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The Conventional elements

The American Gothic Setting

Most of king stories take place in a small settings where it represents the rural

American life style of the working class. For King, small-towns evokes isolation from the city

life ,which mirrors capitalism with its disadvantages .Thus, the city is the source of poverty

and corruption of the individual ,and the city citizens lacks certain values to help them face

evil. Moreover, the small-town location protects its inhabitants because of the secluded nature

of its geography ; the small-town society is secluded and secretive one because it has no

submissive nature to the outside “king seems to understand intuitively that small – town

Maine environment is capable of destroying individuals because of its encrusted isolation

,pressures to confirm ,and lack of compassion” and the harsh winter in these town forces its

inhabitants to live secluded life (Magistrale,48).the American gothic distinguishes itself from

the English gothic through the setting because it does share the gothic history .Thus, it

presents the American setting ,which familiar to the reader. Also, the setting of Misery is a

typical rural area in Sidewinder, Colorado, and Paul car accident happens because of the

unexpected snowstorm.

The American Gothic Tradition

Stephen king‘s stories take place in small town geography where the plot integrates

with the setting. King‘s fiction resembles Poe’s horror tradition since he examines major

themes such as: the nuclear family, the authority of the writer, American values and security,

which have nostalgic feelings towards the past. In Stephen King’s Gothic, John Seas argues

that king’s canon reinvents the gothic tradition and he takes it back to New England. Thus,

king’s texts depict the landscapes of American authors such as Howthrone and Lovercraft.
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The setting is one of the key elements in gothic literature, which leaves a psychological scare.

Therefore, the environment influences character’s emotions and actions. In King‘s writing, he

creates mental depth through the use of symbols. The setting becomes a figure projects the

external landscape (Seas, 158).king‘s Settings reminds the reader of pervious American gothic

tales where the individual faces the perils of the exterior world.

Clive Bloom explains that gothic landscapes demonize the character through the repetitive

settings of graveyards and medieval settings that connect the individual with the supernatural

powers; therefore, it has sentimental and sublime effects. Another element is the grotesque,

which is the use of bodily function that suggests terror. Also, the traditional representation of

women as victims of a patriarchal manipulation and abuse symbolizes the external and

internal conflict of the characters (261). In this respect, King uses the gothic elements to

arouse fear within the reader because of the disturbing environment .Thus, the setting might

not be the medieval castle, but it affects the character’s mood because of the limited space,

which expresses a limited freedom of movement. Also, King female character is the opposite

of the traditional gothic victim because she claims power and dominance from the male

victim.

Bernard Gallagher argues that Stephen king has an allegorical approach, which aims to

repel the reader. He violates the cultural norms to evoke shock; however, he does not use the

Supernatural elements .Instead, he examines the political, economical and psychological

Sphere while Vernon Hyles notices king’s grotesque in present-day society, which he calls it

“the new Gothicism” ,which includes the sense of alienated world .Natalie Schroeder believe

That king aims to discuss our fear of death and encourages us to accept as it is the natural

process (qtd in Hoppenstand and Browne 17).King simulates the American gothic tradition of

Nathaniel Hawthorne biblical illusions when Annie compares Paul to a God, who breathes life

within the characters

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Nostalgic settings

King settings are ‘complete, mundane, comfortable world with name products and

familiar language […] a world like our own whose repletion of surface is disavowal of its real

ephemerality’ ( qtd in Badley, 42) . King adapts American naturalism with popular culture.

Thus, he organizes the characters with the setting mixed images of advertisement, brand

names and television (Badley, 42).Paul keeps going back to past experience while Annie

keeps going back to her laughing place .Therefore, both characters have nostalgic feelings

.They keep remember the past ,or in Annie’s case the Memory Lane book because it us

familiar .

