Author: Joel Fuentes
Throughout our Gothic literature class, we’ve learned different concepts to better understand the meaning of the word “gothic” and we’ve achieved enough knowledge to understand and analyze certain situations, architecture, and even basic images related to gothic literature.
Throughout this gothic space post, a series of images are shown. The first two images were taken while walking down a dark street close to my neighborhood with the first image approaching a street light. While reading “The Invisible Man”, the incident that occurred between him and the blonde man is one thing that I still remember and the way I created the scene in my mind is pretty similar to the picture taken above. walking down a dark street and accidentally bumping into a stranger under a bright street light that brights up only that specific spot while the rest of the street remains dark. I personally think this space can be described as uncanny because it is reality, something we can see, a dark street but it is strange.
For the third image, while touring my neighborhood, this specific building grabbed my attention. While there are bright lights around that building, in particular, it is somehow still dark due to the building on the right side with the dark windows which gives a sense and creates a lot of dark spots in the area. This image stood out to me because it reminded me of chapter four of “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde”, where a maid was looking through a window and witnessed the murder of Sir Danvers Carew done by Mr. Hyde. In this image, we can imagine the maid on the third floor of the building on the left looking through the window while Mr. Hyde beat Sir Danvers Carew to death on the next side of the street (from where the picture was taken)
Last but not least, the fourth image is the backyard of my apartment building, where my landlord parks his vehicle in the dark. While during the day it is quite bright due to sunlight, at night it is pretty dark. I did not take this image blurry intentionally, it was quite cold that night and my hands were frozen, I did not notice the picture was blurry, but afterward while analyzing, it ended up turning out into a good photo. Dark, brick walls, iron fenced windows and the overall color of the image creates this dark feeling of terror that could make us wonder if the building is haunted by looking at the dark windows. If we let our imagination fly beyond us, we could imagine people trapped inside this building tormented by an evil force causing this “random person” who took this picture to feel horrified if he actually saw it happening, even though it is not reality, I feel this image could be fantastic. “The Fall of the House of Usher”, the appearance of the House of Usher can be related to this image.
I’ve chosen St. Patrick’s Cathedral because it always grabbed my attention every time I go around that area. The structure of the building in general is described as gothic because of its different aspects, which generally include its shape and structure. Many pointy and sharp edges mostly pointing above.
I’ve chosen the Queensboro Bridge as my second image because of the old fashioned structure with pointy edges and color tone. The beams and overall design of this bridge give a sense of gothic and not modern.
Throughout “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde”, written by Robert Louis Stevenson we have encountered scenes of mysteries and violence. a character that stood out the most, meaning, one of the main characters created throughout this novel is Mr. Hyde who was created using science by Dr. Jekyll. On the other hand, we have “the Invisible Man”, an excerpt by Ralph Ellison, the invisible man being the narrator himself describing his life as an invisible person to society’s eye. Mr. Hyde and the Invisible Man both have similarities as well as differences. Whether in behavior, emotions, and society’s point of view towards them.
Throughout the chapters of “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde”, readers were presented with mysteries and strange cases that involve violence. The main character, Mr. Hyde is one of the characters that was the most involved and mentioned, but less seen until reaching the end of the story. Mr. Hyde can be described as a horrifying creature even though there is not a proper description of his appearance. His actions are the ones that can mostly be described due to his evil desires to cause harm.
Now, throughout the excerpt of “The Invisible Man”, at the beginning of the story, he described himself as a regular person with feelings, but the only difference was that he is invisible to society. Being invisible to society caused him to have this anger and distrust in society.
One of the similarities that stood out the most was the fact the Invisible Man almost killed an individual on the streets late at night. In comparison to Mr. Hyde, he committed a crime at night where throughout the story all his crime was done. Setting plays a huge role in both stories. Dark, which can represent a sense of evil and bad things happening which connects to the definition of Gothic.
