The late 18th century brought the beginning of a new literary genre in America; American Gothic. Already a popular genre in Europe, this new literary genre in America was born to create a rather stark contrast with the foundations of the Enlightenment on which America was born. Instead of covering issues of freedom and the “pursuit of happiness”; key elements of the American Dream, American Gothic literature "embodies and gives voice to the dark nightmare that is the underside of the 'American Dream'" (Savoy, 2003, p. 167) Although it contains many similar elements to that of its European counterpart , American Gothic has its own characteristics that make it "particularly American". These characteristics include the setting, language, style and essentially the topic of the text which concerns American history and fears. In this essay I will examine these "peculiarly American" elements evident in Edgar Allan Poe's The Fall of the House of Usher. A work of Gothic fiction, whether American or European, can be identified by specific common characteristics of the genre. A Gothic tale usually took place in an archaic building; in European Gothic fiction this building would generally have been a castle, abbey, palace, or monastery, many of them of Gothic architecture. As the genre developed and spread, the setting changed with the country, since America did not have the castles and abbeys that were important in Europe at that time, settings such as houses, forests and old buildings were used in Gothic literature American. Gothic literature is overly concerned with the past, be it the past of a country, a race, or a family. The setting and the anxieties of the past are linked; often in gothic literature it is common…… half of the paper…… and. Typical of Gothic writing, the secrets of the Usher family are hinted at but never fully revealed by the author. In conclusion, American Gothic literature contains the common Gothic traits, as well as its distinctive characteristics that make it uniquely “American.” Particularly American characteristics evident in Edgar Allan Poe's The Fall of the House of Usher included the setting of the tale being located in a dilapidated house to fit the Gothic elements into the American landscape. Poe used language, distinctive symbolism, and rhetorical techniques of metaphor and personification to show the connection between space and its inhabitant (Al-Mahdawi, 2002, p. 2), which was relatively new to the American Gothic. And finally, the concepts Poe explored were specific to America and the American people, the fear and desires of the modified to fit America..