In the recollection of memories, there is no chronological order, which is an element in

postmodern canon. It transforms the solid ego into a elastic one .According to the psychology

of postmodern, history is relative, subjective and non-linear .The ability to go back in time is

possible through memory because of the nostalgic attachment. ‘King’s landscapes are haunted

with the debris of the accumulated, corrupt past and the future is ever in doubt’ (Badley, 43).

King chooses forgetting American settings, has a historical significance. These places

evoke nostalgic sentiments .Therefore; it continues to have value with time. It focuses on the

scenery which creates an excess that resembles the gothic setting. Because gothic has a

nostalgic nature, it regresses through the recapture of spiritual energy with its hunted spaces.

The examination of the past allows the individual to be born again (Badley, 44-45).Paul

represents nostalgia because of his romantic Victorian novels, but he seeks to produce a

postmodernist work Fast Cars .However, Annie, who is obsessed about the romantic heroine

Misery Chastain forces him to rewrite the novel, and to burn Fast Cars. In this respect, she

keeps him a prisoner of the past, it is through the past that Paul born again.
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Paul’s Room

Most the events of the story take place in Annie’s spare room where she keeps him in

isolation from the rest of the world. However, his only consolation is Annie’s television and

radio, which are under the supervision of Annie. Annie keeps Paul a prisoner in a room with

one window, which overviews on her barn, and in these passages his reaction towards the

place:

Alone in Annie Wilkes‘s house, locked in his room .looked in his bed .The

distance between her and Denver was like...well, like the distance between the

Boston Zoo and Africa (28).

In this passage Paul claustrophobic environment is evident due to the choice of words such as:

‘alone’, ‘locked’, ‘room’, which expresses Paul environment resemblance to the gothic

setting. Also, he considers the room as extinction to his personal space. Thus, he feels agitated

whenever she seats near him.

For the first time in weeks -it felt like years –he was able to look at

geography different from that of his room with its unchanging verities –blue

wallpaper, picture of the Arc detriomphe , the long ,long month of February

symbolized by the boy sliding down hill on his sled (he thought that his mind

would turn to that boy’s face and stoking each time January became February

,even if he lived to see that change of months another fifty times).He looked in to

his new world as eagerly as he had watched his first movie Bambi as a child(49).

In the second passage, Paul observes Annie‘s living room, and starts to realize the period of

time he was a prisoner. He wonders inside Annie’s house, which suggests that the character

starts to demonstrate rebellion against his tormentor with the images of the Arc detriomphe,
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which symbolizes the victory of French with the boy, who slides on the hill in the colander

symbolize Paul triumph over Annie.

The American gothic explores different landscapes from the British gothic. For example,

the American novel includes landscapes of the frontiers, which have a historical significance.

It also includes puritan heritage and slavery issues, the fear of monarchy. It is all these factors,

which are fundamental elements in the gothic novel. The American gothic explores dark room

instead of dark castles, and it focuses on the conflict between the society and the individual

(Smith 3, 5).In this respect, King’s home town Maine is the setting of puritan settlers, and

since the setting of story is in Colorado near the Rockies mountains, it includes the secludes

history of the frontiers. Thus, it is a home for Annie and a prison for Paul.

Winter, Snowstorms and the Rockies

After Paul finishes his new novel Fast Cars, he decides to celebrate with a drink and a

cigar. Later on, he asks the waiter about the weather, who informs that the storm will pass;

however, the blizzard with the strong wind led him to have a car accident in an isolated road.

Also, Paul enters into a state of hibernation because of his shattered legs and he is under pain

killer most of the time ,which puts him into sleep most of the time; therefore, winter

symbolizes obscurity and lowliness , and it isolates the character from the rest of the world.

