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The Black Cat And The Tell Tale Heart

Decent Essays
Edgar Allan Poe suffered through many unpleasant emotions through his life, the manner in which he expressed these emotions was his brilliantly horrifying short stories. In the two short stories “The Black Cat” and “The Tell Tale Heart” Poe uses characterization to portray the guilt of the narrator. “The Black Cat” short story’s writing has a morbid effect on readers and describes the torments of guilt. In “The Tell-Tale Heart” Poe explores the effects of the subconscious mind, the suppressing of guilt and the narrator’s guilt forcing him to confess.”

“The Black Cat” is written with violent language to create a grotesque effect on the reader, in an effort to portray the narrator’s horrified thoughts against his own actions. “I took from my waistcoat pocket a penknife, opened it, grasped the poor beast by the throat, and deliberately cut one of its eyes from the socket!” The narrator was under the influence of alcohol when this act was committed. The narrator describes the event very graphically, as if he too could not believe that such an event took place. The narrators vivid description shows us how repelled he is at his own actions, it gives the reader a hint of the guilt he has over this specific incident.

Edgar Allan Poe implies the idea that the narrators guilt lingers and affects his thoughts and emotions in “The Black Cat”. “By slow degrees, these feelings of disgust and annoyance rose into the bitterness of hatred. I avoided the creature; a certain sense of shame,
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