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Edgar allan poe analysis essay
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In the short story “The Black Cat” by Edgar Allan Poe the reader is led onto a journey in which they are told the gruesome actions of a disturbed narrator. This subjective narrators' actions are spurred by a heavy alcohol addiction and deteriorating mental state. The narrator tells the reader of his deeds,which ultimately led to his demise, starting with the killing of Pluto. Pluto was the household cat of the narrator and his wife. He was very much cared and adored for but one night after returning home “much intoxicated” the narrator carved one of the poor beasts eyes after he upset him. After that event a disagreeable mood leeches onto the narrator and he decides to hang the pet using a noose and attaches it onto the limb of a tree . A string of evil deeds follows the hanging, including the attempted killing of a new cat who bore a startling resemblance to Pluto and the inevitable murder of the narrators wife by his own hand when she tried to stop the attack on the animal, which follows the act of her being stuffed into the walls of the family cellar. By the end of the story however, the narrator own foolishness and glee at the murder of his own wife are what lead to his ultimate downfall in the form of his capture by the authorities. While at first the motivation of the narrator to kill living beings in cold blood seems to be alcohol, there is also a deeper psychological reason behind his behavior. The narrator does not feel guilt for his deeds and portrays a cold methodical human being, void of conscience or sense of morality. In all aspects the narrator does not seem to be void of conscience as the story begins, he even goes as far as too portray himself as a caring and loving individual who is an avid animal lover. “Fro... ... middle of paper ... ...k Cat. The narrator with his degraded morals could only function as a killing machine. He became a being with a one track mind, his mind filling with thoughts to kill and not be found, the true feelings of being alive escaped from him. Once a logic system of cause and effect replaces the conscience of a man these true human feelings of love, friendship, and even true happiness are forever forsaken. Not to mention that when one stoops as low as the narrator did these feelings become skeletons of their former meaning, leaving behind a person with an emotionless calculating mind, which with the right ingredients can become a lethal combination. In conclusion the narrator of the Black Cat portrays a case of the ultimate descent into madness and a man who could not handle his guilt, turning himself into a victim but ultimately a victim whom is in denial about his actions.
Poe carefully details the most brutal scenes of his stories, a quality shared by many of his works. Within “The Black Cat,” three situations stand to illustrate Poe’s message: when the narrator stabs out Pluto’s eye, when the narrator hangs Pluto, and when the narrator murders his wife. Before the first violent act described in the story, the narrator is known to be a drunkard who abused his wife. No matter how despicable this may be, he is still a somewhat ordinary man. Nothing majorly sets him apart from any another, relating him to the common man. However, his affinity towards alcohol, led to “the fury of a demon” (2) that came over him as he “grasped the poor beast by the throat” (2) and proceeded to “cut one of its eyes from the socket.” (2) Poe’s gruesome description of the narrator as a destructive demon, one who was awakened by alcohol, connects his behavior to the common working-class man. Alcohol is a legal drug that can be obtained by many, and when consumed in excess leads to the uncontrollable madness that ensued. The descriptions of the act plants fear into the hearts of the readers, especially those who have consumed alcohol, of ever becoming such a
How a man can engage in such evil acts by the sole reaction of the human reflex. The short stories of “The Tale Tell Heart” and “The Black Cat” share many similarities with each other but they are also very different in many ways. One similarity which both accomplish is the themes they represent of murder and the belief in supernatural events caused by their own insanity. In “The Tell Tale Heart” “Poe 's confessional tale features a psychologically ill protagonist who recalls his grisly murder of an old man” (Zimmerman 342) as mentioned is exactly that as it is about a man who felt justified in killing a man because “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.” (The Tell Tale Heart 691) as the main character states. According to the main character, the old man’s eye was causing his insanity and it was his justification for killing him. This shares a similarity with the other
Another extraordinary tale by Edgar Allen Poe is, “The Black Cat”. “The Black Cat” recounts the story of an unnamed narrator with a selfless character. Loving animals, he and his wife have several pets, one of which being a black cat. The narrator and the cat grow very close and life for the narrator seems complete, until he beings drinking. Intoxicated by alcohol, the narrator becomes irritable and abusive. One day, that narrator, infur...