The winter is a fundamental factor because it shapes the Main natives consciousness

and it explains the cold reception of American small –town inhabitants towards strangers. In

general, King has a mixed opinion towards the small-town setting in his fiction. On the other

hand , it examines the group mentality ,which the natives tend to have , but on other hand

most of his fictional characters are from small-town setting ,and they represent individuality,

dignity and courage , which are characteristics shape the image of a hero that allow them to

fight evil(Magistrale,48). It is worth to mention that Both Paul and Annie are not originally
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from Sidewinder. Paul is from New York City while Annie is from California; therefore, they

are both from the city, and they are outsiders to town. As the city represents chaos and

corruption, the characters are morally dysfunctional. Paul is an alcoholic writer while Annie is

a former Nurse and a serial killer with a mental illness. Annie’s neighbors ‘the Roydmans

’dislikes Annie proves the view of small –town inhabitants towards outsiders:

They were miles from the neighbors who, Annie said, didn’t like her. What was

the name Boynton? No, Roydman. That was it .Roydman. And how far from town?

Not too far, surely .He was in circle whose diameter might be as small as fifteen

miles, or as large as forty-five. Annie Wilkes house was in that circle, and the

Roydmans, and downtown Sidewinder, however pitifully small that might be…

(36).

Annie tells Paul that the Roydman family dislike her and even make rumors about her to

make her live; therefore, it suggests that they the town inhabitants do not expect Annie

because she is a stranger to the town.

King takes the American landscapes which are familiar to the American reader and he

turns it into unfamiliar setting. This difference happens because of juxtaposition of the

scenery .For example; King uses the weather climate as another factor, which the characters

have to face. The characters in The Shining are trapped inside The Overlook Hotel because

of the snowfall .The same reason with Paul Sheldon, who faces a hard winter in the Rocky

mountains of Colorado, which adds to the torture of the character. King is familiar of the

Main weather; therefore, he writes lengthy narratives that demonstrates the hardship of

winter. As a matter of fact, Paul compares Annie’s unpredicted behavior to the weather.

Annie is violent and cruel .Thus, the setting defines the story and it analyzes the character

reaction in a limited space (Magistrale 51-52).the environment plays a significant in the

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novel, and the first words that Paul speaks of is about the light and darkness that occupy his

vision .It is because of Paul dark surrounding that he thinks that he is in danger.

Maine geography and spirit exist in King Fiction because it joins the personality of the

setting with the theme of the story to produce a strong ambivalence .King examines the ideal

and evil that lurks within small towns (Magistrale,63). Since Maine is the hometown of the

author, he constantly writes about it as the setting of most of his stories, and Colorado

resembles Maine in terms of geography and culture. Thus, King represents a familiar

archetype to retell past tales with modern perspective. It explains the familiarity of his setting

that varies from the suburban area to American small-towns like: Castle Rock, Maine,

Libertyville, Pennsylvania, which gives a mundane effect (Badley 37). Therefore, he

organizes the characters with the setting mixed images of advertisement, brand names and

television (Badley, 42).Paul keeps going back to past experience while Annie keeps going

back to her laughing place .Therefore, both characters have nostalgic feelings .They keep

remember the past ,or in Annie’s case the Memory Lane book because it us familiar.

The Individual Vs Society

King depicts the modern struggles of post-modern man in the face of the American

corruption, social and personal issues such as alcoholism and drug addiction. These are

factors which concern the American society .Moreover; King focuses on the individual

against the corrupted society. According to king, the individual, who develops survival skills

and has faith to preserve his values is able to fight the dangerous world ‘king essentially

affirms a fundamental American archetypes and myth: that the American has always

possessed potential to rise above the corruption of the past’ (Badley49-50). It is due to Paul

survival skills that he survives Annie, and his ability to examine her moods allows him to

surpass it. This theme of man against society is present within the works of Nathanial

Hawthorne. Paul represents individualism and creativity whereas Annie represents the
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societal pressure to conform specifically when she forces him to burn his novel because it is

not sophisticated.

