The word ‘ Ghost’ can be described as many things; an illusion, a spirit, a sinister supernatural hallucination, a shadow, or even a figment of your imagination. All these words resemble a part of fear. Are there Ghosts? Have you ever seen a Ghost? Your answer to ‘ Are there Ghosts?’ will probably be negative or vague, but a lot of people have had that moment in their life when they are unsure of what they have seen, this very moment can make it hard to answer ‘ Have you ever seen a Ghost?’A second word which is familiar with the word ‘ Ghost’ is ‘ Fear’, deep down everybody has a fear, which can be all in your imagination, your head may think in a rational mature way but your imagination paints the worst and most ridiculous picture. Perspiration on the forehead, high-speed beating of the heart, shaking hands, and breathlessness are all signs of nervousness, it is about being that frightened that you are unable to open your eyes for fear of what you might see but too frightened to closes your eyes in fear of what your mind is telling you may happen.
Some people are more logical when talking about Ghosts:” They are just the use of our imagination”” They are not real”” They are what Writer’s have created to scare the likes of us” Yet, when you are put in the situation of unfamiliar surroundings where the slight creek of a staircase can send you into an uneasiness, the experience can make you change your mind about ‘ Ghosts being the use of your imagination’. An experience of the ‘ Supernatural’ can send your mind on a rollercoaster of fear, panic, worry and horror, the phobia of the unfamiliar is so strong, it can send a person off the edge. This is what H. G.
Wells (The Red Room) and Susan Hill (Farthing House) try to do, in the use of shadows and language they are creating the illusion of fear to unleash inside us.’The Red Room’ by H. G. Wells shows a conservative look to Ghosts. The Narrator is an up-right man who acts in a pompous manner.
He goes into the room big-headed, yet when he wakes up, he is a new man, he understands the fear inside and he becomes more mature, the below quote backs this up:’” I can assure you,’ said I ‘ that it will take a very tangible Ghost to frighten me”…” The worst of all things that haunt poor mortal man’ said I ‘ and that is, all in its nakedness-Fear!”‘ The above two quotes show how he has grown from leaving the room and how the experience has opened his eyes.
He uses the first quote at the beginning of ‘ The Red Room’, this complex sentence gives an edginess to the story as it is broken up into pieces. H. G. Well’s Victorian Language is shown in the story as you can see the syntax which is used such as ‘ said I’. This language brings a focus to the time in which it was wrote. H.
G. Wells uses the setting to add to the tension, he uses the Clich� of a gothic house with dark, hidden passageways. This setting is alike a typical Haunted house in all Ghost Stories. In and around corners he uses the use of shadows to create an atmosphere, this use of light and dark adds to the tension, such as:’A shadow came sweeping up after me, and one fled before me into the darkness overhead.
‘ At one point the Character makes a grab for his gun, this is an example of how H. G. Wells builds up the stress before even entering the room. He also uses Characters in a descriptive and imaginative way to sustain this idea of their being some sort of supernatural being in the room. The Character also feels the need to barricade himself in, this suggests that he is scared of what he cant see, so he wants to keep whatever it is, away from him:’I had pulled up a chintz-covered armchair and a table, to form a kind of barricade before me, and on this lay my revolver ready to hand.
‘ He uses personification to describe the use of shadows and candles, by describing the candles as if they are winking, it acts as if they are taunting him. This brings a sense of evil to the house:’I saw the candle in the right sconce of one of the mirrors wink and go right out…the candle at the foot of the bed went out, and the shadows seemed to take another step towards me.
‘ This tension which is being created from the personification of the shadows and candles adds to the mood of the gothic building creating the reader to be slightly scared of what is about to happen. The writer also uses repetition to build up the story, towards the end, he uses the word ‘ Fear’. He writes this word capitalised, this is because the room is no longer associated with the word ‘ Ghost’ but with the word ‘ Fear’. This word is being personified, like with the words ‘ shadows and candles’ in ‘ The Red Room’. One other thing which is used in most Ghost stories is to introduce Characters.
H. G. Wells does this whilst adding a frightening sense to each Character as they all seem so scared of the room, they hardly even bare to talk about it, but they have to warn him off. These characters are described as a man having withered arms, a woman with pale, wide eyes and another man who is wrinkled and bent with decaying yellow teeth and inflamed eyes.
They all avoid eye-contact and they distance themselves from each other, this build up the pressure as they are so fearful of the room. These Characters are described so deadly that they almost seem like Ghosts. H. G. Wells gets the character to talk to himself when he is in ‘ The Red Room’, this shows how tense and apprehensive the character is in this frightening situation:’ “ What’s up?” I cried, with a queer high note getting into my voice somehow.
