I have already finished my Final Project in Stylistics) I wouldn't say it was that easy, because it was not. But it worth the little "struggle" with the story, dictionary, your own mind, fantasy and the skill to read between lines. Now, whatever book I will read, I know, that simply readings  is not all. But I can do more. I actually can see more, can notice much more than those whose don't acquainted with  the essense of Stylistics. I'm glad we had it in our university curriculum. Because learning Stylistics the text became for me more valuable, and it brings more aesthetic pleasure to take the book into my hands.

   As for my Final Project, I adore all the works of E. A. Poe. That's why I've chosen one of his horror stories for the stylistic analysis. I do not suggest I've done the perfect stylistic analysis of the "The Fall of the House of Usher". But I tried to penetrate to the inside of it. To the characters' feelings and emotions, to the darkness. And I swear, there were moments while reading the story for the next time and putting it into fragments I had the goose skin on my arms and another time I saw curtains moving in my room. Brrrr...

  Edgar Poe is the author to whom EVERY word, coma, element's presence or its absence is relevant and significant. Everything is counted. I hope I've noticed at least the least hiden of them. 

   P. S. And thank you, Victoria Victorivna for knowledge of Stylistics!

 Complete stylistic analysis of our horror story "The Fall of the House of Usher"

   The story under analysis comes from a novel is written by the outstanding American author Edgar Allan Poe. Edgar Allan Poe wrote about the eternal and exotic and neglected topical and dull. One of his favourite themes is the nature, which is his source for the difficult to interpret and exquisite symbols - ancient and those he established himself. The Nature is metaphorical to the core and hides subtle shades of secret meaning. He introduced the British horror story, or the Gothic genre, to American literature, along with the detective story, science fiction, and literary criticism.

   Edgar Allan Poe (born Edgar Poe; January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849) was an American author, poet, editor and literary critic, considered part of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre, Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is generally considered the inventor of the detective fiction genre. He is further credited with contributing to the emerging genre of science fiction. He was the first well-known American writer to try to earn a living through writing alone, resulting in a financially difficult life and career.

   The story under analysis is one of his horror (or gothic) stories. This semi-fantastic tale about the narrator's last visit to the old mansion of his friend, the strange lady’s Madeline illness, the more strange mental Usher’s illness, about the secret inner connection between brother and sister, and supernatural communication between home and its inhabitants, of premature burial, the death and, in the end, the fall of the house of Usher to the dark waters of the lake and the escaping narrator, who barely managed to do it in the moment of disaster.

   The basic themes of the story are as follows:

- mortality - the line between life and death is one of the main discussed here;
- madness and the consequences it can cause;
- fear - everything in the story is fully penetrated with fear: fear of unknown, of inescapable, of death and of one's own nature;
- friendship - the theme of close partnership between the narrator and Usher is revealed in the story. The narrator is the only person whom Roderick believes and ready to open all his secrets.

  The setting of the events in the given story  is fantastic and rather mysterious. It is presented in a detailed way. It  symbolizes the emotional state of the characters and reveals the main idea of the story.

   The following points can be mentioned:
- the author doesn't mention neither the geographical position nor a specific year when these events took place. The fact is, the mood and atmosphere in the setting is very important - it is certainly a powerful atmosphere that Poe creates;
- the outside of the mansion is one which full of scare settings Poe renders in his tale. We imagine an ethereal glowing cloud, a dark and eery lake, not to mention the ominous fissure running down the center of the mansion. He creates a different but equally scary setting inside the mansion, where everything screams “YOU ARE IN A HORROR STORY.”
- the house itself is created to show the mood and atmosphere of the story, like the creepy tapestries and furnishings inside. The fact that Usher hasn’t left the house in ages lends the tale a sense of claustrophobia. In fact, the narrator himself doesn’t leave until the end of the story – he is as trapped as Roderick. The house’s sentience is also a big deal – the physical setting of the story is as supernatural as its action and themes.
    The following stylistic means are noticed to create the dull and dark atmosphere of the story:
a) Lexical: metaphors in the sentences given below suggests the narrator’s evaluation of the atmosphere around him and helps us to get inside the depressing images, which the house, the lake made us to feel:
"DURING the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country; and at length found myself, as the shades of the evening drew on, within view of the melancholy House of Usher ".
"It was a mystery all insoluble; nor could I grapple with the shadowy fancies that crowded upon me as I pondered".
"Nevertheless, in this mansion of gloom I now proposed to myself a sojourn of some weeks".
b) Syntactical: the idea expressed through the use of asyndeton is to show the weirdness and inaccessibility of what was going on in the House for the strangers and non-inhabitants:
"While the objects around me--while the carvings of the ceilings, the sombre tapestries of the walls, the ebon blackness of the floors, and the phantasmagoric armorial trophies which rattled as I strode, were but matters to which, or to such as which, I had been accustomed from my infancy--while I hesitated not to acknowledge how familiar was all this--I still wondered to find how unfamiliar were the fancies which ordinary images were stirring up".
c) Graphic: capitalization and hyphenation are taken by the author to show the readers the continuity and consistency of the actions developing there in the mansion for centuries:
"DURING the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country; and at length found myself, as the shades of the evening drew on, within view of the melancholy House of Usher."
"I looked upon the scene before me--upon the mere house, and the simple landscape features of the domain--upon the bleak walls--upon the vacant eye-like windows--upon a few rank sedges--and upon a few white trunks of decayed trees--with an utter depression of soul which I can compare to no earthly sensation more properly than to the after-dream of the reveller upon opium--the bitter lapse into everyday life--the hideous dropping off of the veil" (this also the case of anaphora is present here)
   The description of gloom and despair which overcame the building inside and ouside is done in detailed way, what we can see through the use of stylistic means commented above.