In Stephen King’s Gothic, John Seas argues that king’s canon reinvents the gothic tradition

and he takes it back to New England. Thus, king’s texts depict the landscapes of American

authors such as Hawthorne and Lovecraft. The setting is one of the key elements in gothic

literature, which leaves a psychological scare. Therefore, the environment influences

character’s emotions and actions. In King‘s writing, he creates mental depth through the use

of symbols. The setting becomes a figure projects the external landscape (Seas, 158).king‘s

Settings reminds the reader of pervious American gothic tales where the individual faces the

perils of the exterior world since New England had a puritan heritage while the Rockies is in

the frontiers.

The Gothic Uncanny

Angela Carter claims that H. P.Lovercraft relies on geography to present the uncanny in a

dream while King achieves ‘the uncanny precision’ through the use of reality over dreams.

Thus, king focuses on the ego over the id .Moreover, king’s texts combine realism and

Surrealism to produce an uncanny gothic in which the character’s desires provoked by the

internal conflict (qtd inSeas, 158). For example, Annie’s house represents her mental state

because It appears to be a normal farmhouse, but it is only a shell to disguise the woman

madness. Paul wonders outside his room, and he finds a telephone; however, it appears that it

does not have an exterior like Annie herself ‘if she might not have any blood vessels or even

internal organs’ (King10) .Annie’s house is merely a representation of her personality; she is a

body Without a substance because she is the physical force that holds Paul hostage.

Domestic Confinement
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Seas argues that king‘s “bad place” corresponds with Freud the uncanny, which represents

The confinement of the domestic setting; as a result, the domestic place transforms into the

dangerous house .For King, the uncanny retells the struggle between the internal and the

External .Thus, it is a combination of both the familiar and the unfamiliar, which evokes fear.

It is the horrible history of the setting, which makes the setting gothic. Also, the past in Gothic

literature is a ghost, which causes intrusion within the psyche of characters (167).

In Misery, Paul Sheldon past childhood and memories keep intervene with his present, and

he becomes the prisoner of both his past life and Annie Wilkes. Unlike Paul, who disposes the

Misery novels to start a new beginning as a contemporary writer, Annie’s reminisces over The

Past because she denies Misery Chastain death, and she chooses to read a romantic novel

which tells a story about the Victorian era. Also, she keeps a book entitles Memory Lane,

Includes articles from news papers about her past murders .Also, it is worth to mention that

Annie has her own laughing place. In contrast, she does not laugh, but she screams.

The Past and Memory

Paul recalls his childhood memories through dreams. He constantly remembers the pilling,

which he saw in the Revere Beach. The Revere refers to the French word révérer. Paul

constantly has dreams about his childhood because it is an escape from Annie’sworld, which

proves Carter’s opinion about King’s relevance to Lovecraft’s landscapes. In addition,

location is a fundamental to the character because it mirrors the individual journey from

Displacement to placement in terms of characters intrusion (Seas159).King takes the invasion

of the Setting where the character invasion of places shifts into the mind, and then the

invasion of bodies. Moreover, Annie’s character is the embodiment of past mistakes; she does

not accept the death of the fictional character Misery Chastain because she is “antagonistic to

the very idea of change” (King22) and this evident in her book “Memory Lane”, which she

keeps her past murders.

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The Premature Burial

The uncanny exists in the premature burial, which is a gothic element in Poe’s works. Both

Misery Chastain and Paul Sheldon go through the premature burial both literally and

metaphorically. Paul imprisonment resembles Scheherazade’s situation, which Paul

constantly alludes to it. He keeps fantasizes about the dead trooper, who Annie killed coming

back to life. This represents Paul’s desire for resurrection and the fear of false burial. The

gothic fiction studies this type of non-final death cases .Therefore, Paul faces two parallels the

fake burial and the real burial (Seas113). The premature burial is an American gothic element

evokes the deepest concerns of individual, which lies between life and death.