The short story the “Black Cat” begins with the narrator of the story telling his side of events that have occurred throughout his life. When first being introduced to the narrator you can tell something is off with him. The narrator is originally a well-put together man he has a wife and many of different animals but has a much greater love for one of his animals named Pluto a black cat. As the life of the narrator goes on he falls into a drinking problem he cant stop drinking and when he does drink he gets violent. One night when
Analysis of the Role First Person Narration Plays in Edgar Allen Poe's Poem The Black Cat
In "The Black Cat," the author, Edgar Allan Poe, uses a first person narrator who is portrayed as a maniac. Instead of having a loving life with his wife and pets, the narrator has a cynical attitude towards them due to his mental instability as well as the consumption of alcohol. The narrator is an alcoholic who takes out his own insecurities on his family. It can be very unfortunate and in some cases even disastrous to be mentally unstable. Things may take a turn for the worst when alcohol is involved, not only in the narrator's case, but in many other cases as well. Alcohol has numerous affects on people, some people may have positive affects while others, like the narrator in "The Black Cat," may have negative affects like causing physical and mental abuse to those he loved. The combination of the narrator's mental instability along with the consumption of alcohol caused the narrator to lose control of his mind as well as his actions leading him to the brink of insanity. Though the narrator is describing his story in hopes that the reader feels sympathy towards him, he tries to draw the attention to his abuse of alcohol to demonstrate the negative affects that it can take on your life as well as destroy it in the end.
Furthermore, Poe’s plot development added much of the effect of shocking insanity to “The Black Cat.” To dream up such an intricate plot of perverseness, alcoholism, murders, fire, revival, and punishment is quite amazing. This story has almost any plot element you can imagine a horror story containing. Who could have guessed, at the beginning of the story, that narrator had killed his wife? The course of events in “The Black Cat’s” plot is shockingly insane by itself! Moreover, the words in “The Black Cat” were precisely chosen to contribute to Poe’s effect of shocking insanity. As the narrator pens these he creates a splendidly morbid picture of the plot. Perfectly selected, sometimes rare, and often dark, his words create just the atmosphere that he desired in the story.
Gargano, James W. “’The Black Cat’: Perverseness Reconsidered.” Twentieth Century Interpretations of Poe’s Tales. Ed. William L. Howarth. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1971. 87-94. Print.
“Black Cat” is about a narrator and his tribulations with animals, cats in particular with this work. The short story starts out with the narrator telling
...is wife and hides her body he does not own up to his actions but instead blames the cat as the one “which had been the cause of so much wretchedness”. (254)
In “The Black Cat”, the main character is consumed so much by his madness, which grows more and more as the story goes on and eventually ends with him being put in jail for murder of his wife. The madness first starts when his love for his black cat, Pluto,turns to utter hatred. He stabs out the
Edgar Allen Poe’s short story The Black Cat immerses the reader into the mind of a murdering alcoholic. Poe himself suffered from alcoholism and often showed erratic behavior with violent outburst. Poe is famous for his American Gothic horror tales such as the Tell-Tale Heart and the Fall of the House of Usher. “The Black Cat is Poe’s second psychological study of domestic violence and guilt. He added a new element to aid in evoking the dark side of the narrator, and that is the supernatural world.” (Womack). Poe uses many of the American Gothic characteristics such as emotional intensity, superstition, extremes in violence, the focus on a certain object and foreshadowing lead the reader through a series of events that are horrifying and grotesque. “The Black Cat is one of the most powerful of Poe’s stories, and the horror stops short of the wavering line of disgust” (Quinn).
The narcissism of the narrator contributes to the overall darkness of the story and is largely conclusive to the dark and the underlying malevolence of Poe’s own conscience. The cat in “The...
This story is a confession of an atrocious sin told by an old man on his deathbed. The plot begins to unfold as the main character reflects back on his childhood. He recalls having been an animal lover all of his life. A conflict first arises between himself and Pluto, his cat. He becomes angered when the cat rejects him out of fear. However, he quickly resolves this problem by killing the cat. Throughout the story he seems to be having an
Edgar Allan Poe's classic tale, "The Black Cat," is a disturbing story that delves into the contrasts between reality and fantasy, insanity and logic, and life and death. To decipher one distinct meaning presented in this story undermines the brilliance of Poe's writing. Multiple meanings can be derived from "The Black Cat," which lends itself perfectly to many approaches of critical interpretation.