The Tell Tale Heart

938 Words2 Pages

“The Tell Tale Heart” is a story containing a conflict within the narrator. There is a mental conflict within the narrator himself who seems to be in a mentally unstable state. Through obvious clues and proclamations, Poe informs the reader to the mental state of the narrator, which is insanity. The insanity is described as an obsession with the old man’s eye, which eventually causes him to resort to violence. Even though he appears to be insane, and supposedly has freedom from guilt, his feeling of guilt over the murder is too crushing to tolerate. The narrator can’t bear it and eventually confesses his theoretically “perfect” crime. People tend to think that insane people are outside the regular realm of reason shared by those who are in their right mind. This is proven to be false as guilt is an emotion shared by all humans. The most hysterical beings are not above the feeling of guilt and the disorder it causes to the soul. Poe uses tools such as; setting, character, and language to reveal that even an insane person can feel guilt. This eventually leads to the theme of “The Tell Tale Heart”: The sensation of guilt will eventually crash through the nearly indestructible walls of insanity. Poe is has been known for his great works of writing and "The Tell Tale Heart" is just one his many masterpieces that possesses the ability to keep the reader engaged from the beginning of the story to the end. But how exactly is does Edgar Allan manipulate his readers throughout the entire piece? He used three very powerful tools, foreshadowing, shackling information, and character development. He continued using these throughout the piece, which proved tremendously effective. The author first led suspense in to his story right at the beginn... ... middle of paper ... ... to someone's inevitable death. But there is always the possibility that, maybe he did know. Purposely or not, this peculiar instance in the novel compares sex and death in a way that is very interesting. “The Tell Tale Heart” shows the reader the ultimate battle, that being a civil war between an insane individual and their mind. The main cause of this struggle is triggered by the old mans eye. This obsession eventually leads to the unfortunate event of violence. This overwhelming feeling of guilt abruptly spoils the “perfect” plan that is the murder of the old man. Although it is perceived that the mentally unstable are immune to emotions such as guilt, the narrator is clearly overcome by the shameful murder of the old man. This proves to the reader that in the end, the sensation of guilt will eventually crash through the nearly indestructible walls of insanity.

Show More
Related

  • The Tell Tale Heart

    1666 Words  | 4 Pages

    In the “Tell-Tale Heart” by Edgar Allan Poe, the narrator is extremely uncanny due to the reader’s inability to trust him. Right from the beggining the reader can tell that the narrator is crazy although the narrator does proclaim that he is sane. Since a person cannot trust a crazy person, the narrator himself is unreliable and therefore uncanny. Also as the story progress the narrator falls deeper and deeper into lunacy making him more and more unreliable, until the end of the story where the narrator gives in to his insanity, and the reader loses all ability to believe him.

    Read More

  • Insanity In The Tell-Tale Heart By Edgar Allan Poe

    1008 Words  | 3 Pages

    The “Tell-Tale Heart” is a short story written by Edgar Allan Poe and serves as a testament to Poe’s ability to convey mental disability in an entertaining way. The story revolves around the unnamed narrator and old man, and the narrator’s desire to kill the old man for reasons that seem unexplainable and insane. After taking a more critical approach, it is evident that Poe’s story is a psychological tale of inner turmoil.