In addition, king exemplifies the uncanny in which Paul returns to the uncomfortable

familiar while Annie keeps him hidden from the rest of the world. For instance, the uncanny

represents detached body parts, which is the primary violent act in Misery .Annie punishes

Paul by amputating his left foot (Seas247). Annie cuts Paul’s foot as it is a trivial act, and she

keeps repeating that it is an ordinary thing “she picked up his foot .Its toes were still spasm.

She carried it across the room. By the time she got to the door they had stopped moving”

(Seas247). Paul is literally in misery; he suffers the pain and the agony “who shrieked and

writhed in the charred and blood soaked bed, his face a deathly white” (King, 139). Annie

continuous dismemberment of Paul transforms his body into unfamiliar and distorted thing.

Thus, Paul’s body becomes the uncanny (Seas112).In other words, king creates the uncanny

from unknown settings into the body; therefore, the character’s body becomes the object of

intrusion instead of the setting.

In Sigmund Freud‘s The Uncanny, he explains that fear arouses from live burial, which is

an uncanny thing because it is a manifestation between the hideous world of death and the
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living world. This kind of manifestation resembles the individual‘s hidden memory and the

world of dead, which should be buried. Thus, it evokes feelings of disturbance and disgust

within the individual. This fear was justified before the rise of scientific rationality; the belief

in ghosts was common. Moreover, the premature burial symbolizes the intrusion of the dead

into the living’s world (qtd in Andrew Manghan, 1). The premature burial symbolizes

different meanings in king’s novel .Thus, it means the metaphorical death, which means that

Paul’s car accident is a near death experience, but Annie revives him and instead of liberation

,he is buried in a room where he cannot move ,and Annie the Angle of death forces him to be

on her command. For Paul the brilliant writer, forcing him to rewrite his fiction is an

intellectual death. Also, Paul is buried in his mind because he keeps remember childhood

memories, which he buried, but Annie’s torture evokes.

Angela Wright argues that the gothic novel focuses on violence and repulsion while the

reader becomes passive because he cannot act upon it .Thus, he becomes also a victim to the

fiction. Furthermore, premature burial is a common theme among gothic novelists, who

combine space and imprisonment to provoke fear. For instance, Edgar Allen Poe discusses

premature burial as a terrible event that causes the distress of the body and mind because it is

the individual’s burial before the death. This corresponds with Edmund Burke ideas about the

effects of confinement and darkness within the individual ‘vacuity, Darkness, Solitude and

Silence ’. This terms hinder live burial (qtd in Mangham, 3).This abstracts evoke loneliness of

the grave; therefore, it is necessary to quote these passages:

Yerrnnn umber whunnn fayunnnn. But sometimes the sounds –like the pain –

faded, and then there was only the haze .He remembered darkness solid had come

before the haze .Did that mean he was making progress ?Let there be light […]

,and the light was good ,and so in the darkness? He didn’t know the answers to

any of these questions […] he wished he was dead ,but the pain-soaked haze that
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filled his mind […]which looked to him like the single jutting fang of a buried

monster […] this memory circled and circled […]Sometimes the sounds stopped.

Sometimes he stopped […] Darkness .Then the pain and the haze […]

although the pain was constant, it was sometimes buried […] (king 8- 10).

It is noticeable in this quotation, the use of words like : ‘sounds’, ‘darkness’ , ‘solid ‘,

‘dead’, ‘ pain’ , ‘ buried’, ‘stopped’ ‘haze’ , which suggest that the character is trapped in a

dark place. Paul hears Annie‘s voice, but he cannot listen to what she says because it is only

sounds above him. Also, he wishes that he was dead, but he is not because he feels the pain.

This means that Paul is in between death and life; he is buried alive with the pain in

darkness. In addition, Paul‘s buried memories come back to him with the childhood

monster.

Gothic Characters

Misery adopts the gothic dramatic element in which every character claims a certain role.

