The pit and pendulum are a short story which is written by Edgar Allan Poe. It is about a prisoner of prison in Toledo, Spain. How lives what the torture he must go through when he is in prison there. Edgar Allan Poe uses several different features to make his story better and most important more attractive to read.
Firstly, symbolism is an important part of the short story the pit and the pendulum. The cell is one of the symbols it symbolizes that someone is locked up for 24 hours a day, in a small place and against the good side of humankind. This is an important, because it comes multiple times back inside the short story. Secondly, you have the pit which is of course in the title. It is a deep hole in the ground inside the prison. It symbolizes the suffering inside the prison and what kind of horrible time the prisoners must go through. The pit is an important part of the story, because it reminds the reader where the prison eventually will end up and the dead is coming closer and closer for the prisoner. The symbols are, also used to create suspense in the story
Secondly, the stylistic features are also an important part of the story. Edgar Allan Poe uses a lot of stylistic features in his short stories to make them livelier and more interesting. Repetitions are used multiple times throughout in the story, this mostly the let certain important things stand out more and make people aware of this part of the story. Repetition is a stylistic feature which is used in almost every literature story. The author also omits certain words out of the text to create some extra suspense. Alliteration is also, used several times mostly the f and s sounds.
Edgar Allan Poe uses a lot of difficult language, but also certain words from Latin or even German literature. He for example used Deus ex Machina which from German literature in the pit and the pendulum. This means a lot of different power of events when you thought was a hopeless situation. In this story this can be related, because when you are in jail and you are waiting for your death sentence, you are in a hopeless situation when you are facing your death. At the start of the short story the pit and the pendulum the author uses Latin, to create suspense. Latin was a language form the Greek and roman times, this language was mostly for the rich and the important people.
To conclude, the three different features: stylistic devices, language and symbolism are important part of a story, overall. Without those the story would be really boring to read, and the reader would not have any suspense. This story was of course written in the beginning of the 19th century and some language would not be used now. Some expressions from other countries which are really used very scarcely.
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