Monthly Archives: October 2022

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An Analysis of “The Judge’s House” by Bram Stoker

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When we think of a battle between science and folklore, I do not think a quaint horror story of a mathematics students comes to mind. However, in “The Judge’s House” by Bram Stoker, we have just that scenario.

Today, I am going to provide a short summary and analysis of the short story “The Judge’s House” by Bram Stoker. It’s quite spooky and features many elements of Gothic literature. Even so, it is a stand out classic in the haunted house genre.

Summary

Looking for a Quiet Place

The story takes place at the turn of the century. It is about a math student named Malcolm Malcolmson, who is seeking a quiet place to work on his studies. Luckily, after searching for a time, he discovers a long-abandoned home. The home once belonged to a judge in the town of Benchurch. There the student takes up residence for a time.

The house is a strange one:

“It was an old rambling, heavy-built house of the Jacobean style, with heavy gables and windows, unusually small, and set higher than was customary in such houses, and was surrounded with a high brick wall massively built. Indeed, on examination, it looked more like a fortified house than an ordinary dwelling. But all these things pleased Malcolmson” (Stoker).

The House is Unquiet

However, the student is young and skeptical, so pays no mind to the superstitious warnings. Yet, slowly, over the course of the following days, he realizes rats have infested the house. The vermin both unsettles and alarms him. As it turns out, they make quite a racket while he attempts to work on his mathematical quandaries.

“Tonight the rats disturbed him more than they had done on the previous night. How they scampered up and down and under and over! How they squeaked, and scratched, and gnawed! … getting bolder by degrees, came to the mouths of their holes and to the chinks and cracks and crannies in the wainscoting till their eyes shone like tiny lamps as the firelight rose and fell” (Stoker).

Furthermore, various characters warn him that the Judge’s house is a haunted one. The judge was a twisted man who sent many criminals to death by hanging with complete impunity. One day, after traveling to the local inn “The Good Traveler,” Malcolmson meets with local doctor and scholar Dr. Thornhill. Thornhill tells him about the Judge’s evil deeds. The judge was a twisted man, Malcolmson is told. In fact, maliciously hanged the gallows’ rope from his home’s warning bell.

The Dangling Rope

Malcolmson investigates the rope at the Judge’s house and takes a “deadly interest in it.” He speculates as to “who these victims were, and the grim wish of the Judge to have such a ghastly relic ever under his eyes” (Stoker). It is at this point that a particularly antagonistic rat emerges once again to antagonize him more.

And, yet, the student is unable to kill the rat. He is then confronted by none other than the judge himself. In spectral form, the judge harries him with a noose made from the alarm bell rope.

Stoker writes, “He saw the Judge approach—still keeping between him and the door—and raise the noose and throw it towards him as if to entangle him. With a great effort he made a quick movement to one side, and saw the rope fall beside him, and heard it strike the oaken floor. Again the Judge raised the noose and tried to ensnare him, ever keeping his baleful eyes fixed on him, and each time by a mighty effort the student just managed to evade it.”

Unfortunately, the student succumbs to his own skepticism and reticence to believe in the supernatural. By the time help arrives, he is found the hanged from the rafters.

“There at the end of the rope of the great alarm bell hung the body of the student, and on the face of the Judge in the picture was a malignant smile” (Stoker).

Analysis

Bram Stoker’s “The Judge’s House” is a quintessential ghost story that benefits from Stoker’s own imagination and talent for description. The story reads like a folkloric argument between personal belief and skepticism. I think the reader finds—just as they would in Dracula or the short story “Dracula’s Guest”–that Stoker places a great weight on belief and on the concreteness of oral storytelling, whether it is pure invention or not.

Stoker was born in 1847 and died in 1912—when Gothic horror and weird fiction were very popular. He was also a mathematics major at Trinity College. This gives us some understanding as to the pursuits of Malcolm Malcolmson. It also gives us a glimpse into the mind of a man who very clearly has an understanding of the strength of mathematics and its rational appeals. However, much like author Washington Irving, Stoker also clearly has a passion for folklore and storytelling. His interests creates the neat dichotomy between the student and the town in “The Judge’s House.” The story itself is one of skepticism and a fixation on the duality of the world. It is a story of science and rationale, and one of mystery and magic.

Conclusion

In “The Judge’s House” by Bram Stoker, Malcolmson wants a place to study regardless of the evil things lurking in the shadows, whether they be rats or spirits. Meanwhile, the town of Benchurch has relied on their beliefs and traditions and want none of it.

