Skip to main content

How is fear created in "The Signal-Man" by Charles Dickens?

Dickens creates a sense of fear in a number ways. Here are three.


1. Imagery that evokes desolation, foreboding, and the supernatural


After the narrator has descended the path and joined the signal-man at his station, he describes the place as a "great dungeon." He comments on the "gloomy" red light and the  



"gloomier entrance to a black tunnel, in whose massive architecture there was a barbarous, depressing, and forbidding air. So little sunlight ever found its way to this spot, that it had an earthy, deadly smell; and so much cold wind rushed through it, that it struck chill to me, as if I had left the natural world."



The vivid sensory impressions set the scene. This is the sort of place where the reader can easily imagine seeing a ghost.


The sense of foreboding is furthered by the narrator's first impression of the signal-man himself. For a moment, the narrator says, "a monstrous thought came into my mind…that this was a spirit, not a man."


2. The recounting of uncanny events and deadly episodes


The content of the signal-man's stories is intrinsically disturbing. For instance, when the signal-man reaches out to the dark, mysterious, urgent figure, it suddenly disappears. Then,



"…within ten hours the dead and wounded were brought along through the tunnel over the spot where the figure had stood.”



3. Empathy and fear contagion


Fear is contagious; we tend to become more anxious or frightened when we witness fear in others. More generally, observing distress in others evokes an empathic response. We experience their emotions second-hand. Dickens uses this aspect of human psychology to induce fear in the reader.


For instance, at the beginning of the story, the signal-man reacts to the narrator with great wariness. The narrator is aware of this, noting, "I detected in his eyes some latent fear of me." He wonders if there is an "infection in his mind."


Later, we learn that the signal-man hears the bell ring when no one else can. He believes that it signals the return of the ghost. The reader is left to consider this man's position -- spending long hours, alone in this gloomy place, waiting with anxiety for the bell to ring.


The reader is also influenced by the fearful reactions of the narrator. For example, when he hears the signal-man's story, he mentions the "slow touch of a frozen finger tracing out my spine," and notes that a "disagreeable shudder crept over me."


And when he thinks he sees the ghost he again shares his immediate, involuntary reaction with us:



"I cannot describe the thrill that seized upon me, when, close at the mouth of the tunnel, I saw the appearance of a man, with his left sleeve across his eyes, passionately waving his right arm."



Even the ghost's body language suggests anguish and distress about death:



"It was an action of mourning. I have seen such an attitude in stone figures on tombs."


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Is there a word/phrase for "unperformant"?

As a software engineer, I need to sometimes describe a piece of code as something that lacks performance or was not written with performance in mind. Example: This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. Based on my Google searches, this isn't a real word. What is the correct way to describe this? EDIT My usage of "performance" here is in regard to speed and efficiency. For example, the better the performance of code the faster the application runs. My question and example target the negative definition, which is in reference to preventing inefficient coding practices. Answer This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. In my opinion, reads more easily as: This coding style leads to unmaintainable and poorly performing code. The key to well-written documentation and reports lies in ease of understanding. Adding poorly understood words such as performant decreases that ease. In addressing the use of such a poorly ...
Post a Comment
Read more

A man has a garden measuring 84 meters by 56 meters. He divides it into the minimum number of square plots. What is the length of the square plots?

We wish to divide this man's garden into the minimum number of square plots possible. A square has all four sides with the same length.Our garden is a rectangle, so the answer is clearly not 1 square plot. If we choose the wrong length for our squares, we may end up with missing holes or we may not be able to fit our squares inside the garden. So we have 84 meters in one direction and 56 meters in the other direction. When we start dividing the garden in square plots, we are "filling" those lengths in their respective directions. At each direction, there must be an integer number of squares (otherwise, we get holes or we leave the garden), so that all the square plots fill up the garden nicely. Thus, our job here is to find the greatest common divisor of 84 and 56. For this, we prime factor both of them: `56 = 2*2*2*7` `84 = 2*2*3*7` We can see that the prime factors and multiplicities in common are `2*2*7 = 28` . This is the desired length of the square plots. If you wi...
Post a Comment
Read more

What warning does Chuchundra issue to Rikki?

Chuchundra, the sniveling, fearful muskrat who creeps around walls because he is too terrified to go into the center of a room, meets Rikki in the middle of the night. He insults Rikki by begging him not to kill him. He then insults him by suggesting that Nag might mistake Chuchundra for Rikki. He says, "Those who kill snakes get killed by snakes."  He issues this warning to Rikki not to help keep Rikki safe but as a way of explaining why Rikki's presence gives him, Chuchundra, more reason to fear.  Chuchundra starts to tell Rikki what Chua the rat told him--but breaks it off when he realizes he might be overheard by Nag. He says, "Nag is everywhere, Rikki-Tikki." Rikki threatens to bite Chuchundra to get him to talk. Even then, Chuchundra won't overtly reveal any information. But he does say, "Can't you hear, Rikki-Tikki?" This is enough of a clue for the clever mongoose. He listens carefully and can just make out the "faintest scratch-s...
Post a Comment
Read more