The Foxworth Hall Room

Foxworth Hall is a very intimidating place with many halls and rooms. The vision of Foxworth Hall compared  to the house where Cathy lived in Gladstone is very striking because it's a place where the children, even their mother were not expecting to live. The moment the children  arrived to this estate, they are immediately locked away in a very secluded room. Cathy describes this room where she stays as large but cluttered.

   " I sat up and looked around this room that was, perhaps, sixteen-by-sixteen. Large, but with two double beds, a massive highboy, a large dresser, two overstuffed chairs, a dressing table between the two front windows, with its own small chair, plus a mahogany table with four chairs,  it seemed a small room.Cluttered. Between the two big beds was another table with a lamp. Altogether there were four lamps in the room. Beneath all the ponderous dark furniture was a faded Oriental red rug with gold fringe. At one time it must have been a beautiful thing, but now it was old and worn. The walls were papered in cream with white flocking. The bedspreads were gold-colored and made of some heavy fabric like quilted satin. There were three paintings on the walls. Golly-lolly, they did steal your breath away! Grotesque demons chased naked people in underground caverns colored mostly red. Unearthly monsters devoured other pitiful souls. Even as their legs still kicked, they dangled from slobbering mouths filled with long, shiny, sharp teeths..."
(Flowers in the Attic, page51)

If you try to visualize it, you will notice how stressfull this place really is to the point of insanity. The old furniture and the fact that the children can't open the windows make it very unberable for them to live. The following is the sketch I used to draft a more detailed  room.

There are two beds inside the room, and  a table with four chairs for them to eat, a bathroom, and a closet with access to the attic. I think this is pretty much how the  room would look like,

Cathy mentions all the existence of three paintings of  hell in the room. Here is the outline of the closet that has  access to the attic.

Cathy describes the door to the stairs that lead to the attic as very narrow, but I think the dimensions that she gives,one foot wide, is very unrealistic. I think the exaggeration is also an allusion to Alice in Wonderland.

I find this room very peculiar, and I wonder if there are actual houses that have rooms like this one. Virginia C. Andrew was very creative in creating this room, and I wish we had more descriptions of the rest of the house.

The real room is even more stressful but because of software limitations, I couldn't add more dark furniture.

Literary Allusions: The Doppelganger

The last name of the family in Flowers in the Attic alludes to the german word doppelgänger. The idea of a doppelgänger has been explored in popular culture throughout ages. One of the most  popular movies that I can think of inspired by this concept is the 1993's cult classic Doppelganger starring Drew Barrymore. 

  Doppelgänger literally means "Double Walker"  and legend says that if you were to meet or see your  doppelganger, you would die soon or something really unlucky would happen to you. I think it's a very interesting concept, these are other two movies that also deal with the subject.

                                                         

How similiar are the previous mentioned movies to Flowers in the Attic, you will be surprised. I will write more in depth about it in the future, as it really takes more detail since the comparison is not very obvious, actually for the most part is very cleverly hidden.