elements such as theme, plot, characterization, setting, style, point of view, foreshadowing and tone all contribute to the total meaning of the work. Those are
separated from other things or extrinsic aspect; author, reader, and social culture must be pushed aside, because it has no correlation with the art’s structure. Both
approaches linked together in answering the problem statement. Here, the researcher took the element such as characterization, point of view, setting, plot,
foreshadowing, and diction to reveal the appearance of mystery in the three short stories. After examining those elements, the researcher finds the interrelationship
among them. At the end it bring to a mystery. Based on the introduction above, the researcher formulates the problem as
follow: “How does Poe create the mystery in his works as reflected in the short
stories The Fall of the House of Usher, The Tell-Tale Heart and The Black Cat?
2. Analysis
As stated above, the researcher will apply structural approach to reveal the appearance of mystery in Poe’s works. Here, researcher only analyzes the element
of literary work, especially short story that are characterization, point of view, setting, plot, foreshadowing, and diction to give a clear mysterious picture of what
Poe wants to tell the reader.
2. 1. Characterization
An author has his own style in creating his fictional characters. Poe is no exception, his characters always represent people who are mentally disturbed and
they are obsessed with evil acts. He wrote about a man who is driven outside of the real world to the edge of madness.
There are three significant characters in The Fall of the House of Usher: the narrator, Roderick Usher and Madeline Usher. The narrator is an old friend of
Roderick’s. Roderick and Madeline are twins. They came from ancient family. Physically what we can see in Roderick’s performance is vagueness. There is
something mysterious in him; the miraculous luster of the eye, his action and his voice. The eye are two luminous windows that later, when madness causes his
eyes to become red litten window. His lips are very pallid and smile no more. Roderick’s reserves are always unobtrusive, charity, excessive and habitual. He is
fond of music and book. Yet the character of his face is like an ordinate expansion of above the regions of the temple. But now the expression of his face is
vagueness. His voice is a tremulous, weighty, abrupt, unhurried, and hollow- sounding enunciation as he says: ‘I shall perish,’ said he,’ I must perish in this
deplorable folly. Thus, thus, and not otherwise, shall I be lost.’Poe, 1990:18. What narrator finds in Roderick’s voice is like a bounden slave. He is enchained
by certain superstition impressions. The other characteristic of Roderick described by the narrator through
small picture of his gloom interior and the condition of auditory that morbid. He has a fantastic characteristic. The verses that entitled ‘The Haunted Palace’ also as
an expression of Roderick’s characteristic. The verse from the first until fourth describe about the greatness of the palace, the greenest of the valleys, cooled wind
blow, and bright color of the sun light. It is like a picture of a peaceful palace.
Next the fifth and sixth verse describe the opposite of the palace. The power of evil has assailed the glory of the palace. It blushed and bloomed destroy without
reminder. Through these verses narrator describes that Roderick as a daring, trespassed characteristic.
After the entombed of Roderick’s sister, his characteristic became worse. He roams and runs from chamber to chamber with hurried, unequal, and
objectless step. He has owned fantastic impressive superstitions. All the characters that appear in Roderick’s performances, voices, and his actions above arouse a
strange or mysterious feeling. This excites the narrator reader’s curiosity to learn and reveal more about the hidden mystery of Roderick.
Madeline is associated with the material and temporal. Madeline matches her brother’s pallor. Her special mark is red. A faint blush when she entered, blood
on her garments when she emerged, this was timely by the blood-red light of the emergent full moon at the moment of destruction on the house. Roderick and
Madeline Usher are the sole. They are twins two parts of one personality. Roderick and Madeline are so close that they can sense what is happening to
each other. Roderick represents the mind of intellect. While, the portion of personality senses is represented by Madeline. Roderick tries to detach itself
from its more physically oriented twin. This can be seen in Roderick aversion to his own senses as well as by his premature entombment of his twin sister. Living
without Madeline without the senses makes him suffer from an “... intolerable agitation of the soul”. At the end story the two are reunited in death. This
becomes a hidden mystery in both characters, also an important aspect in the unity of effect of this story.
What we can notice from the characterization in The Tale-Tell Heart is that Poe creates the character narrator like an insane man. The man says that he hears
the voice in heaven but certainly he does not. “I heard all things in the heaven and in the earth, I heard many things in hell” Poe, 1990 : 88. Here Poe does not show
the appearance of man’s character, but from what man says and does. The man is obsessed killing the old man who bears an extreme fear of his evil eye. Actually, it
is the evil eye that the man murders, not the old man. The old man has done nothing wrong to the man as Poe illustrates: “I loved the old man. He never
wronged me. He had never given me insult....” Poe, 1990: 88. The man’s obsession shows that he has owned mystery in his characteristic.
Why has he the heart to kill? In a deeper sense, the murder does have a purpose to ensure that the man does not have endured the haunting of the evil eye any longer.
The man suffers and commits a crime because of an excess of emotion over intelligence. So the mystery in the narrator had been solved. Poe relates how the
man believes the validity of previous statement: ‘... very dreadfully nervous I had been and am, but why will you say that I am mad? The disease had sharpened my
senses-not destroyed-not dulled them” Poe, 1990: 88. The disease in this case is obviously a severe case of emotion ad nervousness. The man has the reason and
plans but not to distinguish right from wrong. As stated by Robert Regan in his essays “... they approach us and speak to us what is true and what is so mysterious
as to confound our categories of truth and falsehood Regan, 1967: 10. Poe also
creates the police officers characters as the minor characters since they are not developed. However their appearance in the end of the story gives special
significance to the story. It increases the intensity of action of the story. The characterization in The Tale-Tell Heart is quite similar to the
characterization in the tale of The Black Cat. Here, Poe shows narrator, like the main character is an individual who suffers from mental disorder, who has owned
mystery too. For the first time the narrator shows his good behavior to his pets. “I was especially fond of animals, and was indulged by my parents with a great
variety of pets. With these I spent most of my time, and never was so happy as when feeding and caressing them” Poe, 1990: 198. Suddenly, the narrator was
driven by mental disorder. He becomes high tempered and this is illustrated in the way he treats his cat. “I took from my waistcoat-pocket a penknife, opened it,
grasped the poor beast by the throat, and deliberately cut one of its eyes from the socket I blush, I burn, I shudder, while I pen the damnable atrocity” Poe, 1990:
200. The spirit of perverseness possesses the narrator. It urges him to commit continual evil acts. It can be seen in the way he kills his black cat. “... I had
inflicted upon the unoffending brute. One morning, in cold blood, slipped a noose about its neck and hung it to the limb of a tree. Poe, 1990: 201.
The narrator’s spirit of perverseness was possessed by evil thoughts. He unfortunately killed his wife by axe then inserted the body on the wall. He clearly
shows his very strange behavior. Though he commits a series of crime, he looks as if he were not guilty at all. “... I soundly and tranquilly slept; eye, slept even
with burden of murder upon my soul” Poe, 1990: 209. Through the actions of
the narrator, it can be inferred that in narrator’s character of strangeness convincingly creates mystery. Poe also presents the narrator’s wife and group of
police as the minor characters. They are not developing at all, but their presence supports the intensity of the action.
2. 2. Point of View
