Arthur Hobson Quinn's The Tell-Tale Heart

Psychological Analysis of “The Tell-Tale Heart” In Arthur Hobson Quinn’s book “Edgar Allan Poe: A Critical Biography” it gives in great detail on Edgar Allan Poe and his life. Also why he could have written how he wrote. In Quinn’s book it states that Edgar Allan Poe was born on January 19, 1809 by the name Edgar Poe in Boston to two traveling actors by the names of Elizabeth Arnold Hopkins Poe and David Poe, Jr. Poe had two siblings, an older brother by the name of William and a younger sister by the name of Rosalie. At the age of two Poe’s father left, and during that same year his mother died. The Poe children were then split up, Edgar was taken into the Allan household. The Allan’s served as Poe’s foster family since they never

The story is set in first person point of view, where the main character, who is a young unnamed man, is also the narrator. This short story tells the readers about how the narrator made his case of sanity by telling what had happened to him. He killed his master, an unnamed old man, because he disliked this one eye of his that reminder the narrator of a vulture eye. Every midnight, he would come to the old man’s room to stare at him. However, the old man did not awake. One night, he tried to come to the old man’s room, but this time the old man awakened because of his entrance. At that time, the narrator heard “[...] a slight groan, and I knew it was the groan of mortal terror [...] the low stifled sound that arises from the bottom of the soul when overcharged with awe.” (Poe 42). He considered this as the heart beating of the old man, which later becomes so strong that the neighbors might hear the sound too. Soon the narrator could wait no longer and killed the old man, “The old man’s hour had come! [...] I threw open the lantern and leaped into the room. He shrieked once - once only.” (Poe 43). Hearing the shriek, one of the neighbors had reported a disturbance to the police. Shortly after the narrator had dismembered and hid the old man’s body, the police came to investigate the report, and searched the whole place. They found nothing to

However just as in Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper” the main character began to realize the reality around her and her insanity began to become sane throughout the course of the short story. Here in “The Tell-Tale Heart” our narrator is trying to prove his sanity and that his actions are not insane actions, by the end of the story he faces the reality of his insanity. So as the woman in “The Yellow Wallpaper” grew towards sanity and saw reality, the narrator in “The Tell-Tale Heart” grew towards insanity and saw reality. Edgar Allan Poe’s early childhood and upbringing are reflections in his writings, and are why so many of his characters resemble psychological problems. Our narrator in “The Tell-Tale Heart” uses the motivation of his hatred towards the old man’s “vulture-like” eye to kill him, and then is haunted still by the heartbeat of the dead old man, which causes the narrator to confess his awful deed and sealing his fate. The narrator could be diagnosed with the mental disorder Schizophrenia Paranoia on the basis of the three main behaviors, which coincide with the thoughts and actions of the narrator. The statements in the short story thought and said by the narrator are to be considered Delusion. These examples being the heartbeat of the old man that could be heard by the neighbors, then the heartbeat of the dead old man in which