Both Edgar Allen Poe and Alfred Hitchcock are known for their preferences for injecting fear and suspense into their works. Both artists are very skilled at creating and building up suspense. Edgar Allen Poe displays his skill in his short story, "The Fall of the House of Usher" and Alfred Hitchcock's method of suspense-building is demonstrated in his movie, "Rear Window". Both Poe and Hitchcock utilize first person narration, an uncertain sense of madness, and very descriptive settings to move plot forward and build suspense along the way.
The first person point of view is a very important aspect of the two aforementioned works of literary art. In Poe's "The Fall of the House of Usher", the first person point of view is expressed through an unnamed narrator. We are given no description of the narrator nor any characteristics that would identify him. For all intents and purposes, the narrator is, by definitive reasoning, not a character at all. This places the reader in charge of analyzing the events of the story in the narrator's stead. This method builds suspense by igniting the reader's imagination with sparks of uncertainty, naturalism, and madness. The reader is urged to question the reality of the events as if it were all the narrator's dream. Poe many times puts the narrator in a dream state to iterate the importance of reality, or lack thereof, in his works. For instance the unnamed narrator tries "Shaking off from [his] spirit what must have been a dream" (Poe 196) when staring at the dreamlike manor and seemed to enter a dreamlike state while "[he] listened, as if in a dream, to the wild improvisations of [Roderick's] speaking guitar" (Poe 199). Alfred Hitchcock uses a similar tactic but his narrator is a very three dimensional character,L.B. Jeffery. Rather than making us the narrator, Hitchcock puts us directly behind the narrator, always watching over his shoulder, questioning his every move and pondering his interpretation of events while inventing our own interpretations as if we were viewing someone else's dream. In this method, the viewer is left wondering about the narrator's integrity or perhaps sanity. Hitchcock puts us directly behind the narrator, always watching over his shoulder, questioning his every move and pondering his interpretation of events while inventing our own interpretations. The reader is injected into the dream that Poe or Hitchcock creates and believes everything the narrator experiences, a perfect formula for bringing suspense directly into the reader's mind.
Integral to Poe's and Hitchcock's method of cultivating suspense is the concept of madness in the first person narrator. In "The Fall of the House of Usher", we are brought to question whether the narrator is becoming madder and madder as the plots turns stranger and stranger. By the time Madeline escapes from her tomb, the narrator or reader must have become a madman to believe the plot. Roderick evens call the narrator "Madman!" (Poe) at two points. This sense of madness keeps suspense high because it is so hard to say what will happen next and uncertainty is certainly a major component of fear. All this suspense builds up to the final moment when the house falls and the narrator is released from the insanity. In "Rear Window" no one believes the narrator, Jeffery, until Lisa also notices the suspicious man. At first glance Jeff can be interpreted as a very delusional man with disturbing hallucinations The events that develop either support or debunk the idea that Jeff is in fact a madman. This is another device that Hitchcock uses to build suspense and stir fear.
Another one of Poe's devices for inciting fear is the use of a very descriptive setting. In the case of "The Fall of the House of Usher", the story begins on "a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens" (Poe). This is a very appropriate setting because Roderick has a very strange acuteness of the senses and a soundless, dull, and dark night is his perfect habitat. This description is a very ominous opening to the short story and gives, yet again, a very deep sense of uncertainty; the type of uncertainty that could drive an isolated man insane. As the narrator enters the manor he experiences "an atmosphere of sorrow. An air of stern, deep, and irredeemable gloom hung over and pervaded all" (Poe). This is the type of atmosphere that leaves no room for good thought or merry endings, instead paving a way for something very fearful. This setting is meant to keep the reader in a fearful state and in suspenseful wait for whatever terrible, unforeseen event may occur. Likewise, in "Rear Window" the setting gives enough insight on the conflict to keep the reader in suspense without completely revealing the unforeseen events ahead. The main setup of the movie is an apartment complex with many apartments visible from a certain window. Every window in the string of apartments is usually open. Because the windows are open, Jeff can sit in his apartment, stare out his window, and observe the lives of the tenants of the other apartments. And because every window is usually open, Jeff has reason to be suspicious when the window of an apartment occupied by a bickering couple is closed. This suspicion builds suspense by making the viewer consider Jeff''s suspicions and eventually share the same fear that Jeff feels.
When considering the works of Edgar Allen Poe and Alfred Hitchcock, it is very difficult to not describe it as suspenseful. These two literary artists have mastered the ability to incite fear and uncertainty in the hearts of their audience. This ability is clearly demonstrated in Poe's short story, "The Fall of the House of Usher", and Hitchcock's film, "Rear Window", with the use of a first person narrator, a very descriptive setting, and feelings of madness. Perhaps directors of horror movies nowadays can learn a few things from these masters of suspense.
