The Tell Tale Heart And The Black Cat

The narrator’s relationship with the elderly man is never disclosed in the story. What is known is that he feared the man’s “vulture eye”. It is describe as pale blue with a film over it. The narrator states that “Whenever it fell upon me, my blood ran cold…” Due to this discomfort, the narrator believes the only rational solution to this problem is by killing the old man. His actions demonstrate the possibility that the narrator suffered from some variation of mental illness. In addition, the narrator tends to repeatedly tell readers that he isn’t mad. He doesn’t believe that any of his actions in the story make him mad. The narrator acts in a wisely but, cautious manner as he carries out the stalking and eventual murder of this poor old man, something in which he

“The Black Cat” and “The Tell-Tale Heart” are both written by a famous American writer named Edgar Allan Poe. In these stories, he writes as a nameless narrator that at first seems calm, but really, has an issue with something to the point where he has to kill it. In both of these stories, he does ending up killing someone or something, which would make it seem like it's the same story, but they have some similarities but a lot of differences which I will explain in the following paragraphs.

In this paragraph, I will talk about the story, “The Tell Tale Heart”. In the beginning of the story, the narrator wants to kill an old man, who lives with him, because of his vulture eye. He decides that he will watch the old man at night and shine a light on his vulture eye. If he sees the eye he will kill the old man. In the first seven days, he does not see the vulture eye. But on the 8th night he makes a slight noise and wakes the old man up. After a little while he charges into the room, which then the old man screams, and the narrator kills the old man by

In “The Tell-Tale Heart” a man is obsessed with an eye that belongs to an old man he lives with. This story is told from a first person point of view by the main character, whose name is never mentioned. The first thing he tells the reader multiple times is that he is not mad, only nervous. He claims that once the thought of the eye entered his brain it was all he could think about. The man did not hate the old man, but there was something about the eye that made his skin crawl. “For his gold I had no desire. I think it was his eye! Yes, it was this! One of his eyes resembled that of a vulture-a pale blue eye, with film over it,” (37). He believed the eye was disgusting and the only way to permanently get rid of it was to take the old man’s life. This man stays awake at night and watches the old man sleep while he plans to do something about the eye. The eighth time the narrator sneaks into the man’s room while he’s sleeping, the old man is awoken by a noise and then is murdered by the man. A neighbor hears a scream and calls the

In the short story of Tell-Tale Heart, the narrator talks about an insane mad man who speaks to himself. He describes what his intentions to kill an old man who he loves, but allows his emotions to overwhelm him with the thoughts that the old man’s eye in which he identifies as a vulture’s eye is invading his every emotion. He goes on to expose his every move insanely and vividly to murder the old man.

Object there was none. Passion there was none. I loved the old man. He had never wronged me. He had never given me insult. For his gold I had no desire. I think it was his eye! yes, it was this! He had the eye of a vulture --a pale blue eye, with a film over it. Whenever it fell upon me, my blood ran cold; and so by degrees --very gradually --I made up my mind to take the life of the old man, and thus rid myself of the eye forever”(41).

First, horror is developed in “The Tell Tale Heart” by the insanity of the narrator. The narrator believes he is a sane person, but contradicted himself when he kills the old man. This creates a complex in the character’s mind. When the police shows because the neighbors heard a yell, he begins to hear the old man’s heartbeat, but his guilt consumes him and he confesses to murdering the old man and putting his body underneath the floorboards. Also, in the beginning of the story, the narrator describes why he wants to kill the old man. “It was impossible to say how first the idea entered my brain; but once conceived, it haunted me day and night” (Para. 2). His insane idea of killing the old man because of his vulture eye pops into his thoughts without a preconceived notion of doing so. The murder is premeditated and thought out as each night he cracks the door open and glares the lantern directly at the vulture eye. The insanity of the narrator develops “The Tell Tale Heart” into horror.

Edgar Allen Poe is known to many as a very talented and interesting writer in his time. However, unlike many other authors, Poe was not successful during his lifetime at all. He was very poor and depressed from the loss of his loved ones, and also was a heavy drinker. In his poems and short stories, he uses the experiences of losing his loved ones and manifests them differently in his works. In some of his stories, he incorporates these losses similarly, and yet he does have some differences in his works. In two of his works, “The Tell-Tale Heart” and “The Black Cat”, he uses the fatalities of his mother and wife to write two great stories. Although “The Tell-Tale Heart” and “The Black Cat” by Edgar Allen Poe seem similar on the surface

Poe describes, “I soundly and tranquilly slept; aye, slept even with the burden of murder upon my soul.”(The Black cat) In both stories, the context of the characters and how they describe everything shows how mad Poe really is. I feel as if Poe inserts his thoughts and emotion into his own stories, showing his own insanity. Poe seems to be very calm until paranoia comes in, that is when the characters confess, when guilt overcomes them. Both the Tell Tale Heart and The Black Cat, have a lot of similar traits, from the metaphors, to the emotion and tone of the stories. Also both characters portrayed in the stories have an obsession, which both lead to murder. The characters are also very paranoid, and easily become overwhelmed with guilt. The scenes, settings in both stories also happen to be very dark and sort of creepy, almost like spine-chilling creepy. Both characters play the emotions of the victims; “ And it was the mournful influence of the unperceived shadow that caused him to feel - although he neither saw or heard - to feel the presence of my head within the room.”(Tell Tale Heart) This is Poe describing how the old man felt when hearing the door creak

The eye is a part

In “The Tell-Tale Heart,” the main character was deeply disturbed not by a cat’s eye but, by a man’s eye. He described that the eye had the same look as that of a vulture’s (Poe). It was “a pale blue, with film over it” (Poe 702). Every night at mid-night, the obsessive man would sneak into the other man’s room and watch to see if his “vulture” eye was open; but, the man was always soundly asleep. On one particular evening, the man’s eye was wide open and the sight of his eye made him furious (Poe). He decided to drag the man to the floor and smother him with his own bed until he was dead.

The narrator in the short story “The Tell-Tale Heart” does a great job of showing his disgust of the old man for whom he is living with. He tells the audience that he has nothing against this old man except for the fact that he has a blind eye that he calls the “vulture eye”.

ENGL104 Essay Choose two of Edgar Allan Poe’s short stories and write a research essay that compares Poe’s employment of gothic literary techniques in both these short stories. In your essay you must define the term gothic literature and identify specific examples from the texts in order to justify your argument. Edgar Allan Poe was well-known for his use of gothic literature in his texts. Gothic literature can be defined as a form of text that employs dark and picturesque view, astonishing and theatrical narrative devices and an overall ambiance of terror, ambiguity, and exoticism.

Edgar Allen Poe was known for his dark-romanticism writings which evoked horror in readers. Seen specifically in his short story, “The Tell-Tale Heart”, readers are able to get into the mind of the mentally ill narrator who murders an elderly man, one whom he claimed to love. Poe created conflict in this story by having the narrator admit to loving the man and having him be his caretaker. Conflict, and the story line, is created because it makes readers question why he would commit such a heinous crime as killing and dismembering the man. Readers eventually find out that it is the elderly man’s eye that pushes the narrator to do what he does. The narrator is trying to justify his actions and prove his sanity by explaining how he observes

Edgar Allen Poe has created many stories that are dark, suspenseful, and murderous such as The Tell- Tale Heart and The Black Cat. His works tend to resemble one another in style, mood, theme, and plot. The ways in which these elements are displayed show contrast between the two. The Tell- Tale Heart and The Black Cat are two brutal tales with similar themes about being insane. Both stories are told from the first person point of view with a maniacal narrator.