Roderick Usher

Roderick Usher and his friend by Madeline's coffin.










      Usher is described as having a "cadaverous complexion; an eye large, liquid, and luminous beyond comparison; lips somewhat thin and very pallid; delicate nose..finely molded chin..hair of a more than web-like softness and tenuity." Usher is also described is a hypochondriac by our narrator once he learns of Madeline's death.  Roderick Usher is not just an interesting person physically but also mentally. He is disintergrating mentally and emotionally before the narrator because he is struggling with his conscious and unconscious thoughts. This is an important fact that helps readers to better understand where Poe is going with this character. To understand why Roderick was falling apart just like the house and getting sick like his sister.

Roderick Usher's Tragic Struggle

http://jerome.stjohns.edu:81/login?url=http://www.jstor.org/stable/3044247

Hennig Cohen discusses Usher's struggle between his conscious and unconscious thoughts and the toll it had on him.

Vincent Price - The Fall Of The House Of Usher(Family Legacy)

 This clip from The Fall of the House of Usher shows just how odd of a character Usher is, and how truly affected he is by the house and by the pressure of  having on pass on the name Usher.  

Our narrator describes how he feels as he arrives at the house. He says at "the first glimpse of the building, a sense of insufferable gloom pervaded my spirit." He also says that as he looked at what was before him "upon the mere house, and the simple landscape features of the domain-upon the bleak walls-upon the vacant eye-like windows-upon a few rank edges, and upon a few white trunks of decayed trees" he wondered if this was truly his friend's house. Immediately the feelings of depression and despair come upon the visitor at arrival. This image of the house can be use as a representation of its owner, and of what is to come later in the story.