Meghan Gibson and Lily Ashcraft Gibson/Ashcraft 1

Cooper/Whipple
APUSH and English
11/17/16

Lightside, Darkside Project Essay

Back in the early 1800s, the United States was developing the belief of Manifest Destiny,

which was the term for a positive attitude towards expanding the country of America greatly over

the continent, towards the west coast. They believed this was their God-given right and that it

was inevitable, but it also caused many conflicts between other communities such as Native

Americans and Mexico. Meanwhile, in this same time period (the early 19th century), the Gothic

literature movement was growing in response to the social and cultural aspects of that time, such

as slavery, fear of the unknown (unexplored land on the frontier), and more. The Gothic

Romance motif of signs and omens can be connected to the Antebellum Era event of Manifest

Destiny in many ways and is a motif that can be seen in the poem The Raven by Edgar Allen Poe

and Young Goodman Brown by Nathaniel Hawthorne.

The signs and omens motif of the Gothic literary movement is very apparent in the texts

The Raven by Edgar Allen Poe and Young Goodman Brown by Nathaniel Hawthorne. For

example, in The Raven, Poe mentions early on in the poem that the raven perched upon a bust

of Pallas (Poe). Pallas is a symbol of knowledge, and a raven is a stereotypical bad omen, so

this represents the narrators loss of reasonable and logical thinking. The raven omen is a

foreshadowing sign of what was to come later in the reading.

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The second example is from Young Goodman Brown, by Nathaniel Hawthorne, where

Faith asks her husband to stay because when she's alone she is troubled with (Hawthorne) fear-

inducing dreams and thoughts. The dreams and thoughts she is experiencing are signs that

something bad would happen that night and a bad omen of the things Brown would see and

experience, for example, seeing highly respected members of the community as evil and never

trusting anyone again.The point of this motif being used in these works of literature is to show

the connection between objects or events and negative connotations and also to hint at a later

event that may occur later in the text. Cultural fears and anxieties are expressed in this literary

movement in a few ways. Mostly negative, the signs and omens components of this literary

movement are expressing fear in general in the form of foreshadowing. The Gothic literary

movement also greatly portrays an anxiety of losing ones insanity or going mad in a sense

because it is a component of both of the texts.

The motif is also apparent in the Antebellum historical event of Manifest Destiny.

Manifest Destiny can be defined as a widely held belief in the United States that its settlers

were destined to expand across North America (Wikipedia). The movement of Americans to the

west coast had a very negative impact on Native Americans, causing them to be removed from

the land that was originally their own. This expansion was an omen that was good for the settlers

and bad for the Native Americans in the sense that the Americans were securing ports on the

west, gaining more land for farming and harvesting raw materials, as well as expanding

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Americas territory. Meanwhile, the term Manifest Destiny was just the beginning of the

displacement of Native Americans and was also used to create a war with Mexico in order to

gain other territories like Texas. Manifest Destiny was also a bad omen for slaves because it

allowed slavery to be expanded into Texas (Wikipedia). Since omens can be either good or

bad, Manifest Destiny is an example of this motif because it had both types.

In our art piece, our motif is shown through the woman who is the central focus. She

represents an omen and is half dark and half light. The dark side shows how Manifest Destiny

was an evil or horrid omen for the Natives whose land was being taken. Her dark side also

represents a raven from Edgar Allan Poes The Raven and she also represents a nightmare, which

is the omen example from Hawthornes Young Goodman Brown.

Her light side represents an omen for the settlers. For them, expanding west meant more

opportunities for work and places to settle since the east was being overpopulated, especially in

the north. To her right her wing is light to show the good in the omen of expansion, and her left is

dark and representative of a raven in order to show the darkness she brings to Natives. The right

of the picture has darker colors to show civilization moving along with the woman. The left

uses brighter colors because its untouched by civilization. The natives are scared, and running

from the woman, while a train comes from the right side to show people moving into the west.

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In summary, the signs and omens motif in Gothic literature that is found in many writings

of the time, such as The Raven and Young Goodman Brown, can be connected to Manifest

Destiny. The motif was used mostly in literature to convey cultural anxieties at the time such as
fear of future experiences through foreshadowing. Nowadays, we still experience signs and

omens throughout everyday life in the form of superstitions. Its zalso present in modern

literature like YA and adult novels, all of which are usually fiction.

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Works Cited

"The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe | Poetry Foundation." Poetry Foundation. Poetry Foundation,

n.d. Web. 28 Nov. 2016.

"Young Goodman Brown." Hawthorne, "Young Goodman Brown" N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Nov. 2016.
History.com Staff. "Manifest Destiny." History.com. A&E Television Networks, 2010. Web. 30

Nov. 2016.

"Manifest Destiny." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, n.d. Web. 30 Nov. 2016.