    Read More

  • Comparing The Tell-Tale Heart And The Yellow Wallpaper

    811 Words  | 2 Pages

    The narrator in “The Tell-Tale Heart,” the narrator realizes that he absences a reason for killing the old man he lives with. He even starts to admit having to love the man. He states, “There was no reason for what I did. I did not hate the old man; I even loved him. He had never hurt me. I did not want his money. I think it was his eye” (Poe 64). Psychosis is seen in the difficult rationality the narrator uses to defend his murder. The logic the narrator provides is that he thinks the desire to murder the old man results from the man’s eye, which bothers him. He says, “When the old man looked at me with his vulture eye a cold feeling went up and down my back; even my blood became cold. And so, I finally decided I had to kill the old man and close that eye forever!” (Poe 65). The fact that by this man’s eye is what makes him very angry is such a irrelevant reason for the narrator to kill him. This proves that he is not mentally stable, anyone in their right state of mind would not want to commit such a crime due to an irritation of someone’s eye. This represents the idea that this narrator expresses his complete lack of sanity through the premeditation and planning he put into committing the murder. In the beginning of the story, he says “vulture eye” giving the impression that he is uncertain that the eye is the reason for the murder, he also says how he thinks it’s the eye, he uses past tense as opposed to declaring with certainty that this is why the killing of the man. This shows the contrast to how as a sane person would be sure that this is their reason for killing another person before committing.

    Read More

  • Essay On Tell Tale Heart

    582 Words  | 2 Pages

    Have you ever felt the urge to know how it feels to be insane. Have you wonder how it would feel to be rid of something that haunted you for eight days. Have you felt the thrill of getting rid of it by ending it. I might be a little crazy but, I strongly believe that tell tale heart is appropriate for the 8th grade standard. “What is the Tell Tale Heart?”, you my ask. Tell Tale Heart is a horror genre story that is about a man who suffers from a mental disease, and he lives with a old man that never harmed him or wronged him. What made him kill him was because of the old man’s eye. “It was like a vulture’s eye” (pg.89) so he stalked him in his sleep every night for seven days just to see the old man’s eye open. His verge to insanity he was not stable. He was already ill, but instead of seeking for help he states that it sharpened his senses. He stated that he was trustworthy (no end mark; reread this run-on

    Read More

  • The Tell Tale Heart Literary Analysis

    761 Words  | 2 Pages

    In Poe has a lot of “psychological drama” in the work “The Tell-Tale Heart” (179). Poe’s work make the readers feel if the readers are there. He uses “irony” and “dramatic actions.” Poe intends to keep his readers one edge. Poe’s style has a genius about it. In Poe’s short story “The Tell-Tale Heart” it states, “Oh, you would have laughed to see how cunningly I thrust it in! I moved it slowly --very, very slowly, so that I might not disturb the old man 's sleep” (qtd. Poe). In this work Poe is Dramatic in telling the readers that he is creeping into this old man’s room to kill him. Poe’s work make an impression on his reader especially in “The Tell-Tale Heart.” In the entire short story Poe tries to under mind his

    Read More

  • Tell-tale Heart Literary Analysis

    710 Words  | 2 Pages

    Like many of Poe's other works, the Tell-Tale Heart is a dark story. This particular one focuses on the events leading the death of an old man, and the events afterwards. That's the basics of it, but there are many deep meanings hidden in the three page short story. Poe uses techniques such as first person narrative, irony and style to pull off a believable sense of paranoia.

    Read More

  • The Tell-Tale heart

    818 Words  | 2 Pages

    The behavior of the narrator in The Tell-Tale heart demonstrate characteristic that are associated with people with obsessive-compulsive disorder and paranoid schizophrenia . When Poe wrote this story in 1843 obsessive-compulsive disorder and paranoia had not been discovered. However in modern times the characteristics demonstrated by the narrator leads people to believe that he has a mental illness. Poe’s narrator demonstrates classic signs throughout the story leading the reader to believe that this character is mad

    Read More

  • Symbolism and Irony in The Tell-Tale Heart

    2255 Words  | 5 Pages

    The Tell-Tale Heart" consists of a monologue in which the murderer of an old man protests his insanity rather than his guilt: "You fancy me mad. Madmen know nothing about this. But you should have seen me. You should have seen how wisely I proceeded. . . " i.e. a. By the narrator insisting so emphatically that he is sane, the reader is assured that he is indeed deranged.

