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Death Penalty In The Tell-Tale Heart By Edgar Allan Poe

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Death penalty, mental hospital, or something in between? The short-story “The Tell-Tale Heart” by Edgar Allan Poe is narrated in first person in the view of a killer. The main character tries to convince the reader that he is normal making it obvious that he's unaware of his mental illness. This is shown when he obsesses over “the eye” of the old man and plans a deadly murder around it. The narrator walks us through his thought as he ends up horrifically killing the old man. This is after observing him for seven consecutive nights. The killer shows no empathy after the job is done and describes the old man as being “dead as a stone”. The author used this simile to show how lifeless the old man was after the murder. The killer then takes …show more content…
He introduces himself as an ill man. He states, “It’s true! I have been ill, very ill. But why do you say that I have lost control of my mind, why do you say that I am mad?” (Poe, 1843). From the first few sentences of the text, the reader can start to notice that he is paranoid, a sense of self-importance and lack of reality is shown. Voices in his head and paranoia can give him disadvantage. The abnormal thoughts make it impossible for him to control hi actions and intentions. This is also shown when he obsesses over the old man’ eye, “the eye of an vulture”. He narrates, “He had never hurt me. I did not want his money. I think it was his eye..” (Poe,1843). This quote is significant because it implies that killing the old man wasn’t his purpose. Instead, he was by the eye, the thing that he strongly wanted to get rid of. He expresses, “Always the eye was closed, so it was impossible for me to do the work. For it was not the old man I felt I had to kill; it was the eye, his Evil Eye.” (Poe, 1843) The main character proves that he didn’t intend to kill the old man. Once again, his mental illness controlled him and His obsession over the eye shows that he is delusional, that he was fantasising over the old man, picturing him as an object. Because of the many mental issues esing with his head, he should be sentenced to life

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