For example, the main characters are Paul Sheldon and Annie Wilkes who play multiple

positions that constitute: nurse and patient, the author-reader, prisoner-guard, victim and

guard. These types of relationships reduce the roles of society. Another gothic element which

Sears discusses is the individual against the other. The novel addresses the relationship of the

writer and the reader. The writer turns into a reader and the reader turns into an author

(Seas120-122). Paul the writer is the embodiment of individuality and the creative force,

which seeks to express personal development against Annie, who represents the other, which

suppresses change and art. Hence, both Paul and Annie are the gothic representation of good

versus evil, man verses society, and madness verses sanity.

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Annie Wilkes’s House and Isolation

Tony Magistrale thinks that king uses the gothic atmosphere since “his Gothic landscapes

are animated by a terrible potency that appears out of all proportion to the small vulnerable

humans who are held within its bondage”. (17)King‘s Gothic tradition continues to be present

in postmodern works because of the everlasting effects that recreate the past with the present.

The house symbolizes stability and security for the individual. It preserves one’s self and it

protects him ∕her from hostile environment. It organizes behavioral patterns to form a routine;

however, it has a confinement quality to be a burial space. (Aureli and Gludiei 1) Annie’s

house is in an isolated area of Colorado, Sidewinder. It is a spatial setting, which encloses and

protects the individual from outside danger; however, it retreats to a form of isolation.

Raškauskienė believes that the works of Anne Radcliffe depicts the home as an extension

to the female character’s personality while the room denotes a sense of privacy and seclusion

of the mind from the external world. (35, 43)Noticeably, Paul‘s impression of Annie’s house

is not different from his opinion about her personality. For example, Paul starts to feel better

to investigate inside the house for an outlet; however, he finds the house doors looked, and in

Paul’s statements, there is a similar quality between Annie and her home “He smelled

something on her breath, something from dark and sour chambers inside her, something like

dead fish”. (King100)Also, Paul’s room becomes a sanctuary to rest his body and thoughts

from Annie’s madness .Since Paul’s encounter with Annie, he describes the repulsive smell of

food and her impulsive eating habits; this remark denotes Annie’s relationship with Paul.

Although Paul promises her to rewrite the Misery novel for her in exchange of his freedom, it

is not enough because she wants the books with her favorite author. Thus, she has an open

appetite for murder, food, and reading, which can never be satisfy. In this passage, Paul

describes Annie’s kitchen:

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This was an old fashioned room with bright linoleum on the floor, magnets

surprisingly ,they all looked ,like candy[…].There were big window over the

sink and they would let in a lot of light even on a cloudy days […] it could

have been a cherry kitchen but wasn’t. The open garbage can overflowed onto

the floor and emitted the warm reek of spoiling food, but that wasn’t the only

wrong […] it was perfume de Wilkes; psychic ordure of obsession. (King112)

This passage demonstrates Paul’s reaction to Annie’s house; she experiences one of her

mental depression, which makes her leave Paul alone for unspecific period of time .Paul

cannot open the door; therefore, he looks for food to find Annie’s kitchen in a mess. His

depiction resembles his opinion about her mental status. Thus, he thinks that if she takes

medication “let in a lot of light”, it will improve her mental state “it could have been a

cherry”. Also, he remarks that the smell of the room resembles her smell. Thus, Annie’s house

is an extension to her alienated personality and psychosis condition.

The gothic aesthetics highlights the importance of locations in the literary tradition to the

extent that it overwhelms the character’s role in the narrative. Thus, it defines the gothic

novel, and the character’s moods and personality. In the gothic tradition, space evokes

sentiments of solitude and enclosure. Also, it adds psychological elements of madness and

evil, which hunts the gothic locations constantly to heighten the tension between

characters.(Romaneski16-17) Annie’s house is far away from town or neighbors ,who can

provide help to Paul “things… isolated like pieces of cloth”.(King36)Paul describes Annie as

“ woman full of tornados”(King48) emphasizes the unpredicted behavior of the character

,which makes a constant danger .

