The Pit and the Pendulum

How does this guy think of these weird stories? This story is kind of disturbing and definitely really weird.. I really doubt that this is a true experience though. In this story Poe would continue to change his mind between if he wants to die and end this torture or if he wants to keep struggling and live. He randomly gets hope that he will be able to live. Luckily, he keeps trying and ends up living through it. If he would have given up he could die for no reason since, the French save him. At the end of they story all I could wonder is how he would live his life after the story's end. He has to be a mess in the head. I mean anyone would be a mess if they were going through such torture that Poe does. He has to have some anxiety issues after such a life changing experience like this. Post traumatic stress disorder would have to be an overwhelming part of his life after being tortured in a small dungeon for days and days on end. But, even during the time he is in the dungeon you can tell Poe is having some mental issues. He wants to die and he even was thinking that through death not everything in his life could be lost. But how can this be? Death is the end of all so I don't really see how he could think that death could not be the end of life. " What of it there remained I will not attempt to define, or even to describe; yet all was not lost. In the deepest slumber -- no! In delirium -- no! In a swoon -- no! In death -- no! even in the grave all is not lost." (Poe) He is hopeful that all will be well and he will have some sort of after life. But, not letting himself die seems a little odd. Knowing that you are going to die I think most people will just give up and jump into the pit. But he does not. He lets the torture overwhelm him and he takes all the different things the people throw at him. The pit, the pendulum, the immense heat, he takes it all. You think most people will be tired of going through such things and just let the events kill him. So I think it shows he is psychologically different than most because he does not give up he just lets the thought of death and the view of it stay around him. He knows death is near and is some how very calm about the whole thing. It is all around him and he is abnormally calm about it, don't you think? You think people would be freaking out if they are in his position. But this is a typical example of the dark romanticism period. It is a tragedy where the main character suffers but he ends up fine in the end. This is like other tragedies such as Romeo and Juliet. Characters in dark romanticism also are put through a lot of pain and agony which Poe is. But it seems as though he knows there is a God. In the romanticism writing they believe God is in everything around them and causes the beauty in the world. I think Poe does see God but not in the beauty but in the dark bad things.

Poe, Edgar A. "The Pit and the Pendulum." Literature.org - The Online Literature Library. Web. 22 Jan. 2012.