Critical Thinking In Edgar Allan Poe's The Tell-Tale Heart

The Autopsy of the Eye Can one truly ever get inside Edgar Allan Poe’s head to have a full understanding of what he meant in any of his literary work? One can only try to piece together the deep, dark feelings which he expressed through his poems and stories. When using literary critical thinking to dissect Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart”, it is found to be slightly intriguing. In this short story, Edgar Allan Poe depicts how guilt and fear can drive a person completely insane all while drawing out a very elaborate plot. “The Tell-Tale Heart” has been known to be one of Edgar Allan Poe’s most known short stories about a young servant that is simply drives himself mad. The story is told by the young servant, which we can only assume,

There is the old man who is believed to be the master of the house, the servant that takes care of the old man and his house, the neighbors who called the authorities, and the officers who came to inspect the house after the dispatch call of a shrieking noise. The narrator, who is the young servant, seems fairly calm and collected throughout the tale as he goes about his plans on killing the old man, even being so very cleaver as to ensure the old man never suspected a thing. He reassures the reader of his clarity of mind and even refers to himself as a genius. The young man’s motive to kill the old man was not out of passion or for money, but oddly enough due to his strange obsession or fear of the old man’s pale blue, film covered eye. Once the narrator killed the old man, he acts as though nothing happened. He even goes as far as to show the investigating officers around the house and even sits with them in the very room where he just buried the dismembered body parts of the dead old man. As the conversations with the officers grew longer and longer, the narrator began to become more and more nervous. He subconsciously began to hear the old man’s heart beat louder and louder which inevitably caused him to have a complete and utter