   The plot of The Fall of the House of Usher is not very complicated, though very interesting. It creates perfect background for E.A. Poe’s masterly art of depicting an atmosphere of darkness and horror.
   From the point of view of presentation the text is the 1st person narrative. The story is presented from the point of view of an unnamed narrator, who is acquianted to the owner of the house—Roderick Usher, whom he knows since boyhood. The narrator receives a letter from him with a very urgent request to come to his house and keep him a company in his terrible disease. "A letter, however, had lately reached me in a distant part of the country--a letter from him-- which, in its wildly importunate nature, had admitted of no other than a personal reply."
    In the first paragraphs Poe gives the introduction and the exposition to his horror story (we know where and when the action was taking place). The development of the events is revealed through the descriptions, narrations and with cases of dialogues between Roderick and the narrator. I think, the author did the intentional choice of types of speeches to create the gloomy and mysterious image of the whole story. So, the inner narrator's meditations help to observe the hesitations of him, fear and superstitions. The narrator felt something bad was going to happen, but there were no proofs. To some extent.
The climax comes when Roderick and the narrator realize that they've buried lady Madeline alive and when she comes out of her tomb, enters the room and falls onto Roderick.We understand, it was awaited by Roderick. He knew, they've burried his sister alive. But he was too weak to admit it and to save the soul and body of lady Madeline. That is the moment the readers understand how his mental illness made the Master of the House of Usher do the most terrible deed in his life.
The anticlimax of the story comes when the narrator escapes the House, and looking back, he saw the house falling into the lake and it's waters engrossed the walls and fragments of the house. I think, it is exactly anticlimax, as we don't know what happened there inside and we do not have answers to our questions. The end of the story is not very clear.
    From the point of view of presentation the text is the 1st person narrative.
    The characters we meet in the story under analysis are:

1). Narrator, a friend of the master of the House of Usher. When he visits his friend, he witnesses terrifying events.
2). Roderick Usher, the master of the house. He suffers from a depressing illness characterized by strange behavior.
3). Madeline Usher, twin sister of Roderick. She also suffers from a strange illness. After apparently dying, she rises from her coffin.
4). Servant, domestic in the Usher household. He attends to the narrator's horse.
5). Valet, domestic in the Usher household who conducts the narrator to Roderick Usher's room.
6). Physician, one of several doctors who treat Madeline Usher.
 Of course, the greatest attention is paid by the author to Roderick, narrator and Madeline.
The writer reveals Roderick by means of  the direct characterizations - the narrator describes his appearance, mental state, all his actions. Through narrative descriptions with implied or explicit judgment and surface details of  physical appearance, for example:
  "Yet the character of his face had been at all times remarkable. A cadaverousness of complexion; an eye large, liquid, and luminous beyond comparison; lips somewhat thin and very pallid, but of a surpassingly beautiful curve; a nose of a delicate Hebrew model, but with a breadth of nostril unusual in similar formations; a finely-moulded chin, speaking, in its want of prominence, of a want of moral energy; hair of a more than web-like softness and tenuity; these features, with an inordinate expansion above the regions of the temple, made up altogether a countenance not easily to be forgotten."
  Roderick Usher is presented as a weak person, who has a mental disease and a burden of the ancient family damnation on his shoulders.

  Madeline. She is presented also through the direct characterizations of the narrator. We even don't here her voice. She doesn't participate in the rare dialogues in the story. Madeline is like Roderick's shadow, an integral part of him. When this part dies - Roderick dies also, he can't live without it. The woman is presented through narrative summary without judgment. 
   The narrator has no name, but we are satisfied with the fact, that he is a close person to Ushers to have no doubts in his thoughts, words and ideas. We feel this man loves Roderick as a friend, as a brother. He wants to help, but he doesn't know HOW. And he tries his best even through his oppressive feelings and FEAR. Yes, he is afraid, as every of us. Because he doesn't understands what's going on, though his intuition gives him hints. And he of course confused, he looses his close friend. He feel helpless in that God forgotten place.