The landlady of the inn tells the student, “It is too bad of me, sir, and you—and a young gentlemen, too—if you will pardon me saying it, going to live there all alone. If you were my boy—and you’ll excuse me for saying it—you wouldn’t sleep there a night, not if I had to go there myself and pull the big alarm bell that’s on the roof!” (Stoker).

As such, she is the stand-in for the entire community. They knew something was wrong with the house, and they warn him to stay away. However, the student’s rationale mind only wants a place to study.

No doubt, at least according to Stoker, if Malcolmson had listened to the warnings of the superstitious folk then he would still be alive. Rationalism, it seems, doesn’t account for everything–even past misdeeds.

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“Fall, Leaves, Fall” by Emily Bronte: Analysis

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Fall is certainly one of the best times of the year. Yet, it is strange how it differs from city to country, from sidewalk to path. The colors pop a little harder in some places, and a little less in others. With it, however, is that feeling that the winter is on its way, and that the season is forever shifting onward without you. Poets really have a way with saying one thing and meaning another. In this post, we are going to analyze “Fall, Leaves, Fall” by Emily Bronte.

Analysis
Memories

I could speak a while about watching Charlie Brown and friends sail the ocean blue with Christopher Columbus one dreary Sunday in November and finding myself looking away from the television at the leafless, lifeless trees outside and searching somewhere deep inside myself for happiness.

In “Fall, Leaves, Fall” by Emily Bronte, the poet reminds us of such memories for a specific reason. That is, while we are thankful for the rain hitting the window on gloomy, fall afternoons, we are still reminded of the growing darkness headed around the corner.

The Poem

In the first quatrain of “Fall, Leaves, Fall,” the author espouses a love for the autumn season as it happens. “Fall, leaves, fall; die, flowers, away;” she states. “Lengthen night and shorten day; / Every leaf speaks bliss to me, / Fluttering from the autumn tree” (Bronte).

Furthermore, in the second quatrain of the poem, Bronte welcomes winter. Bronte states “I shall smile when wreaths of snow / Blossom where the rose should grow;” which shows us Bronte’s acceptance of the changing seasons. “I shall sing when night’s decay / Ushers in a drearier day,” Bronte finishes. “Decay” is an odd word choice because what else decays but nature and humanity?

Explanation

Time and life dwindling away are always tried and true themes in stories of change and renewal. I mean, what greater imagery is there than the leaves falling from a colorful tree to remind us that life moves in cycles? The only sadness is the shortened days and longer nights. But, without the abbreviated days, it really wouldn’t feel so fall out, would it? So we come to appreciate this cycle.

Yet, poems are rife with metaphor, so one has to look a little deeper at the language used in the poem. In the poem, leaves “fall.” Of course, the poem is set in the season of fall. There is a link between these two ideas. In the same way, one could argue that leaves falling symbolize the descent of life into death. That is, a living thing falling and landing on its own grave—the Earth itself. To “Lengthen night and shorten day” is to see the darkness growing in our own lives while the light is extinguished. Our lives literally grow shorter and the light leaves us for darkness. Sure, cold overtakes the rose (love and warmth), but what else is there to do but embrace the coming darkness?

Meanwhile, “Every leaf speaks bliss to me” shows the author’s feelings toward this growing inevitability. Every leaf that has fallen, every day that has gone by, has been bliss. Even as the end looms, there is much to be thankful for those days are counted. Bronte relishes this realization and looks toward the future.

The link between the two is clear to me.

Conclusion

Everybody understand the frailty that exists between autumn and winter. When you have the first, the second is very, very close behind. Though, is that not symbolic of life? As we know the good days are always haunted by the bad ones, and one’s life can have love and warmth, but we all face the coming cold and darkness regardless of our station or our purpose.

Bronte, much like many poets, tells us that our hearts are in the drearier days, but if we cherish the days we’ve had and relish the days ahead, then any amount of dreariness should be the driving fire that pushes us forever onwards.

Works Cited

Brontë, Emily. “Fall, Leaves, Fall .” Poetry Foundation, 10 Oct. 2022, poetryfoundation.org/poems/52330/fall-leaves-fall.

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Studying Horror: Elements and Conventions

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Horror is that chill in the night while you are walking to your front door. It is the fear that a hand will reach out and grab you in the dark. It is the feeling that something is not right when you are home alone. You can feel it there in the shadows, or is it just behind you? And the hair on your neck stands up. We know the feeling of horror, but what is horror? By examining the conventions and elements of the genre, we can begin to understand one of the most fascinating and entertaining genres since the dawn of time.

Horror Defined

It doesn’t matter your age, horror as a genre is the absolute best. Both September and October are prime months for horror movies. The leaves are dying, the chill is in the air…the wall between the living and dead is thinning out, and the old Celtic tradition of Samhain is just around the corner!