The Horror of The Grotesque

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It is a visual element that shifts a familiar object, event or an experience into an ambiguous

experience, which changes the perception of the reader .It aims to depict the distortion and the

monstrosity that exists in a world of disorder. In other terms, Edward and Graulund explain

that it is “the experience of something being both foreign and familiar engenders the emotive

responses”. (qtd in Bryant31) King distorts reality through the character’s hallucination and

dreams, which makes it impossible to differentiate between reality and imagination. For

instance, disturbed imagery, which evokes fear and disgust are present in this passage:

Slowly, apparently unaware of what she was doing, she began to suck the rat’s

blood from her fingers. Paul jammed his teeth together and grimly told himself

that he would not vomit, would not, and would not. ‘It’s like waiting for the

end of one of those chapters- plays ’.She looked around suddenly, the blood on

her mouth like lipstick. (King109)

This quotation describes a horrific accident, which Paul observes that Annie is in depression

, and she catches a rat in a trap ,which she calls it a “poor thing”, but she breaks his body and

the blood patters .Although the scene is repulsive and obnoxious, Paul compares the blood on

her lips to a lipstick provides both disgust and fascination.

The grotesque has psychological effects, which includes humor and horror. This paradox

feeling creates the absurdity of the events, which chaos, alienation and doom are predominant

in the story. Thus, it creates a light atmosphere in a horrific environment. (Bryant 34)In this

respect, King‘s humor has a sarcastic tone to it, and it reliefs the reader from the intensity of

the situation. Paul cannot express his opinion about Annie, but he had his internal comments,

which has a sense of humor “Absolutely not, my Pepsi is you Pepsi .She twisted the cap of the

bottle off and drank deeply .Paul thought: chug-a-lug, chug-a-lug make ya want to holler hi-

de-who was that? Roger Miller, right? Funny the stuff your mind coughed up. Hilarious.

(King167) Paul is with Annie in the basement where she plans to kill him and herself in case
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the police finds out about the policeman‘s murder, which depicts Annie’s strange behavior

when she asks him to drink his Pepsi because she needs the sugar, Paul remembers a song.

Paul makes fun of the situation because it is unbelievable.

The Gothic Double in Annie Wilkes’s Character

The Gothic double or the Doppelgänger is a term describes the internal duality that exists

in the human nature, which examines the internal struggle between the good and evil that

reside within the individual. Moreover, the Gothic novel explores the dark side of the

individual’s psyche in the Gothic double, and Heidi Strengell defines it as “…refers to the

essential duality within a single character on the further presumption that duality centers on

the polarity of good and evil”.(qtd in Winthaegan 12) King highlights the change of moods

that Annie undergoes ,which makes her abnormal and strange. Paul describes her smile as a

maternal grim, which combines the paradox of the character .Although Annie declares her

love to her favorite writer, she also declares her hatred “I‘ll kill you if you don’t”. (93) Annie

has a monstrous side, which is ready to kill at any time.

In addition, Paul confronts Annie of the murder of the policeman, who came to search for

him, and he sees the evil within her “There was craziness in that grin, but he saw something

else in it he saw something else in it –as well something that really frightened him .He saw

conscious evil in it–a demon capering behind her”. (King163)Annie’s double character is

predominant in every situation.

The Duality of Paul Sheldon

Bruhm states that if the Enlightenment Gothic documents the fear of doubleness and self-

splitting that is the result of repression of desires, King’s Postmodern Gothic documents the

fear of self-splitting that is the result of documentation of writing and representing the self”.

(5) King reflects the classical portrayal of doubleness into a modern perspective. King uses
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the Gothic double as a representation of repression, which exists within the human nature.

Thus, the existence of the doubles indicates the presences of evil. (7) Annie represents the

Gothic double, and the repressed desires, which she fails to control.