   "From that chamber, and from that mansion, I fled aghast. The storm was still abroad in all its wrath as I found myself crossing the old causeway. Suddenly there shot along the path a wild light, and I turned to see whence a gleam so unusual could have issued; for the vast house and its shadows were alone behind me."
   All the characters in the story are victims of the House and the family damnation. Only the narrator escapes, as he doesn't belong to this place. The inhabitants of the house and the building itself became one whole long ago. And they disappear from the earth also together. They lived their time. 

    The story  is rather a description than a narration, because many descriptive paragraphs are given here (mostly the narrator's observations).
   In order to portray the characters, to describe the setting, to reveal the idea, to render the general  atmosphere of the story  vividly and convincingly the author of the analysed story  resorts to the following devices. Edgar Allan Poe is the master of word. And "The Fall of the House of Usher" is not an exception. Here many stylistic means and devices are employed to create the effect of a real "gothic" story, of horror, mystery, death, and destruction.
Lexical:
- foreign words:
1. Upon my entrance, Usher rose from a sofa on which he had been lying at full length, and greeted me with a vivacious warmth which had much in it, I at first thought, of an overdone cordiality--of the constrained effort of the ennuye man of the world.
2. His chief delight, however, was found in the perusal of an exceedingly rare and curious book in quarto Gothic--the manual of a forgotten church—the Vigiliae Mortuorum Secundum Chorum Ecclesiae Maguntinae.
   The foreign words, in particular French and Latine, are used here to elevate the language of the story.
- metaphors:
1. DURING the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country; and at length found myself, as the shades of the evening drew on, within view of the melancholy House of Usher .
   This metaphor is used to show the ghastly atmosphere of the story, to say about the abnormal things that were happening there.
2. It was a mystery all insoluble; nor could I grapple with the shadowy fancies that crowded upon me as I pondered.
   This metaphor is used to underline the effect of something mysterious, that surrounded the narrator, as if they were real and made our narrator feel not safe.
3. Nevertheless, in this mansion of gloom I now proposed to myself a sojourn of some weeks.
   The metaphor above is used to emphasize the main image of the short story under analysis. It helps to create negative and mournful image of the house, which only look pushes back everyone from that place.
4. In this there was much that reminded me of the specious totality of old wood-work which has rotted for long years in some neglected vault, with no disturbance from the breath of the external air.
   This metaphor underlines the neglect of the house. There lived people, but the above given words underline that it was a dead place for a long time already, and its inhabitants were people no longer, but ghosts, creatures at death's door.
5. His countenance, I thought, wore a mingled expression of low cunning and perplexity.
   This case of metaphor shows us the features of madness of Roderick Usher.
6. The impetuous fury of the entering gust nearly lifted us from our feet.
   This metaphor shows us the strong power of nature, where the human is powerless. This also shows a hint that something tremendous was going to happen and even the nature was irritated.
7. While I gazed, this fissure rapidly widened--there came a fierce breath of the whirlwind--the entire orb of the satellite burst at once upon my sight--my brain reeled as I saw the mighty walls rushing asunder--there was a long tumultuous shouting sound like the voice of a thousand waters—and the deep and dank tarn at my feet closed sullenly and silently over the fragments of the "House of Usher".
   The alike case of metaphor to the previous one. The wind was not easy, like breeze, but strong, and it is like the last breath of the falling house before it would be absorbed by the lake waters.
- metonymy:
1. A letter, however, had lately reached me in a distant part of the country--a letter from him-- which, in its wildly importunate nature, had admitted of no other than a personal reply.
   The case of metonymy here means the importance and urgency of the message, "...a letter from him-- which, in its wildly importunate nature, had admitted of no other than a personal reply".
- epithets:
1. I had so worked upon my imagination as really to believe that about the whole mansion and domain there hung an atmosphere peculiar to themselves and their immediate vicinity-- an atmosphere which had no affinity with the air of heaven, but which had reeked up from the decayed trees, and the grey wall, and the silent tarn--a pestilent and mystic vapour, dull, sluggish, faintly discernible, and leaden-hued.
   The choice of such epithets as given above help to reveal the dark atmosphere of the text and to show the stagnation, dying away of life in the house as well as outside.
2. Perhaps the eye of a scrutinizing observer might have discovered a barely perceptible fissure, which, extending from the roof of the building in front, made its way down the wall in a zigzag direction, until it became lost in the sullen waters of the tarn.
   The choice of such epithets as given above help to reveal the dark atmosphere of the text and to show the stagnation, dying away of life in the house as well as outside.
3. The now ghastly pallor of the skin, and the now miraculous lustre of the eye, above all things startled and even awed me.
   The epithets "ghastly" and "miraculous" are used here to show the detailed description of the Roderick appearance, appearance of not a concscious person, but of a person, who suffers, struggles, and giving up.
