Ana Sucaldito
Ms. Wilson
AP Multicultural Literature B
15 January 2013

Ringmaster

              In the opening pages from Gaston Leroux’s The Mystery of the Yellow Room, Leroux uses his signature journalistic-like format, first-person dialogue and syntax to draw the reader into “the natural mystery of the Yellow Room” (Leroux 1).
            One of Leroux’s signature formats is similar to that of a journalistic article. Often includes copies of outside sources, such as “the following note” (Leroux 2). Adding outside sources increases the speaker’s credibility, building ethos. The fact that he was there during the case also increases credibility, even though he was not the one who ultimately solved the mystery. Ethos could still be called into question because the novel was written many years after the case, yet this frame narrative format offers distinct advantages. Analepsis, or flashback, assures the reader that the novel’s events, no matter how terrifying, do come to a happy ending when Joseph Rouletabille “brought in the key to the whole case” (Leroux 2).  Another characteristic of Leroux’s work is the first person point-of-view as “[the speaker] begin[s]  to recount here . . . extraordinary adventures” (Leroux 1). The use of first person gives him the opportunity to interject his own opinion while giving the additional information made possible by the analepsis.
           This first person point-of-view affects a majority of the piece’s syntax and diction. This point of view allows for rhetorical questions, which serves as direct dialogue with the audience, fostering a relationship with the readers and encouraging them to view the speaker as their guide. The idea of the speaker as guide explains Leroux’s use of the run-on sentence. This run-on, describing the “adventure of which Joseph Rouletabille had told me he wished to be for ever forgotten” (Leroux 1) creates suspense, letting the speaker act as a ringmaster as he draws in the readers. The excitement is capped with the short “The Yellow Room!” (Leroux 1).  Like in his other work, The Phantom of the Opera, Leroux also uses adjectives to further his purpose. In The Phantom of the Opera, Leroux’s use of adjectives paints the Phantom as an ordinary, unhappy man. Here, adjectives work to set the stage for a mystery bigger than life, a “mysterious, cruel and sensational drama” (Leroux 1) and draw the reader in.
            The final trick to draw in the reader relates is the note from the Temps included as an outside source, describing the “attempt . . . to assassinate Mademoiselle Stangerson” (Leroux 2). The abrupt shift from flowery to sparse diction signals the beginning of the actual tale; Leroux uses the shock from the shift mirrors the shock of the crime in order to immerse the readers in the mystery.  In The Mystery of the Yellow Room’s opening pages, Leroux’s diction, syntax and structure work together to entice the reader into the tale and then prepare him for the harsh reality of the mystery of the Yellow Room.