Episode 129: Luminous Miasma: On Edgar Allan Poe's "The Fall of the House of Usher"

Edgar Allan Poe can be lauded as a major inspiration for many innovative artists, genres, and movements, from horror fiction to the music of Maurice Ravel. He has also been a major inspiration for Weird Studies, particularly his short story "The Fall of the House of Usher." In this episode, JF and Phil try to pinpoint just what it is about this tale that is so compelling, discovering in the process that whatever it is cannot be pinpointed. Instead, the haunting mood of the story emerges from the peculiar arrangement of all its parts, becoming something entirely new.

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References

Edgar Allan Poe, “The Fall of the House of Usher”
Edgar Allan Poe, “The Masque of the Red Death
Klangfarbenmelodie, musical technique
Edgar Allan Poe, "The Poetic Principle"
Graham Harman, Weird Realism: Lovecraft and Philosophy
Lovecraft without adjectives
Weird Studies, Development of Circle vs. Spiral: Wheel of fortune, Blade Runner, The Star, Birhane
Matei Calinescu, The Five Faces of Modernity
Weird Studies, Episode 101 on ‘In Praise of Shadows’
Phanes, deity
James Herbert, The Dark
Joseph Adamson, “Frye and Poe”
Lucien Lévy-Bruhl, French anthropologist
James Machin, Weird Fiction in Britain
Edgar Allan Poe, “Eureka”

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