It is considered that the Puritans that populated New England in the 17th century left a distinctive mark on the American culture. The article explores some projections of Puritan legacy in two American novels of different periods – Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter (1850) and Stephen King’s Carrie (1974). After establishing a connection between the Puritan writings and gothic literature, the two novels are analyzed in terms of some Puritan projections, among which are the problem of guilt and the acceptance of an individual in the society. Some references regarding the idea of the witch and the interpretations it bears, especially in terms of the female identity, are also identified. Despite the different approach of the authors in terms of building their characters, those references are mostly used in a negative way, as an instrument of criticism and exposing inconvenient truths.
The study examines Captain Ahab – Herman Melville’s iconic figure from the novel Moby-Dick in comparison with Jack Torrance, who is the central male character in Stephen King’s The Shining. The analogy is motivated by the tragic nature and the madness of the two characters, which is related to their antagonism. The aim is to establish any references between the two characters with the idea to trace the characteristics of dark romanticism such as the progression of madness and human fallibility in the development of Jack Torrance. Several aspects of parallelization are proposed – the characters’ tragic features, the essence of their madness, and their function as fatherly figures. The analysis demonstrates some common features between Ahab and Torrance. Both of them can be associated with Shakespearean tragic heroes, even though the tragedy of Jack is not heroic, but domestic. Their stories take place in isolation from society, in a microworld, where they take a leading position, which can be interpreted as a representation of the negative father – the father that fails to protect his family. Although both of them are obsessive, the roots of their obsession are different. Captain Ahab’s monomania is driven by his thirst for revenge, while at the core of Jack’s madness is his alcohol addiction and his failure.
Horror fiction typically aims at generating the emotional effect of fear, terror and suspense, which is usually achieved by the introduction of scary elements such as vampires, witches, and ghosts. Although monsters can be considered an essential part of the genre, the ways of creating them might be different. The object of the article is the monster from the hotel room in Stephen King’s The Shining and its cinematic adaptation directed by Stanley Kubrick. The paper aims at analyzing the various narrative and media-specific means of introducing the ghost in both works of art and exploring some possible interpretations.
The article deals with the idea of the bad place as a characteristic feature of the horror genre. Its aim is to explore the function of two buildings that epitomize this idea in two literary works from different periods of American literature: the Usher mansion from Edgar Allan Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher (1839) and the Overlook Hotel from Stephen King’s The Shining (1977). The two architectural structures reveal various undercurrent meanings that lead to the conclusion that the haunted place in the gothic genre may serve purposes rather different than creating horrific atmosphere and triggering emotions like fear and suspense. By binding their characters to a specific building the two authors not only trap them and put them in isolation, but they also reveal certain psychological states or criticize the society. In Poe’s short story the crumbling mansion is obviously a reflection of the unstable mind of the narrator as the author employs his usual method of using architecture to speak about psychology. In The Shining the hotel unleashes evil powers because of its sinful history. Thus a critical look at the society is provided. In both cases the architectural structures are destroyed in the end. However, although the two buildings can be taken as symbols of evil, their identical fates may be interpreted differently in each context.
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