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Edgar Allan PoeA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
At the beginning of the story, the narrator notes the artistic persuasion, or as he puts it, “a peculiar sensibility of temperament,” that has run through the Usher family line for generations (5). They were prolific artists, musicians, and philanthropists. The narrator attributes this strong family characteristic to the fact that the Usher clan has only had one line of descendants. He credits the “deficiency […] of collateral issue” with the undeviating nature of the Usher personality and with the close association of the House of Usher with its family (5).
Readers can assume that the brothers and sisters of the Usher family became the parents of the next generation and so forth. The narrator notes that this singular family line has lasted through the “long lapse of centuries,” implying that the Usher issue of today are the descendants of generations of interbreeding (5).
Inbreeding has long been associated with the aristocracy. European royal families believed that they were superior to others and did not want individuals of a lower social class marrying into their family and creating lesser offspring. By breeding within the same gene pool for generations, royal families created and passed on genetic anomalies.
By Edgar Allan Poe
A Dream Within a Dream
A Dream Within a Dream
Edgar Allan Poe
Annabel Lee
Annabel Lee
Edgar Allan Poe
Berenice
Berenice
Edgar Allan Poe
Hop-Frog
Hop-Frog
Edgar Allan Poe
Ligeia
Ligeia
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Tamerlane
Tamerlane
Edgar Allan Poe
The Black Cat
The Black Cat
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The Cask of Amontillado
The Cask of Amontillado
Edgar Allan Poe
The Conqueror Worm
The Conqueror Worm
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The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar
The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar
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The Gold Bug
The Gold Bug
Edgar Allan Poe
The Haunted Palace
The Haunted Palace
Edgar Allan Poe
The Imp of the Perverse
The Imp of the Perverse
Edgar Allan Poe
The Lake
The Lake
Edgar Allan Poe
The Man of the Crowd
The Man of the Crowd
Edgar Allan Poe
The Masque of the Red Death
The Masque of the Red Death
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The Murders in the Rue Morgue
The Murders in the Rue Morgue
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The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket
The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket
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The Oval Portrait
The Oval Portrait
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The Philosophy of Composition
The Philosophy of Composition
Edgar Allan Poe