But what makes horror blend so well with these things? Why do the turning leaves always remind me of the Headless Horseman’s fateful pursuit of Ichabod Crane? Why does the crispness in the air fill me full of joy and delicious dread, such that the narrator of the Tell-Tale Heart shares with the reader? There are many answers.

The horror genre generates a sense of fear, suspense, mystery, and dread. Some sources define it as these feelings being created inside of the reader or viewer, including “repulsion” and terror,” which ultimately “…develops the atmosphere of horror” (Literaryterms.net). Sometimes, horror is merely an assault of the unknown, such as ghosts and goblins reaching for you in the dark.

Horror as a genre has many conventions, or elements, that make it what it is, and it’s these conventions that touch the darkest pits of our animal brains and tickle us in just the right way.

Examples of Conventions at Play

Dracula

If we look at some prime examples from literature, we can understand how these conventions come into existence. For instance, in Dracula (1897) by Bram Stoker, an awful monster continually assaults the characters both physically and mentally.

Dracula, of course, is a supernatural being, ranging somewhere between a wraith and an unholy blight. Stoker plays quite fruitfully on the the convention of the unknown, as it is a looming element in the horror genre. The characters don’t know what to expect from Dracula (whose powers are largely unknown to them) and that creates foreboding and suspense for the reader.

In the following excerpt, the protagonist of Dracula, Jonathan Harker, is traveling to Dracula’s castle via carriage and hears noises in the distance.

“Then, far off in the distance, from the mountains on each side of us began a louder and sharper howling—that of wolves—which affected both the horses and myself in the same way—for I was minded to jump from the caleche (a horse-drawn vehicle) and run, whilst they reared again and plunged madly, so that the driver had to use all his great strength to keep them from bolting” (Dracula).

The unknowing of this section of the story is crippling to the reader. Who are these wolves and why are they howling at the carriages approach? Yet, we also know he will be just fine because wild dogs howling in the distance is a convention of horror. However, it doesn’t mitigate the apprehension one has while reading about Harker’s journey up to the castle.

The Judge’s House

Moreover, The Judge’s House (1891) by Bram Stoker feeds into the conventions of horror AND the ghost story.

The elements are as follows:

  • There’s a learned student (or man of science).
  • There’s a long-abandoned, portentous abode.
  • The main character spends the night(s) there.
  • There is a fearful town of superstitious folk.
  • The main character ignore the warnings from said folk.
  • The main character comes to a bad end for dismissing superstition.

All of these features can be found in The Judge’s House by Bram Stoker, but they can also be found in almost any haunted house story or movie in the genre.

At one point in the story (spoiler alert), our student protagonist is confronted by a specter and looks to the many rat-holes that litter the walls of the house. There he sees the eyes of each rat peering out. What is more, rats cover the rope in the room that goes up to a great bell alarm.

“Every inch of it was covered with them, and more and more were pouring through the small circular hole in the ceiling whence it emerged, so that with their weight the bell was beginning to sway” (The Judge’s House).

What could be more disgusting (as it fits into the horror genre) than seeing a multitude of large, hairy rats hanging from a rope that is dangling from the rafters? And, also, a rope that spells certain doom for our protagonist? The revulsion that the reader feels fits right into the horror nook.

Conclusion

So, when we ask, “What is horror?” we have a few answers. Horror, much like every genre, is simply a category composed of tropes and conventions. Yes, we can get down to the nitty-gritty if you would like. There are so many interpretations of horror and what it means to the reader and the writer.

For instance, Danse Macabre (1981) by Stephen King spells out a whole thesis on horror and its relationship to the Good and Evil sides of humanity. Meanwhile, the documentary film Nightmares in Red, White and Blue (2009) tackles the sociological manifestations present in the horror genre across multiple decades, from war and conflict to nationwide fears of technology and nuclear annihilation.

Certainly there are deeper analyses and meditations on what horror is, but at its basic roots we have a genre that intends to do one thing for its readers–scare the pants off of them!

Works Cited

“Horror: Definition and Examples | LiteraryTerms.Net.” Literary Terms, 16 Sept. 2017, literaryterms.net/horror/.

Stoker, Bram. “Bram Stoker, Excerpt from Dracula (1897) – A Guide to the GothicShare on Twitter.” Jeanette A. Laredo, 3 May 2022, oen.pressbooks.pub/guidetogothic/chapter/bram-stoker-excerpt-from-dracula-1897/.

Stoker, Bram. “The Judge’s House.” American Literature, 20 Oct. 2AD, americanliterature.com/author/bram-stoker/short-story/the-judges-house.