4. His voice varied rapidly from a tremulous indecision (when the animal spirits seemed utterly in abeyance) to that species of energetic concision—that abrupt, weighty, unhurried, and hollow-sounding enunciation--that leaden, self- balanced and perfectly modulated guttural utterance, which may be observed in the lost drunkard, or the irreclaimable eater of opium, during the periods of his most intense excitement.
  "abrupt, weighty, unhurried, and hollow-sounding" - these epithets characterize Usher's voice as of a person, who is unemotional, very reserved, and doesn't want tell you much.
5. The radiance was that of the full, setting, and blood-red moon which now shone vividly through that once barely-discernible fissure of which I have before spoken as extending from the roof of the building, in a zigzag direction, to the base.
    "...blood-red moon..." - this epithet creates an image of death that is close to the house, it shows that death is already in the house.
- similies:
1. Minute fungi overspread the whole exterior, hanging in a fine tangled web-work from the eaves.
   The fungi are compared to the web-work, because they were everywhere, everything was covered with it and it one more thing, that creates the image of dark, dying place, cold and unpleasant.
2. We replaced and screwed down the lid, and, having secured the door of iron, made our way, with toil, into the scarcely less gloomy apartments of the upper portion of the house.
THE ROOM IS COMPARED TO THE DARK PLACE, WHERE THE TOMB WAS. AND IT REMINDS THE NARRATOR THE TOMB ITSELF (Implicite simile)
3. I reined my horse to the precipitous brink of a black and lurid tarn that lay in unruffled lustre by the dwelling, and gazed down--but with a shudder even more thrilling than before--upon the remodelled and inverted images of the grey sedge, and the ghastly tree-stems, and the vacant and eye-like windows.
This simile is used not once in the story under analysis, and we should pay great attention to it, of course. The windows are like eyes, vacant eyes. The house is supposed to be the body, and windows are it's eyes. But as house is rotting, the eyes, as the mirrors of person's soul are empty, there is nothing to reflect already. There nothing everywhere. No sign of life is noticed in the house and outside it. The darkness and nothingness of the house constantly absorbed everything around it.
- hyperbole:
1. While I gazed, this fissure rapidly widened--there came a fierce breath of the whirlwind--the entire orb of the satellite burst at once upon my sight--my brain reeled as I saw the mighty walls rushing asunder--there was a long tumultuous shouting sound like the voice of a thousand waters—and the deep and dank tarn at my feet closed sullenly and silently over the fragments of the "House of Usher".
   The hyperbole given above is used to intensify the size of the lake near the house.
- zeugma:
1. The writer spoke of acute bodily illness--of a mental disorder which oppressed him--and of an earnest desire to see me, as his best, and indeed his only personal friend, with a view of attempting, by the cheerfulness of my society, some alleviation of his malady.
   The case of zeugma given above emphasizes the significance of the narrator to the master of the house. Despite his mental disease Roderick remembered about his best and only close friend since boyhood.
- pun:
1. The valet now threw open a door and ushered me into the presence of his master.
   The author played with words here intentionally. The surname of the family is Usher. It is symbolic already itself. The valet ushered the narrator like something insignificant, easy, something, can disappear without evidence. So, the semantic meaning of '"usher" as the remainings of the fire and the verb "to usher" as to move are opposed here.
- oxymoron:
1. The disease which had thus entombed the lady in the maturity of youth, had left, as usual in all maladies of a strictly cataleptical character, the mockery of a faint blush upon the bosom and the face, and that suspiciously lingering smile upon the lip which is so terrible in death.
   The narrator’s ironic treatment of lady Madeline is seen from the use of the case of oxymoron that given above. The phrase "terrible smile" creates a horror image.
- allusions:
1. Among other things, I hold painfully in mind a certain singular perversion and amplification of the wild air of the last waltz of Von Weber.
   Poe here refers to a popular piano work of his time — which, though going by the title "Weber's Last Waltz" was actually composed by Carl Gottlieb Reissiger (1798–1859).[8] A manuscript copy of the music was found among Weber's papers upon his death in 1826 and the work was mistakenly attributed to him.
2. For me at least--in the circumstances then surrounding me--there arose out of the pure abstractions which the hypochondriac contrived to throw upon his canvas, an intensity of intolerable awe, no shadow of which felt I ever yet in the contemplation of the certainly glowing yet too concrete reveries of Fuseli.
   Henry Fuseli (German: Johann Heinrich Füssli) (7 February 1741 – 17 April 1825) was a Swiss painter, draughtsman, and writer on art, who worked and spent most of his life in Britain.
3.The opening epigraph quotes "Le Refus" (1831) by the French songwriter Pierre-Jean de Béranger (1780–1857), translated to English as "his heart is a suspended lute, as soon as it is touched, it resounds". Béranger's original text reads "Mon cœur" (my heart) and not "Son cœur" (his/her heart).
Syntactical:
- anaphora:
1. His ordinary manner had vanished. His ordinary occupations were neglected or forgotten.
The use of anaphoric repetitions attracts the reader’s attention and brings home to him the idea of the sick state of mind of the character, his unemotiveness and continuity of his disease.
- asyndeton:
