Abstract

Edgar Allan Poe is a famous literary master who produced many well-known gothic short stories. The Fall of the House of Usher, which is considered to be one of the most significant works of the American gothic short stories, is Poe’s masterpiece. In this thesis, the author ties to analyze it from the perspective of archetypal criticism which discussed how the forms and the functions of a particular literary piece are determined by relevant archetypes and their corresponding cultural relevance.
The author endeavors to study the main archetypes with the method of archetypal criticism, so that we can better understand Poe’s ingenious symbolic competence. Those archetypes that this thesis attempts to interpret include Madeline Usher, the mansion of Usher, Roderick Usher and the Vault.
Structurally, this thesis has three parts. The first part is an introduction to all background information which related this thesis. The second part focuses on the analysis of characters corresponding to respective archetypes. The third part mainly focuses on the insulation archetype in The Fall of the House of Usher. By interpreting this terror story from a unique perspective—the archetypal criticism, the author finds out distinctive features of the archetypes of vampire, demon and the insulation building.

Key words: Edgar Allan Poe; The Fall of the House of Usher; archetypal criticism
 
摘  要

埃德加•爱伦•坡是美国文学大师，也是众所周知的哥特小说大师。《厄舍古屋的倒塌》作为其哥特小说的开山之作，在美国哥特短篇小说里有着举足轻重的地位。本文作者试图通过原型分析法解读该小说。原型分析法提出原型决定了文学作品的结构和功能，并且强调文学作品所体现的文本意义主要是由文化所塑造。
 本文尝试通过用原型批评的方法对小说《厄舍古屋的倒塌》中的主要原型形象进行分析，即主要对玛德琳、厄舍古屋、罗德里克和地窖的哥特意象进行解析和对比，以归纳爱伦坡哥特意象的主要特征，并探索其后的文学关联性及其对后世哥特小说的影响。
结构上，本文分为三部分。第一部分对论文的背景资料进行了简要的介绍，第二部分主要分析小说里的人物原型，第三部分通过原型批评对小说进行解读——作者通过对小说里各种原型的分析和比较，揭示了吸血鬼恶魔及隔绝建筑原型的一些基本特征。

关键词：爱伦坡；厄舍古屋的倒塌；原型批评