Castle Of Otranto Quotes

It appears that almost all characters from The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole suffers in at least one point of the text. The characters that appear to suffer the most are Manfred’s family. It is not a coincidence that these characters suffer so many hardships. Manfred’s ancestor has committed horrible sins and it is Manfred’s family that gets punished for them. Manfred’s ancestor Ricardo has sinned against Alfonso the Good and in order to correct his sins Alfonso the Good visits the present to cause suffering to Manfred’s family. Conrad suffers death and later the bad opinion of his father. Matilda suffers the death of a brother and bad behaviour of her father. Hippolita suffers the impending doom of a divorcee. Manfred suffers the death of a son, the grief of murdering his daughter and the loss of his throne. All of these sufferings can be traced back to Alfonso the Good and Ricardo. The family would have had no need to suffer if Ricardo had not sinned against Ricardo the Good. It is the sins of the ancestors will cause the sufferings of their children in the future. To begin, Ricardo’s sins against Alfonso the Good is what …show more content…
After Alfonso the Good killed his son, Manfred has become obsessed with producing a new heir with Isabella. Manfred overhears a conversation hat he believes is proof that Isabella is cheating on him and he stabs Matilda. This action causes Manfred a lot of suffering, “‘heaven directed my bloody hardtop the heart of my child. Oh Matilda! —I cannot utter it — can thou forgive the blindness of my rage’” (95)? If Conrad had not been killed by Alfonso the Good. Manfred would not have pursued Isabella the way he had. Alfonso the Good only killed Conrad to start the chain of events to have the proper heir to the throne restored after Ricardo stole it. Therefore, the sins of the past comes to cause surfing in the future by changing Manfred’s actions to kill his