“The Tell-Tale Heart”
“The Tell-Tale Heart” is a short story written by Edgar Allan Poe and published in 1843. The short story tells a tale of a man who felt a burning desire to kill an old man that he knew. Throughout the story, the narrator continues to attempt to convince the reader of his sanity, however this attempt seems to be contradicted by the fact that the narrator himself struggles to really articulate why he desired to killed the old man “Object there was none. Passion there was none. I loved the old man” (Poe 3). However, he states that the old man’s one eye is the reasoning behind his newfound want to kill, stating that he would kill the old man to rid him of his eye forever. The murderer displays great patience in the story …show more content…
As Alfred C. Ward states “Despite its merit as a parable, “The Tell-Tale Heart” is marred by the insanity of its narrator” (Ward 240). With a narrator who is insane, the audience is left wondering if the narrator is telling the story properly. If the narrator is indeed crazy as the text seems to imply, much of the story is questionable. Most importantly, the reader is left wondering if the sound of the heartbeat is actually really being heard through the floor board, or if the narrator’s mental instability has manifested itself in the form of auditory hallucinations. For example near the end of the story “Was it possible they heard not? Almighty God!—no, no! They heard!—they suspected!—they knew!—they were making a mockery of my horror!”(Poe 8). He further states that Poe’s writing is consistently hampered by his use of mental instability as a mainstay in his writing and also believed that having the narrator consistently attempt to state his sanity while his actions showed the opposite was another mistake. Posing an interesting question, Ward asks if it would not be possible for the story to be rewritten in a slightly different manner, giving the narrator a method behind his madness. He states that he believes that it would be possible to preserve the story in its current state and maintain the main device in allowing the criminal’s own conscience to be the instrument of his downfall. However in its current state “This absence of motive robs the story of every vestige of dramatic interest, for it is an elementary axiom that what is motiveless is inadmissible in literary art” (Ward 241). This criticism is not all encompassing however, as others have praised the story’s narrator
“The Tell-Tale Heart” is a short story written by Edgar Allan Poe and published in 1843. The short story tells a tale of a man who felt a burning desire to kill an old man that he knew. Throughout the story, the narrator continues to attempt to convince the reader of his sanity, however this attempt seems to be contradicted by the fact that the narrator himself struggles to really articulate why he desired to killed the old man “Object there was none. Passion there was none. I loved the old man” (Poe 3). However, he states that the old man’s one eye is the reasoning behind his newfound want to kill, stating that he would kill the old man to rid him of his eye forever. The murderer displays great patience in the story …show more content…
As Alfred C. Ward states “Despite its merit as a parable, “The Tell-Tale Heart” is marred by the insanity of its narrator” (Ward 240). With a narrator who is insane, the audience is left wondering if the narrator is telling the story properly. If the narrator is indeed crazy as the text seems to imply, much of the story is questionable. Most importantly, the reader is left wondering if the sound of the heartbeat is actually really being heard through the floor board, or if the narrator’s mental instability has manifested itself in the form of auditory hallucinations. For example near the end of the story “Was it possible they heard not? Almighty God!—no, no! They heard!—they suspected!—they knew!—they were making a mockery of my horror!”(Poe 8). He further states that Poe’s writing is consistently hampered by his use of mental instability as a mainstay in his writing and also believed that having the narrator consistently attempt to state his sanity while his actions showed the opposite was another mistake. Posing an interesting question, Ward asks if it would not be possible for the story to be rewritten in a slightly different manner, giving the narrator a method behind his madness. He states that he believes that it would be possible to preserve the story in its current state and maintain the main device in allowing the criminal’s own conscience to be the instrument of his downfall. However in its current state “This absence of motive robs the story of every vestige of dramatic interest, for it is an elementary axiom that what is motiveless is inadmissible in literary art” (Ward 241). This criticism is not all encompassing however, as others have praised the story’s narrator