Thoughts on The Pit and the Pendulum

We read the Pit and the Pendulum by Edgar Allen Poe in class. It was an exceptionally long story to read, and I thought went into way too much detail. However, the details in the story did help to make it much more spooky and somewhat easier to understand. Although I said the details made it easier to understand, I meant that it was easier for me to understand the scenes and not necessarily what all was going on in the story. The man in the story is in jail, and there is a giant pit in the middle of his cell that he has been put into, after being sentenced in front of judges. The man tries to start counting the paces around the cell using string from his robe, but he faints. When he wakes up, he finds that there is food and water near by, and he starts to measure the cell again, but then trips on the hem of his robe. If he had not tripped, he would have fallen down into the pit in his cell. When the guy passes out again, he discovers that the cell is slightly lit, with a picture of father time on the ceiling. The man is strapped on a board, and hanging from the picture of father time is an axe, which is swinging back and forth, like a pendulum. It is being lowered slightly, and will eventually kill the man. The guy gets rats to chew through his ropes using meat that he had left over, and the guy gets free just as the pendulum is about to kill him. Then, the walls become really hot and start moving in, so the only option the guy has left is to go into the pit. He ends up going into the pit, and hears human voices, and someone pulls him back.



This story reminded me a lot of Indiana Jones, and the kinds of things that he has to do, especially when the walls start to close in, and the guy has to try and get himself out of the situations he just happens to get himself into. I found it interesting though, because I was comparing it to the second Indiana Jones, when Indiana gets caught in a room with spikes, and the ceiling starts to come down with spikes threatening to kill him and spear him. However, thanks to Willie, Indiana and Short Round are saved from the ceiling. So, I was reminded a lot of Indiana Jones while reading this story again.

It was an interesting story to read, and I can tell where Steven Spielberg got the ideas for his Indiana Jones movies. The story was a sort of dark and creepy story, which would make sense since it was written during the dark romanticism period. The topic itself was just spooky, as a guy is getting condemned to death, and there is a giant pit in the cell he is being held in. Plus, the fact that there is a giant axe pendulum slowly being lowered down from the ceiling is definitely another characteristic of dark romanticism.