1. A cadaverousness of complexion; an eye large, liquid, and luminous beyond comparison; lips somewhat thin and very pallid, but of a surpassingly beautiful curve; a nose of a delicate Hebrew model, but with a breadth of nostril unusual in similar formations; a finely-moulded chin, speaking, in its want of prominence, of a want of moral energy; hair of a more than web-like softness and tenuity; these features, with an inordinate expansion above the regions of the temple, made up altogether a countenance not easily to be forgotten.
   The use of asyndeton here shows us not normal physical state of the main character.
- inversion:
1. Shaking off from my spirit what must have been a dream, I scanned more narrowly the real aspect of the building.
2. Much that I encountered on the way contributed, I know not how, to heighten the vague sentiments of which I have already spoken
3. Yet all this was apart from any extraordinary dilapidation.
4. Yet the character of his face had been at all times remarkable.
5. Thus, thus, and not otherwise, shall I be lost.
  The cases of inversion are present here to underline the importance of the actions and events which were going first and to show the deep narrator's inner meditation and Roderick's mad psyche. 
- repetitions:
1. We sat down; and for some moments, while he spoke not, I gazed upon him with a feeling half of pity, half of awe.
   The repetition is used here to show us the ambivalence of the narrator's feelings to the Roderick.
2. Thus, thus, and not otherwise, shall I be lost.
   The repetition is used here to underline the exact way of death by Roderick.
3. Long- -long--long--many minutes, many hours, many days, have I heard it--yet I dared not--oh, pity me, miserable wretch that I am!--I dared not--I dared not speak!
   The repetition is used here to create the image of costant and continuant action.
- emphatic constructions:
1. It was the work of the rushing gust--but then without those doors there DID stand the lofty and enshrouded figure of the lady Madeline of Usher.
2. It was the manner in which all this, and much more, was said--it was the apparent heart that went with his request--which allowed me no room for hesitation; and I accordingly obeyed forthwith what I still considered a very singular summons.
3. It was with difficulty that I could bring myself to admit the identity of the wan being before me with the companion of my early boyhood. Yet the character of his face had been at all times remarkable.
4. In this there was much that reminded me of the specious totality of old wood-work which has rotted for long years in some neglected vault, with no disturbance from the breath of the external air.
   The emphatic constructions are used by the author to catch the readers attention and to make the so called introduction to the main idea. And of course it helps to reveal the main idea of the text.
Phonetic:
- alliteration occurs frequently in the rest of the story, in such phrases as the following:
"iciness, a sinking, a sickening of the heart"
"cadaverousness of complexion "
"feeble and futile struggles"
"certain superstitious impressions"
"sensation of stupor"
"partially cataleptical character"
"wild air of the last waltz"
"fervid facility of his impromptus"
"impetuous fury of the entering gust nearly lifted us from our feet '
"and the deep and dank tarn at my feet closed sullenly and silently over the fragments of the "House of Usher."
   The idea expressed through the frequent cases of alliteration is to show the darkness of the atmosphere, that surrounded the main characters of the story under analysis.
Graphic:
- spacing of graphemes , hyphenation:
1. Long- -long--long--many minutes, many hours, many days, have I heard it--yet I dared not--oh, pity me, miserable wretch that I am!--I dared not--I dared not speak!
2. I looked upon the scene before me--upon the mere house, and the simple landscape features of the domain--upon the bleak walls--upon the vacant eye-like windows--upon a few rank sedges--and upon a few white trunks of decayed trees--with an utter depression of soul which I can compare to no earthly sensation more properly than to the after-dream of the reveller upon opium--the bitter lapse into everyday life--the hideous dropping off of the veil.
   The hyphenation is aimed here at revealing the feelings of the main character of the story. He is confused and has no clear vision of the whole picture.
- capitalization:
1. DURING the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country; and at length found myself, as the shades of the evening drew on, within view of the melancholy House of Usher .
   Capitalization is used intentionally by the author to show, that one and main idea is revealed through the whole story.
2. I have, indeed, no abhorrence of danger, except in its absolute effect--in terror. In this unnerved--in this pitiable condition--I feel that the period will sooner or later arrive when I must abandon life and reason together, in some struggle with the grim phantasm, FEAR.
  Capitalization is used intentionally by the author to show the feelings of the narrator. He is scared and very afraid of the unknown, that was waiting for him.
   All expressive means are used appropriatly and help to understand the main idea of the story in details. The great amount of lexical, syntactic and phonetic means are used to bring the dark image of this gothic and horror story to the reader's mind. To create the special effect of the complexity of the actions and characters' feelings the author uses many complex sentences with many clauses and punctuation marks.
   Summing up the analysis of the given story I should say that Edgar Allan Poe brilliantly uses all stylistic means to create the true gothic and horror atmosphere in his story.  Poe’s usage of the peculiar high-flown  vocabulary  and complex syntax creates a special atmosphere here, though it demands some time to perceive it correctly and consult some additional sources to be sure in every single point."The Fall of the House of Usher," with its stark yet mysterious chronicling of mental collapse, its startling imagery, and its horrific finale, is today probably Poe's best known and most cherished story.

