A Personal Interpratation Of The Fall Of The House Of Usher By Edgar Allan Poe The Fall of the House of Usher: A Personal Interpretation If there is one thing that is widely agreed upon in regards to Edgar Allan Poes The Fall of the House of Usher it is surely the fact that the short story is one of the greatest ever written. The very words that Poe selects and the manner in which he pieced them was nothing short of phenomenal. This however, is pretty much all that people are able to agree upon. Indeed, to almost everyone who reads it sees the story as great, but for different reasons. In a way the tale can be compared to a psychiatrists inkblots. While everyone may be looking at the same picture, they all see different things. What mainly gives The Fall of the House of Usher this quality is the double meanings and symbols Poe seems to use throughout. We encounter such a double meaning almost immediately, the title. While it is obvious that Poe is referring to the building itself, the reader must also realize that he is more importantly referring to the Usher family. In Poes time, a family was often referred to as a house; for instance my family would be called the house of Gilliam. This relationship is important when reading the opening paragraph of the tale. The first reason that the paragraph is successful is the fact that it sets the key element of the story, the tone. When reading the introduction, the narrators description of the house paints a crystal clear image in ones mind of horror, dread, death, and decay. The reader is overwhelmed with a sense of evil. However, if one was to read deeper than what is on the surface, they may be surprised. As I mentioned earlier, in Poes time a Gilliam, page2family was often referred to as a house. Keeping this in mind while reading the opening paragraphs, the reader can very well wonder if our narrator is referring to the building in which the Ushers live in or the family ...