    Read More

  • The Tell-Tale Heart: An Analysis

    902 Words  | 2 Pages

    In "The Tell-Tale Heart", the storyteller tells of his torment. He is tormented by an old man's Evil Eye. The storyteller had no ill will against the old man himself, even saying that he loved him, but the old man's pale blue, filmy eye made his blood run cold. And when the storyteller couldn't take anymore of the Evil Eye looking at him, he said, "I made up my mind to take the life of the old man, and thus rid myself of the eye for ever." This is the start of the storyteller’s madness, and as the reader listens to what he says, the madness within the storyteller becomes very apparent.

    Read More

  • Point of view "Tell-Tale Heart"

    609 Words  | 2 Pages

    Poe writes “The Tell Tale Heart” from the perspective of the murderer of the old man. When an author creates a situation where the central character tells his own account, the overall impact of the story is heightened. The narrator, in this story, adds to the overall effect of horror by continually stressing to the reader that he or she is not mad, and tries to convince us of that fact by how carefully this brutal crime was planned and executed. The point of view helps communicate that the theme is madness to the audience because from the beginning the narrator uses repetition, onomatopoeias, similes, hyperboles, metaphors and irony.

    Read More

  • Literary Analysis Of The Tell Tale Heart

    1694 Words  | 4 Pages

    Yet, there are two overwhelming explanations behind trusting that Poe 's motivation in "The Tell-Tale Heart" goes past the blend of ghastliness and confusion. Above all else, he has shrewdly muddled his story by making the storyteller 's portrayal of himself and his activities seem inconsistent. Incidentally, the hero endeavors to demonstrate in dialect that is wild and cluttered that he is deliberate, quiet, and

    Read More

  • Insanity in The Tell-Tale Heart by Edgar Allen Poe

    1322 Words  | 3 Pages

    Edgar Allen Poe's "The Tell Tale Heart" is a short story about how a murderer's conscience overtakes him and whether the narrator is insane or if he suffers from over acuteness of the senses. Poe suggests the narrator is insane by the narrator's claims of sanity, the narrator's actions bring out the narrative irony of the story, and the narrator is insane according to the definition of insanity as it applies to "The Tell Tale Heart". First, Poe suggests the narrator is insane by his assertions of sanity. For example, the narrator declares that he planned the murder so expertly he could not be insane. He says, "Now this is the point.

    Read More

  • Is The Tell Tale Heart Sane Or Insane Analysis

    466 Words  | 1 Pages

    Many people who have read “The Tell Tale Heart,” argue whether or not the narrator is sane or insane. Throughout this paper I have mentioned the main reasons for the narrator being sane. The narrator experienced guilt, he also was very wary executing the plan, and the intelligence level of his plan to murder the old

    Read More

  • The Narrator in The Tell-Tale Heart

    883 Words  | 2 Pages

    Through the first person narrator, Edgar Allan Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart" illustrates how man's imagination is capable of being so vivid that it profoundly affects people's lives. The manifestation of the narrator's imagination unconsciously plants seeds in his mind, and those seeds grow into an unmanageable situation for which there is no room for reason and which culminates in murder. The narrator takes care of an old man with whom the relationship is unclear, although the narrator's comment of "For his gold I had no desire" (Poe 34) lends itself to the fact that the old man may be a family member whose death would monetarily benefit the narrator. Moreover, the narrator also intimates a caring relationship when he says, "I loved the old man. He had never wronged me. He had never given me insult" (34). The narrator's obsession with the old man's eye culminates in his own undoing as he is engulfed with internal conflict and his own transformation from confidence to guilt.

    Read More

  • Critical Analysis of Poe's The Tell Tale Heart

    1651 Words  | 4 Pages

    Three elements of literary work that truly sum up the theme of The Tell Tale Heart are setting, character, and language. Through these elements we can easily see how guilt, an emotion, can be more powerful than insanity. Even the most demented criminal has feelings of guilt, if not remorse, for what he has done. This is shown exquisitely in Poe's writing. All three elements were used to their extreme to convey the theme. The balance of the elements is such that some flow into others. It is sometimes hard to distinguish one from another. Poe's usage of these elements shows his mastery not only over the pen, but over the mind as well.

    Read More

More about The Tell Tale Heart

Open Document