   Edgar Allan Poe is the master of word. And "The Fall of the House of Usher" is not an exception. Here many stylistic means and devices are employed to create the effect of a real "gothic" story, of horror, mystery, death, and destruction.

Lexical: 

- foreign words:

1. Upon my entrance, Usher rose from a sofa on which he had been lying at full length, and greeted me with a vivacious warmth which had much in it, I at first thought, of an overdone cordiality--of the constrained effort of the ennuye man of the world.

2. His chief delight, however, was found in the perusal of an exceedingly rare and curious book in quarto Gothic--the manual of a forgotten church—the Vigiliae Mortuorum Secundum Chorum Ecclesiae Maguntinae.

  The foreign words, in particular French and Latine, are used here to elevate the language of the story.

- metaphors:

1. DURING the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country; and at length found myself, as the shades of the evening drew on, within view of the melancholy House of Usher .

  This metaphor is used to show the ghastly atmosphere of the story, to say about the abnormal things that were happening there.

2.  It was a mystery all insoluble; nor could I grapple with the shadowy fancies that crowded upon me as I pondered.

   This metaphor is used to underline the effect of something mysterious, that surrounded the narrator, as if they were real and made our narrator feel not safe.

3.  Nevertheless, in this mansion of gloom I now proposed to myself a sojourn of some weeks.

    The metaphor above  is used to emphasize the main image of the  short story under analysis. It helps to create negative and mournful  image of the house, which only look pushes back everyone from that place.

4. In this there was much that reminded me of the specious totality of old wood-work which has rotted for long years in some neglected vault, with no disturbance from the breath of the external air.

   This metaphor underlines the neglect of the house. There lived people, but the above given words underline that it was a dead place for a long time already, and its inhabitants were people no longer, but ghosts, creatures at death's door.

5. His countenance, I thought, wore a mingled expression of low cunning and perplexity.

    This case of metaphor shows us the features of madness of Roderick Usher. 

6.  The impetuous fury of the entering gust nearly lifted us from our feet.

    This metaphor  shows us the strong power of nature, where the human is powerless. This also shows a hint that something tremendous was going to happen and even the nature was irritated.

7. While I gazed, this fissure rapidly widened--there came a fierce breath of the whirlwind--the entire orb of the satellite burst at once upon my sight--my brain reeled as I saw the mighty walls rushing asunder--there was a long tumultuous shouting sound like the voice of a thousand waters—and the deep and dank tarn at my feet closed sullenly and silently over the fragments of the "House of Usher".

    The alike case of metaphor to the previous one. The wind was not easy, like breeze, but strong, and it is like the last breath of the falling house before it would be absorbed by the lake waters.

- metonymy:

1. A letter, however, had lately reached me in a distant part of the country--a letter from him-- which, in its wildly importunate nature, had admitted of no other than a personal reply.

  The case of metonymy here means the importance and urgency of the message, "...a letter from him-- which, in its wildly importunate nature, had admitted of no other than a personal reply".

- epithets:

1. I had so worked upon my imagination as really to believe that about the whole mansion and domain there hung an atmosphere peculiar to themselves and their immediate vicinity-- an atmosphere which had no affinity with the air of heaven, but which had reeked up from the decayed trees, and the grey wall, and the silent tarn--a pestilent and mystic vapour, dull, sluggish, faintly discernible, and leaden-hued.

   The choice of such epithets as given above help to reveal the dark atmosphere of the text and to show the stagnation, dying away of life in the house as  well as outside. 

2. Perhaps the eye of a scrutinizing observer might have discovered a barely perceptible fissure, which, extending from the roof of the building in front, made its way down the wall in a zigzag direction, until it became lost in the sullen waters of the tarn.

  The choice of such epithets as given above help to reveal the dark atmosphere of the text and to show the stagnation, dying away of life in the house as  well as outside. 

3. The now ghastly pallor of the skin, and the now miraculous lustre of the eye, above all things startled and even awed me.

   The epithets  "ghastly" and  "miraculous" are used here to show the detailed description of the Roderick appearance, appearance of not  a concscious person, but of a person, who suffers, struggles, and giving up. 

