Image and Fear in Four Select Short Stories - Essay Example

Image and Fear in Four Select Short Stories

Like most aspects of literature and art, fear is based on perception. Self-image, image toward others and image on society are all critical aspects in the development and representation of a character or a situation in text. This is because people constitute a notion in their mind based on what they can see, or what they believe to be apparently represented before them. Indeed, when what people see is insufficient, they are inclined to complete the image through imagination and therefore in effect influence the way they understand a certain image. Perhaps one of the most notable illustrations of this idea is the fact that people often fear that which they do not understand. This idea is a result of the image their understanding of a certain idea creates in their minds. The theory presented in this essay is therefore that image (self-image, the image perceived by other individuals and overall societal image) is the greatest contributor to the representation of fear in literature.

Edgar Allan Poe’s The Cask of Amontillado is one of his most significant and acclaimed works. The seminal short story aptly demonstrates the idea of fear based on perceived image. Montresor, the story’s narrator and primary figure, tells of the intricate manner in which he lured Fortunato, an individual he believed to have caused him great shame by some unspecified insult and numerous injuries, to his death in a niche within a catacomb. Poe does not explicitly state the true motivations for true motivations for Montresor’s actions, a fact that has created decades of speculation. However, it is apparent that one of his greatest motivating factors was fear (Baraban, 51). Montresor believes he has been hard done by Fortunato and his success. The stature of the former’s family has also been, he believes, significantly diminished due to the latter’s action. Montresor therefore fears that both he and his family will only be ruined further if Fortunato is not eliminated.

On the flipside, Fortunato is not afraid of Montresor, even when he appears to be leading him to an obvious death. Although this could, in part, be blamed on his inebriation, it is still notable that the drunk man does not pay any heed to the signs that would otherwise have put him on alert had he a suspicious view of his companion in the catacombs. Because Montresor is apparently weak and not as rich or well respected as Fortunato, the latter does not view him as a threat (Hammond 42). This image leaves him free to keep his guard down, allowing Montresor to take advantage of this and murder him. For this reason, it is apparent that while image sometimes leads to hasty judgment of individuals, as will be demonstrated in other texts explored in subsequent parts of this essay, it can also serve as a reliable measure of a potentially harmful situation. Had Fortunato been suspicious of Montresor enough to see that the man was bitter and sought to end his life, he could likely have avoided his untimely death.

Interestingly, however, the author of the short story does not reveal exactly what Fortunato’s crime on Montresor, if any, was. He does also not allow the audience to know why exactly Montresor killed him. This severely blurs the audience’s image of both characters and the events depicted in the text. Readers cannot tell whether the image of Fortunato presented by Montresor’s narration, which shows him as a man guilty of some heinous crime, is indeed accurate.

Similarly, in William Faulkner’s A Rose for Emily, the titular character Emily Grierson is depicted mostly through the perspective that the narrator has of her. While the narrator is indeed an individual, his image of Emily is heavily influenced by society. His narration is heavily characterized by the use of the word ‘we’, illustrating that what he, in fact, presents is a societal image and not an individual image of Miss Grierson. Through the narrator, the audience is exposed to a subjective image of the character (Sullivan 161). Readers therefore view her as a shady, reclusive individual without actually suspecting her of murdering Homer Barron. This view is influenced by the Southern customs practiced in Jefferson, Mississippi where the story is set.

In this particular situation, the people of the town do simply not fathom that the lady could kill her beau. Before her father’s death, her reclusion and the misfortune that befalls her neighborhood, Emily and her family are well respected in the town. Even when she suspiciously acquires arsenic, her boyfriend suddenly disappears, the strong odor emanates from her house and she mysteriously becomes a recluse, the townspeople do still not piece the evidence together. This is because of the image they have of her as an upstanding human being who could possibly not have a hand in his disappearance. Additionally, because Homer Barron is from the North, not many questions are asked of his mysterious and unexpected departure from the public scene. This disregard is further influenced by the fact that the people of the town consider him to be beneath Emily’s social class. If it had been the other way, with the honorable Southern woman disappearing and the mysterious man from the north becoming a recluse in their previously shared house, there would certainly have been more of a furor about the case. The image of Emily in that society therefore prevented the discovery of her crimes and her being brought to book during her life.

Just as Poe’s Fortunato does not suspect Montresor of any mischief because of the perspective he has of him, so do the people of Jefferson fail to notice the obvious signs that Emily had murdered Homer Barron. This illustrates the significance of societal image in creating fear in both the characters and the audience. The society in the story does not fear Emily Grierson despite apparently viewing her as slightly shady or unhinged. Similarly, the readers are conditioned, by extension, not to fear her, although the element of suspicion is perhaps more apparent among the readers because of their lack of the belief system that the townspeople use to judge Miss Grierson.

