Thomas T.

Vieira

Janie Dawson

English 3A

21 October 2021

The Pit and the Pendulum: a general analysis

Edgar Allan Poe is one of the most famous writers and storytellers in history, and possi-
bly the best one to ever write horror stories. In this tale, “The Pit and the Pendulum”, he exposes
precisely one of the key elements that make his writing style so immersive and – due to the
themes his stories wrap around, horrific. The element in question is his capacity to not only insti-
gate the reader's imagination meanwhile describing a scene but also to develop a character in an
extremely descriptive way.

During the first part of the story – the moment the protagonist deals with his sentence of
death internally and is first thrown into the chamber – we can see a very clear usage of the sec-
ond element cited, the immersive building of his characters. Through the passage of the first mo-
ments of the story, we are already presented to a macabre setting, which is built by the charac-
ter's description of the scene he finds himself in, just after facing his fate. By that, we are not
only introduced to a pessimistic view of the world, but we also get both intrigued by the plot and
get to know the main character better – Afterall, we are not only experiencing what he is feeling
but also how that affects the world and things he sees around him. Then, he is thrown into the
cell.

At that moment he finds himself unaware of even how the place he is in looks, and that
plays an important role in both our and the character’s imagination. At the very first moments in
the cell, both the reader and the character face doubt and curiosity. The character puts these fill-
ings to show by presenting us to a seemingly unending and uninterrupted line of thought, through
which we get to know him better and he draws his superstitions, anxiety, and insecurities about
his situations. As for the reader, we are put to question the future of the character, always expect-
ing the worse to happen, which draws our attention even further into the narrative and creates an
atmosphere of fear and anxiety. That leads us to the moment of the torture itself and his rescuing.

These middle and last moments of the story work especially the building of the character
even more, by putting him through extreme stress and relief. The moment that stripped the char-
acter at its core, the moment I want to talk about, is the attempts of dodging the pendulum, Dif-
ferently from avoiding falling in the pit and just staying alive – moments that he did not have to
make impulsive decisions and conscious effort to avoid dying –, the dodging of the blade shows
that, despite his pessimistic views on life, and his lack of hope, he stills wants to live, and is will-
ing to fight for it. All of that happens while even the reader isn’t given any sort of hint of his im-
 Vieira 2

minent rescue, which makes all of his efforts seem pointless. Then, in a plot twist, the rescue
comes and the story ends, both ending the characters and the reader’s suffering.

The story leaves a feeling of relief incomparable to most other harrow tales. That is, as
demonstrated, due to the elements of which Poe shows no fretting of using them to create such
an intense atmosphere and sense of tension. All of that meanwhile he leaves to the attentive
reader an unexpected – due to the macabre setting and nature of his narratives – moral lesson. He
teaches through the ending that even in the worse scenarios you should hold onto what you think
is worth it.