I had been deceived...” ( Story Citation). The story is told in the past tense it shows that the narrator may have been recollecting or telling the story of his past experience. This makes sense because at the end of this story the narrator is saved by the French army and personally by General Lasalle. Narrating in the past tense since the beginning shows the possible outcome of the future, that everything had already passed and was over

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