Furthermore, Alexsis Hitchock claims that Stephen King includes that the Doppelganger,

which has no link to the supernatural in Misery is in the conflict of Paul Sheldon who wants

to leave his former genre to produce more recognizable works. Although Paul despises the

Misery novels, it provides an escape from Annie’s madness. Paul is familiar with the world he

created because it is a part of him, which comes to accept .(25)Paul has drinking and smoking

problems, which he withdrawals after his imprisonment to realize he is a good story writer

after all .Also, Paul has two sides, which cause an internal conflict. The first side wants him to

write great books while the other side wants to satisfy his readers; however, it is through

Annie’s captor that he realizes that he can do both. (Hitchock32) Annie forces Paul to a world

he left, but he starts to perceive writing the Misery novel as an outlet to survive.

Additionally, Paul’s other double is Annie Wilkes, who captors and forces him to rewrite a

book, which he no longer wants to be a part of ;she holds back both literally and

metaphorically to stay in the past. Thus she reflects the writer’s insecurity and submission to

the reader and the critic. On the other hand, Misery Chastain is a double for Paul because he

puts the fictional character suffers like its creator .In order to revive Misery to satisfy Annie,

he makes buried alive, which resembles Paul’s captivity in Annie’s house; he is buried alive

in a room.( Hitchock33) Paul ‘s double Misery Chastain survives the live burial and the Burka

bee-Goddess ,which is a character kidnaps Misery .Paul’s fiction and reality interrelate

;however, Paul’s revival to Misery Chastain is a metaphor for his own life since because of

the book ,he is able to survive .

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The Realization of The Superego and The Id

Steven Bruhm highlights King’s fixation on the conflict between the Superego and the Id

has a dynamic effect; however, the Ego represents passivity and submission, which alarms the

unconscious’s male-self of the possible threat. (3)Paul embodies represents the Ego because

he is aware of the amount of destruction that Annie can cause, but he does not respond.

However, Paul’s passivity is because of his addiction on painkillers, which causes him to be

unconscious most of the time; nevertheless, he claims power once he realizes his addiction,

and he shifts to a state of awareness. In contrast, Annie conflict between the Superego and the

Id reflects the contradiction of her speech and acts. Although she screams At Paul for the use

of profanity in his work, she uses them, and she commits horrible murders to innocent

victims.

Since the concept of the Id represents pleasure and unfulfilled desires, and the superego

represents the ideals and values, which society designs .Therefore, both concepts are

contradictory because the Id aims to strive on the expense of social appropriateness.

(Sigfried2) Annie‘s character demonstrates the conflict between the repressed desires and

values. In addition, the character has strict codes of values, which she imposes on others.

Although she presents herself as a woman of faith, who speaks to God in times of crisis, she

kills patients and innocents without remorse.(Tarigan35)Annie is able to demonstrate acts of

kindness when she helps Paul in the car accident , but her aggressive side dominates her

personality. Thus, Annie’s tendency to be a sexual predator and a killer is in the passage:

‘You killed him’, Paul said. […]She smiled uneasily. […] ‘Well, I guess it was

something like that […] they’re out to get me, all of them! […] they’d probably

says something crazy like I made a pass at him and he laughed at me and so I

killed him! […] and you know what, I think that just might be a little closer to

the truth. (King131-132)

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Annie confesses that she killed a man, who used to live with her because he lied about his

profession as an artist, and then when confronted him, he laughed. Annie is irrational person,

and her motifs for murder are evidence. Also, Paul believes that she made advances on him.

Although she claims that he was her lover, she believes that the police will claim that she

made advances on him. This represents Annie’s repressed desire, which attempts to hide from

the world.

Conclusion

In this chapter, the investigation studies the gothic setting in Stephen king‘s Misery .It

reveals the use of the American Gothic setting in the novel. In addition, it analyses the

relationship between the character and the landscapes, and the motifs behind the writer’s

focus on the interior space rather than on the interior. As it is explained above this chapter

studies the conventional Gothic characters that exists within King’s novel. However, the next

chapter will study the deviation within King’s Misery.