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Volume 4, Chapter 3
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Mysteries of Udolpho, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Marriage, Love, and Inheritance
The Wonders of Nature
Mystery and Superstition
Mortality
The Value of Education and Art
Summary
Analysis
Dorothée comes back to Emily at the same time as the previous night. They head over toward the late Marchioness De Villeroi’s old, locked room. Even getting close to the room stirs up bad memories for Dorothée. Inside the room, the colors have faded on everything in the past 20 years. The room contains a portrait of the Marchioness that strongly resembles the miniature that Emily has of herself. Dorothée has Emily stand by the portrait to see the resemblance herself.
Just as the physical building of the castle of Udolpho seemed to hint at the secrets it contained with its gloom, the interior of this chateau also conjures up a strong mood, with its locked room that seems to come from the distant past. Emily’s physical resemblance to the Marchioness seems to once again suggest that the Marchioness might be Emily’s mother.
Themes
Emily and Dorothée look through the Marchioness De Villeroi’s things, which include clothes and in particular a black veil. As they’re exploring the place and Dorothée recalls more bittersweet memories of the Marchioness, Dorothée almost imagines that the Marchioness is in the room and that she can see the Marchioness’s face lying on the pillow. All of a sudden, they hear something, then they see a human face looking through the bed curtains. They run out of the chambers at once in fright.
Once again, the chateau recalls Udolpho, with the black veil in the Marchioness’s possessions being a different one than the one in Udolpho but having a similarly grim atmosphere to it. The human face in the bed curtains recalls the mysterious figures that Emily saw at Udolpho, and although those had rational explanations, this new scenario with the face in the curtains is so strange that it once again raises questions of the supernatural.
Themes
Dorothée and Emily discuss what they just saw. While Emily considers that it might have been a living person watching them, neither of them can shake the idea that they may have witnessed something supernatural. After a while, they reluctantly head from Emily’s chamber back out toward the room. At first, they hear nothing, but then from somewhere they hear a mysterious cry of lamentation.
Emily’s belief that she saw a living person (not a ghost) reflects how her experiences at Udolpho have helped her to manage her fear and renewed her faith in rational explanations—and yet, she still can’t help fearing the unknown. The cries of lamentation that Emily hears, similar to the moans at Udolpho, are yet another example of how grief runs throughout the story.
Themes