4. His voice varied rapidly from a tremulous indecision (when the animal spirits seemed utterly in abeyance) to that species of energetic concision—that abrupt, weighty, unhurried, and hollow-sounding enunciation--that leaden, self- balanced and perfectly modulated guttural utterance, which may be observed in the lost drunkard, or the irreclaimable eater of opium, during the periods of his most intense excitement.

"abrupt, weighty, unhurried, and hollow-sounding" - these epithets characterize  Usher's voice as of a person, who is unemotional, very reserved, and doesn't want tell you much.

5. The radiance was that of the full, setting, and blood-red moon which now shone vividly through that once barely-discernible fissure of which I have before spoken as extending from the roof of the building, in a zigzag direction, to the base.

"...blood-red moon..." - this epithet creates an image of death that is close to the house, it shows that death is already in the house. 

- similies: 

1. Minute fungi overspread the whole exterior, hanging in a fine tangled web-work from the eaves.

   The fungi are compared to the web-work, because they were everywhere, everything was covered with it and it one more thing, that creates the image of dark, dying place, cold and unpleasant.

2. We replaced and screwed down the lid, and, having secured the door of iron, made our way, with toil, into the scarcely less gloomy apartments of the upper portion of the house. 

   THE ROOM IS COMPARED TO THE DARK PLACE, WHERE THE TOMB WAS. AND IT REMINDS THE NARRATOR THE TOMB ITSELF (Implicite simile)

3. I reined my horse to the precipitous brink of a black and lurid tarn that lay in unruffled lustre by the dwelling, and gazed down--but with a shudder even more thrilling than before--upon the remodelled and inverted images of the grey sedge, and the ghastly tree-stems, and the vacant and eye-like windows.

   This simile is used not once in the story under analysis, and we should pay great attention to it, of course. The windows are like eyes, vacant eyes. The house is supposed to be the body, and windows are it's eyes. But as house is rotting, the eyes, as the mirrors of person's soul are empty, there is nothing to reflect already. There nothing everywhere. No sign of life is noticed in the house and outside it. The darkness and nothingness of the house constantly absorbed everything around it.

- hyperbole:

1. While I gazed, this fissure rapidly widened--there came a fierce breath of the whirlwind--the entire orb of the satellite burst at once upon my sight--my brain reeled as I saw the mighty walls rushing asunder--there was a long tumultuous shouting sound like the voice of a thousand waters—and the deep and dank tarn at my feet closed sullenly and silently over the fragments of the "House of Usher".

   The hyperbole given above is used to intensify the size of the lake near the house.

- zeugma:

1. The writer spoke of acute bodily illness--of a mental disorder which oppressed him--and of an earnest desire to see me, as his best, and indeed his only personal friend, with a view of attempting, by the cheerfulness of my society, some alleviation of his malady.

    The case of zeugma given above emphasizes the significance of  the narrator to the master of the house. Despite his mental disease Roderick remembered about his best and only close friend since boyhood.

- pun:

1. The valet now threw open a door and ushered me into the presence of his master.

   The author played with words here intentionally. The surname of the family is Usher. It is symbolic already itself. The valet ushered the narrator like something insignificant, easy, something, can disappear without evidence. So, the semantic meaning of '"usher" as the remainings of the fire and the verb "to usher" as to move are opposed here.

- oxymoron:

1. The disease which had thus entombed the lady in the maturity of youth, had left, as usual in all maladies of a strictly cataleptical character, the mockery of a faint blush upon the bosom and the face, and that suspiciously lingering smile upon the lip which is so terrible in death.

    The narrator’s  ironic treatment of lady Madeline is seen from the use of the case of oxymoron that given above. The phrase "terrible smile" creates a horror image.

- allusions:

1. Among other things, I hold painfully in mind a certain singular perversion and amplification of the wild air of the last waltz of Von Weber.

   Poe here refers to a popular piano work of his time — which, though going by the title "Weber's Last Waltz" was actually composed by Carl Gottlieb Reissiger (1798–1859).[8] A manuscript copy of the music was found among Weber's papers upon his death in 1826 and the work was mistakenly attributed to him.

2. For me at least--in the circumstances then surrounding me--there arose out of the pure abstractions which the hypochondriac contrived to throw upon his canvas, an intensity of intolerable awe, no shadow of which felt I ever yet in the contemplation of the certainly glowing yet too concrete reveries of Fuseli.

    Henry Fuseli (German: Johann Heinrich Füssli) (7 February 1741 – 17 April 1825) was a Swiss painter, draughtsman, and writer on art, who worked and spent most of his life in Britain.

3.The opening epigraph quotes "Le Refus" (1831) by the French songwriter Pierre-Jean de Béranger (1780–1857), translated to English as "his heart is a suspended lute, as soon as it is touched, it resounds". Béranger's original text reads "Mon cœur" (my heart) and not "Son cœur" (his/her heart).