.. My hands trembled so much that twice I missed the rough paper of the matchbox’It also shows how the Characters mind is preparing for the worst, this shows the fear inside which H. G. Wells comments on regularly. Towards the end, H.
G. Wells gives a final blow to the story, as the Character has taken so much fright from his own imagination, he runs wild. No longer does he use his brain, he becomes an animal crashing about as he has lost all sense of direction. This brings an edge to the reader as they are unaware that it is the Characters imagination, but they believe it is the ‘ Ghost’. Yet it becomes apparent when he wakes up and begins to understand, that the use of his imagination has overcome him. There is little suggestions of ‘ imagination’ through out the story, such as:’I still found the remoter darkness of the place, ad its perfect stillness, too stimulating for the imagination.
‘ The above quote is an extremely relevant extract as it shows the use of sound, imagination, and light which is repeated through out.’Farthing House’ is written by Susan Hill, this modern writer uses her memory to record the events which happened that night in the poorhouse. She writes in a poetic and matter of fact language compared with that of H. G. Wells. The narrator is an elderly level-headed woman reminiscing of what happened.
She writes to her pregnant daughter because she feel the need to rid her head of these memories which have been built up and are now about to burst. The character remains mature and logical throughout the story, she feels the need to keep a clear head and not go straight into the story. This is how Susan Hill builds up the tension, she does this by talking about what happened but not actually revealing any plot, so the reader is kept in a tremendous amount of suspense as she pours out her heart and feels more at ease with finally telling the story. Susan Hill provides senses to create tension, she uses smell:’I caught the smell of it, that most poignant, melancholy, nostalgic of all smells, something that had been drifting on the edges of my consciousness.
.. It was as though a door had been opened on the past’This causes the reader to wonder about what actually happened that evening at Farthing House, the way in which she builds up the tension is very slow but the story gets to a point where no more tension can be built, so it comes crashing down into a calm, peaceful scene. It is like a calm summers night and out of the blue a large bolt of lightening strikes. H.
G. Wells also introduces senses but he chooses to focus on sound rather than smell:’The echoing of the stir and crackling of the fire were no sort of comfort to me’Like H. G. Wells, Susan Hill introduces repetition, she repeats the word ‘ melancholy’ several times throughout the story. The word ‘ melancholy’ in the dictionary can be described as depression or sadness, this again is another way in which the writer brings tension into the story, as this story is quite sad and depressing. The writer also repeats phrases which relate to different parts in the story but bring her memory back to the same point:’.
.. scuttling the leaves and making the windsmoke drift towards me…the remains of a bonfire of leaves, smouldering by itself in a corner’These slight details are hard to notice but they build up the tension as her memory is a key focus in the story.
Susan Hill constantly uses the words ‘ and’ ‘ but’ and ‘ I’ in short complex sentences, to build up the tension and long complex sentences to sustain the amount of tension. These pauses give the chance for the reader to halt and think about what is happening. Through out ‘ Farthing House’ Susan Hill keeps referring back to death, she makes only slight remarks on it, but they are at the back of the readers mind ready to jump out:’I was in this large, high-ceilinged room because it was free, its previous occupant having recently died.’As well as referring back to death she also refers to birth, which is why it is set in an old building where unmarried teenagers were sent.
The connection of birth and death is vital when she talks about the woman she sees that is looking for the child, as these ideas are so far apart yet so close. Susan Hill writes that the Character is certain that she has seen something:’The previous night, I had had the sensation of someone having just been in my room. Now I saw her.’Yet pages before she writes how she was expecting dreams, or something to happen, this is like H. G. Wells and how the use of imagination breaks the use of being able to think clearly:’I could not help wondering whether whoever had occupied Cedar room had died in it, perhaps even in this bed.
I was, as you might say, almost expecting to have had bad dreams or see a ghost.’Later on Susan Hill changes the senses, from smells to sounds, this is because it is a night and she can not see much, so she is using her ears to paint the picture rather than her eyes or nose. In both stories everything happens at night, this suggests it could be the use of imagination, as the dark surroundings paints a picture of alarm. They both refer to death, so this is at their back of their mind ready to spring up.’Farthing House’ slowly builds up the tension whereas ‘ The Red Room’ is like a lift slowly climbing up tens of floors then it shoots down the great height. A lot of people may have never seen a Ghost but the feeling is there, the fear and anxiety which brings it along adds to the tension of the moment. After reading this, Farthing house and The Red Room you may now be able to answer the first two questions in this essay.