The meaning of redemption in the literature can be defined as the salvation of a soul from a sin committed by a character usually from an evil error. In “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” there was a various moment where it seemed like Dr. Jekyll was defending and trying to cover Mr. Hyde and it was not until the very end of the novel that we got a full view of the transformation of Dr. Jekyll to Mr. Hyde in Dr. in Lanyon’s narrative, in chapter 9, even though we suspected it in previous chapters. After the death of Dr. Jekyll (Mr. Hyde after he drank poison to end his life), we were presented in chapter 10 with the letter written by Dr. Jekyll explaining his experiment and what was he trying to create but at the end, he could not control the transformation. He reveled and clarified to us various moments that kept us wondering throughout the novel for a while. In this chapter, Dr. Jekyll tried to redeem himself to avoid putting everyone in danger and avoid suffering but eventually, it became powerful and Hyde was taking over him until a point that he could not control it. It was becoming part of his nature. At the end of the narrative he explains the reason for ending his life by saying “Here then, as I lay down the pen and proceed to seal up my confession, I bring the life of that unhappy Henry Jekyll to an end.” at the end of his letter, which reveals to us that he lived very unhappy throughout his life and there was nothing else he could do to avoid the danger to society. Now, a question to think about, was this experiment another failure of his? Now we are able to think about the disagreement between the two doctors.Â
Throughout these chapters, a great amount of curiosity and mystery is being dismantled. The person Dr. Jekyll is referring to as “Him” in bold in chapter 3 when Dr. Jekyll says to Mr. Utterson “’ I don’t ask that,’” pleaded Jekyll, laying his hand upon the other’s arm; “’ I only ask for justice; I only ask you to help him for my sake, when I am no longer here.’” is actually Mr. Hyde. This is pretty much ironic because of the fact that even though Dr. Jekyll knows that Mr. Utterson dislikes Mr. Hyde for a while now. This is a fact and every time Mr. Utterson brings up a topic about Mr. Hyde, Dr. Jekyll would just cut off the conversation and strangely try to defend him. This builds up curiosities of why is Dr. Jekyll became so close to Hyde. Dr. Jekyll has been trusting and still trust Mr. Utterson, and now that Mr. Utterson told him that he will help him get out of the current situation, Dr. Jekyll shows more trust into whatever Mr. Utterson will do. The irony here is the fact that Dr. Jerkyll still pretty much implore Mr. Utterson for justice for Hyde even though he knows all the wrong he did. Dr. Jekyll made sure he tells Mr. Utterson that he will not hear from Hyde for now which is oddly strange and it causes the reader to wonder what could’ve happened. Throughout this entire story, so far we have been reading, Dr. Jekyll is being quite mysterious and it does not look right, it does not seem right for Mr. Utterson at the same time knowing Dr. Jekyll for a while now. Another point to observe could be the fact that Dr. Jekyll demonstrates a body language of nervousness while explaining to Mr. Utterson that he is completely fine and every time something about Hyde is being brought up he is trying to stop the conversation somehow.
During this summer a lot has occurred. Staying home for a break was one of them. I wasn’t able to do as much like how we used to before in past summers but I definitely enjoyed taking a break from classes and focus on personal growth and spend time with my family. There wasn’t much thing out there to do that is very exciting due to the pandemic which I personally don’t mind because I would not like to get infected and be the one contaminating someone else.
So, we have read three stories in class so far, and the one that grabbed my attention and I enjoyed the most was “The Black Cat” by Edgar Allan Poe. I enjoyed reading this story, it took various turns and there were unexpected moments that occurred out of nowhere. The narrator used words that changed the reader’s perspective on different occasions when it comes to describing the character’s violent actions, introducing cruel events suddenly like it is something very normal on a daily basis. For example, the time when the character suddenly killed his wife while peacefully walking on the stairs because he was being bothered by the cat and could not control his anger when his wife tried to calm him down.
Overall, the story was a very interesting and dark story that is based on murder and anger. The narrator of this story chose words that capture the reader’s attention and excitement while keeping his narration as “normal” as possible when it comes to talking about the cruelties that occurred throughout the story. To conclude, I found this story very interesting and enjoyable if you like dark scenes, mystery, and sudden cruel moments. It was very detailed in different aspects and it outputted the right mood when it comes to reading it.