Syntactical:

- anaphora:

1. His ordinary manner had vanished. His ordinary occupations were neglected or forgotten.

   The use of anaphoric repetitions attracts the reader’s attention and brings home to him the idea of  the sick state of mind of the character, his unemotiveness and continuity of his disease.

- asyndeton: 

1. A cadaverousness of complexion; an eye large, liquid, and luminous beyond comparison; lips somewhat thin and very pallid, but of a surpassingly beautiful curve; a nose of a delicate Hebrew model, but with a breadth of nostril unusual in similar formations; a finely-moulded chin, speaking, in its want of prominence, of a want of moral energy; hair of a more than web-like softness and tenuity; these features, with an inordinate expansion above the regions of the temple, made up altogether a countenance not easily to be forgotten.

   The use of asyndeton here shows us not normal physical state of the main character.

-  inversion:

1. Shaking off from my spirit what must have been a dream, I scanned more narrowly the real aspect of the building.

2. Much that I encountered on the way contributed, I know not how, to heighten the vague sentiments of which I have already spoken

3. Yet all this was apart from any extraordinary dilapidation.

4. Yet the character of his face had been at all times remarkable.

5. Thus, thus, and not otherwise, shall I be lost.   
   The cases of inversion are present here to underline the importance of the actions and events which were going  first and to show the deep narrator's inner meditation and Roderick's mad psyche. 

- repetitions:

1. We sat down; and for some moments, while he spoke not, I gazed upon him with a feeling half of pity, half of awe.

    The repetition is used here to show us the ambivalence of the narrator's feelings to the Roderick.

2. Thus, thus, and not otherwise, shall I be lost.

      The repetition is used here to underline the exact way of death by Roderick.

3. Long- -long--long--many minutes, many hours, many days, have I heard it--yet I dared not--oh, pity me, miserable wretch that I am!--I dared not--I dared not speak!
       The repetition is used here to create the image of costant and continuant action. 

- emphatic constructions:
1. It was the work of the rushing gust--but then without those doors there DID stand the lofty and enshrouded figure of the lady Madeline of Usher.

2. It was the manner in which all this, and much more, was said--it was the apparent heart that went with his request--which allowed me no room for hesitation; and I accordingly obeyed forthwith what I still considered a very singular summons.
3. It was with difficulty that I could bring myself to admit the identity of the wan being before me with the companion of my early boyhood. Yet the character of his face had been at all times remarkable.
4.  In this there was much that reminded me of the specious totality of old wood-work which has rotted for long years in some neglected vault, with no disturbance from the breath of the external air.

     The emphatic constructions are used by the author to catch the readers attention and to make the so called introduction to the main idea. And of course it helps to reveal the main idea of the text.

Phonetic:

- alliteration occurs frequently in the rest of the story, in such phrases as the following: 
"iciness, a sinking, a sickening of the heart"
"cadaverousness of complexion "
"feeble and futile struggles"
"certain superstitious impressions"
"sensation of stupor"
"partially cataleptical character"
"wild air of the last waltz"
"fervid facility of his impromptus"
"impetuous fury of the entering gust nearly lifted us from our feet '
"and the deep and dank tarn at my feet closed sullenly and silently over the fragments of the "House of Usher."

    The idea expressed through the frequent cases of alliteration is to show the darkness of the atmosphere, that surrounded the main characters of the story under analysis.

 Graphic:

- spacing of graphemes , hyphenation:

1. Long- -long--long--many minutes, many hours, many days, have I heard it--yet I dared not--oh, pity me, miserable wretch that I am!--I dared not--I dared not speak!

2. I looked upon the scene before me--upon the mere house, and the simple landscape features of the domain--upon the bleak walls--upon the vacant eye-like windows--upon a few rank sedges--and upon a few white trunks of decayed trees--with an utter depression of soul which I can compare to no earthly sensation more properly than to the after-dream of the reveller upon opium--the bitter lapse into everyday life--the hideous dropping off of the veil.

    The hyphenation  is aimed  here at revealing the feelings of the main character of the story. He is confused and has no clear vision of the whole picture.

- capitalization:

1. DURING the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country; and at length found myself, as the shades of the evening drew on, within view of the melancholy House of Usher .

      Capitalization is used intentionally by the author to show, that one and main idea is revealed through the whole story.

2. I have, indeed, no abhorrence of danger, except in its absolute effect--in terror. In this unnerved--in this pitiable condition--I feel that the period will sooner or later arrive when I must abandon life and reason together, in some struggle with the grim phantasm, FEAR.

    Capitalization is used intentionally by the author to show the feelings of the narrator. He is scared and very afraid of the unknown, that was waiting for him. 

   All expressive means are used appropriatly and help to understand the main idea of the story in details. The great amount of lexical, syntactic and phonetic means are used to bring the dark image of this gothic and horror story to the reader's mind. To create the special effect of the complexity  of the actions and characters' feelings the author uses many complex sentences with many clauses and punctuation marks.