The cases discussed in the two texts explored above illustrate that image is important in the analysis of characters and situations. Characters can be judged from the language used to describe them and their general characteristics to predict potentially harmful situations. However, this image also has the potential to be misleading. That which would normally be characterized as fearful, could also be inaccurately represented or wholly misunderstood. Wolves aptly demonstrate this in St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised.

In the text, the author relates the story of a number of girls taken to a Catholic school for an education in proper human manners and etiquette. The girls are the children of werewolves who are entirely human because, as Russell herself writes, “their condition skips a generation”. However, while they are indeed human, their behavior does not reflect this because they have after all been raised by wolves. The narrator tells at the beginning of the short story of how their parents, and by extension them as well, are ostracized by both human society and the wolves around them because of their affliction. “They lived on an outsider’s existence in caves at the edge of the forest, threatened by frost and pitchforks,” she writes (Russell 238). This shunning they experience from the human community is because of the fear that these people have of the werewolves. While Russell’s story demonstrates that they are no more evil or ill-intentioned than regular human beings, the image that the society has of the werewolves, means that they are subjected to poor treatment that they do not deserve.

In fact, the work of the nuns at St. Lucy’s Home illustrates that social image is the only reason the werewolves and their children are ostracized. For instance, the fact that the werewolves are willing to give their children up to get a social education and subsequently a better life shows that they are misunderstood and forced to conform to human standards for them to live a decent life. Further, other than small acts of rebellion against the nuns, which would be expected of any group of young girls, the daughters of the werewolves do not cause any real harm to anyone. These are eventually eradicated completely, proving that with a little compassion and education, any set of individuals can be civilized and washed clean of the perceived element of fear.

The daughters of werewolves also bring to the fore issues of a changing social perspective with their view of their youngest, Mirabella. Although all the girls act just like her before they are brought to live with the nuns, the steadily begin to see her as uncivilized or uncouth. To a point, they even become afraid of her despite her being the same person they knew before. Her becoming a worse person or a threat in any manner of speaking does not cause this change in attitude towards her. In fact, Mirabella is arguably a better person than the other girls as evidenced by her fast action to save Claudette from falling apart at the ball. Mirabella rushes to her sister’s aid despite all their other sisters, especially Jeanette, failing to help her (250). She is nevertheless viewed as an ill-mannered oddball because of her reluctance to leave their traditional behaviors. This illustrates just how important perception and social image are to the idea of fear.

Unfortunately, social image is so important that it sometimes affects the behavior of people in a negative manner. This is fittingly brought out in Margaret Atwood’s Lusus Naturae. Atwood relates the story of a young woman struck by a mysterious disfiguring malady, which leads her family to fake her death to avoid social stigma. The family understands that if word were to get out of the terrifying condition into which their daughter has descended, they would likely be collectively shunned. The girl’s elder sister would also lack a suitor, and they would all end up unhappy. Although the mysterious illness only affects one of them, it is obvious that their society would automatically have a negative perception of every member of the family simply by extension. This fear of being shunned somewhat forces their hand. It also demonstrates a correlation between societal image and fear in the reverse. Rather than people fearing someone or something because of what they think of it, in this case the individuals that would be feared are afraid of being feared.

Similarly, the narrator, who is the woman with the strange disease, also understands how society works and how the ailment makes her susceptible to victimization due to the image people might have of her. This illustrates a changing self-image and the subsequent emergence of an apparent self-hate. When her grandmother suggests that her happiness be sacrificed for the sake of her sister’s, she readily agrees (Atwood 5). In part because she wants to be helpful, in part because her family’s perception of her has diminished the value she sees in herself. She comes to fear other people, because of her self-image and her under understanding that other people would almost certainly dislike her for looking like she does (Naimon 140). This change in self-image is accurately demonstrated in her admission that, “I could not see myself. I saw something, but that something was not myself” (Atwood 8). In the end, however, as the mob marches towards her house to kill her, she expresses a degree of acceptance of both herself and her fate.

All four short stories prove beyond any measure of doubt that fear is inherently linked to image, especially in literature. Although self-image and the view that individuals have on a person are both significant, societal image appears to bear the most weight in motivating fear within a people. The stories show that this form of perception has the capacity to cause fear not only in the people witnessing a particular phenomenon or threat, but also on people that inadvertently cause an unpopular phenomenon or pose an apparent threat. Individuals should therefore take time to examine perceived threats and evaluate whether they are indeed what they at first appear to be.