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Themes in the Tell-Tale Heart
There is a belief that the eyes are windows to the soul, although some individuals believe the soul resides in the heart. In Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart,” he highlights the relationship between these two body parts. The story begins with an unnamed narrator telling how he will kill the older man only because he dislikes his evil eye. The narrated tale’s action takes place in the house that the narrator lives with the older man. Notably, the scenery is in the obsessed mind of the narrator. He narrates that the older man’s eye resembles that of the vulture presenting his motive to kill the older man. In this case, the old man’s eye symbolizes his morals and soul (“The Tell-Tale Heart”). It shows how an individual’s inner fear and turmoil can initiate insanity through the intricate plot, metaphorical language, and mysterious charisma. Clearly, in the tale-tell, the heart narrator emphasizes three main ideas guilt, death and insanity, and passage of time.
The narrator is consumed and burdened with the guilt of killing the older man. Although the narrator does not appear to feel guilty on the surface until he had murdered, dismembered, and buried the older man. Even while the police searched his house, the narrator shows no guilt despite feeling completely secure he had lied to the police. The guilt first depicts itself as a ringing in the narrator’s ears. The second sign of guilt is when the narrator becomes agitated as the police sat and talked (“The Tell-Tale Heart”). He thought they knew and suspected him. Lastly, he thought that his victim’s heartbeat had become loud, and the police and other people could hear it. But what he heard was his own heart, pounding with guilt. However, the guilt facilitating confession is not consistent with the narrator’s character. In the beginning, he had detached himself from the crime and assumed he would never feel the guilt of his actions. However, in the end, he was not only unable to defend his actions but also hide his guilt.
Second, the theme of madness and sanity, the narrator’s defenses for killing the older man, and his deeds throughout the story imply that the narrator has inclined into madness. The narrator clearly and continually insists he is sane, but his motives, actions, and words all demonstrate that he is insane. The narrator murdered the older man to prove his sanity to the outside world as he assumed that an insane individual could not implement his well-calculated decision. In the story, the narrator signals his insanity, whereby, before killing the older man, he sneaked into his room for seven nights in a row simultaneously (“The Tell-Tale Heart”). On the eighth night, he recognized a low cry of fear which escaped from the older man, and he says he knew the sound well. This shows that the narrator was aware of his mind, and he shows compassion even when he was about to kill the older man. The evident satisfaction he takes in executing his plan points to his extreme madness. Madness holds the place of rightful guilt as the allegation against which the narrator is frequently defending himself. The typical suspect only enhanced the knowledge of his guilt by repeatedly challenging his innocence; hence he sounded more and more insane as he insists upon his sanity. Moreover, the narrator did not lack the drive to kill the older man in that he hated him, nor did he want his money; he states that he loved him.
Time is a continuous theme throughout the tale-tell heart. Poe uses the marking of the passage of time to increase tension. The narrator views himself as a type of a clock, counting down the older man’s death. The frequent references to time emphasize the narrator’s preoccupation with time and its impact on his psyche (“The Tell-Tale Heart”). The narrator seems fixated on the time in that he first counts the days and marks the time at which he sneaks into the older man’s room, watching him before killing him. After killing the older man, he claims that the older man’s time had come. Apart from this, sound also played a part in the passage of time. The narrator claims to hear a death beetles, kind of beetle sounds such as ticking clock on the wall; he hears the older man beating; he hears the watch ticking. Deathwatch beetles penetrate solid place, signifying that the narrator passed the older man’s bedroom boundaries. The narrator’s ability to manage his time is a sign of loneliness, and at this moment, he began to notice something funny with time.
Briefly, the tell-tale heart shows how three themes, guilt, sanity and murder, and passage of time, are demonstrated. The narrator is completely insane. He murdered and dismembered the older man. His reasons are pretty unjustifiable; the only instance his reasons could have been justified is if the older man’s eye was evil or had powers that could have posed a threat to the narrator. Despite him continuously trying to persuade the reader of his sanity, his madness causes the death and admission of the evil action. It is undoubtedly impossible to get away with evil deeds, and the truth will eventually come into the light. Additionally, a desperate individual will always find a way to justify the behavior that allows them to fulfill their desires, no matter how irrational.
Work cited
The Tell-Tale Heart. 1843, www.poemuseum.org/the-tell-tale-heart.