I found it interesting that the central force behind this
story was a prophecy. Prophecies seem to always be the subject’s self-destruction.
This story is a perfect example of self-destruction based on a character’s fear
of prophecy fulfillment. The prophecy
states, “the castle and lordship of Otranto should pass from the present
family, whenever the real owner should be grown too large to inhabit it". In
the beginning, Manfred fears his people’s whispers of the prophecy. It seems to
loom over him. After the death of his only son, Manfred goes to extreme lengths
to try and secure his lineage. He still has Matilda, but due to the perceived
necessity of a male heir, he ends up killing his daughter and only other heir.
This fulfills the prophecy he tried so incredibly hard to disprove. He made it
true by trying too hard to disprove it and ended up losing his family over it.
No one knows what the prophecy means exactly, yet when Conrad dies, the people in the crowd quickly decide that it must have something to do with the prophecy. The prophecy colors Manfred's perception of the things that go on around him. It makes the need for an heir more immediate and leads to him making some irrational decisions.
ReplyDeleteThe situation with the heirs is something else that might have tipped people off about the text not being as old as initially claimed. Matilda is considered an heir, though less of one as she cannot continue the family name. I would think that in the time that Walpole initially claimed the book was written, primogeniture would have still been in place.
I agree that the prophecy was interesting as a motivator in this story. Most stories with prophecies either believe them or think they are a hoax. In this story though it is a little bit of both. Manfred fears what he hears the people saying about the prophecy, but he does not believe his reign could end. So in fear he does everything he can to try and prevent it from happening. But it does anyway; it was a self-fulfilling prophecy that he could not escape. Most of what happen to cause the fall of his family was his crazy obsession with having an heir.
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