The Tell-Tale Heart
"The Tell-Tale Heart": Irrational Fear and Self Destruction "When ever 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 my self of the eye for ever."(par.2). These are the eerie words used by the narrator, in Edgar Allan Poe's "The Tell -Tale Heart", to describe the point at which he decided to kill an innocent old man for reasons a sane man could not comprehend. Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart" demonstrates how a destructive obsession fueled by an irrational fear can cause a person to embark on a journey of unyielding self destruction and insanity. The narrator's downward spiral towards self destruction begins with an irrational fear of the old man's eye. He describes the eye as "that of vulture-pale blue eye, with film over it" (par. 2). The eye becomes a deadly obsession for the narrator, and believes the only way too free himself is to murder the old man. The narrator himself can not give a sound reason for his fear he can only declare "When it fell upon me, my blood ran cold" (par 2). This is not a rational reason to commit murder. He does not have any real reason to kill the old man; the old man has done him no harm. The Literary critic, Jo
I cut off the head and the arms and the legs. The narrator's journey down the path to self destruction begins with his obsession of old man's eye. From the very beginning of the story the narrator proclaims his sanity with the statement "observe how healthily-how calmly I can tell the whole story" (par1). The fact that he calmly tells the whole story does not prove his sanity at all it merely hinders it. "The Tell-Tale Heart" allows a reader to look deep into the horror of the human soul and reveals that any person might be capable of such madness given the right time and circumstances. Throughout the story there seems to be the theme of self perpetuated destruction. The narrator is trying to escape the old man's beating heart, and once again he only believes there is only one solution. This plea of sanity was undoubtedly the most detrimental of all to his case. James Gargano writes "the protagonist's painful insistence in "proving" himself sane only serves to intensify the idea of his madness" (par. He also believes that his ability to plan and carry out the murder somehow proves his sanity. The arrival of the police would prove to be his ultimate ruin. He seems to take pride in how carefully he planned out the murder; he explains "how wisely I proceeded -with what caution-with what foresight" (par. His inability to reason also made him believe that he was not insane, when clearly he was.
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