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Tell-Tale Heart By Edgar Allan Poe

Decent Essays

How specifically is "Tell Tale Heart" a piece of Romantic Literature? Explain
The romantic literature period started in the late 1700s and expanded through the early 1800s; this period showcased the works of Mary Shelley, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Emily Dickinson, Edgar Allan Poe and many more writers. Romanticism movement was specifically diverse; its elements arranged from nature beauty and truth to gothic and the supernatural events. Gothic Literature create suspense for the reader by involving madness that could not be understood. The Writers in the Romanticism movement displayed strong feelings, emotions, and imagination within their characters which cause the character to take priority over logic and facts. Edgar Allan Poe uses these element …show more content…

In the story, the narrator begins off by explaining his supernatural events. He states “I heard all things in the heaven and in the earth. I heard many things in hell” to justify his reason behind why he/she is not a mad person (pg. 691). (I am saying he/she because Poe does not identify the narrator as a man or woman. Please correct me if I’m wrong.) The narrator sense can hear what others cannot. For instinct. The narrator heard a “low, dull, quick sound” which he thought was the heart of the old man (693,). Nobody else could hear the sound of the beating heart; he/she heard this sound before and after he/she killed the old man. This symbolize two supernatural events that occurred in the short story. The narrator was obsessed with the old man’s eye he called it “the eye of a vulture;” it described as “a pale blue eye, with a film over it” (pg. 691). It did not sound so evil but it made the narrator “blood ran cold” (691). He/she had to set his freedom from this eye so he/she decide to killing the old man. After the killing, the narrator gain his personal freedom from the old man’s …show more content…

He/she claim they was not mad because he/she love the old man; it was only the eye that drive him crazy. The narrator tries prove how stable he/she can be by showing how wisely he/she react and the extreme precaution he/she goes through to executed his deed. After he/she describe how he/she would slowly open the door every night at twelve and poke his/her head in the door. It took an hour just to make it in the room with these precaution; he/she was so please with it that he/she chuckled and asked the readers “would a madman have been so wise as this?”(693). on the eight night he/she hands slips and waken the old man; he/she shines the ray of light on the old man and it hits the “Hideous veiled…eye” (693). This is when he described how he killed the old man and dismember him. Only Madman can present a story of their own horrific deed so coherently. The narrator strong feeling toward the old man’s eye cancel out the love he/she had for the man. His/her first priority was to get rid of the evil eye which meant killing the old man. He even went as far as buried under the wood of the house so he would not see the site of the eye anymore. The narrator decides to kill instead of get over the fear of the old man’s eye.
In conclusion, Edgar Allan Poe’s Short story “Tell-Tale Heart” was more of a gothic reading from the Romantic Literature Period. Poe display supernatural event and many other elements

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