In “The Tell-Tale Heart”, by Poe he demonstrates how certain people react to situations. He wrote this article as if he was inside that particular characters head and said anything and everything that came to mind. This is an example of a stream of conscience based story. The first paragraph of the story talks about how nervous, smart, and mad he is because of what the old man’s eye does to him. He has many different emotions throughout the story, but in the end the main emotion is that he is mad, in the crazy type way. He felt nervous when the eye looked at him. The old man’s eye was “glazed over” and was creepy so it drove the other man crazy. However, I think the man was already crazy. He took hours just to get into the room, and he went in there every single night. Now, who in their right mind would go in and out of the room multiple times just to look at another man’s eye? He even tries to explain why he isn’t mad or crazy. This could mean that he really was and that was his first instinct to explain that he was not insane. Another reason he was not sane is that he was motivated to kill a man because his eye was abnormal. He did not want the old man’s money he just wanted the eye to be gone forever. Yet, when he finally had the guts to kill him he caved in and told the police where the body was when they arrived at the house. He sold himself out instead of being normal and acting casual around the police. No sane person would be stupid enough to give himself away.
I think that you have the right idea Abby and that the man was mad the whole time. When you said the part about how he was trying to not be mad but really was I believe that to be true because the man clearly had problems. I also think that your comment of no sane person would rat themselves out but I will leave you with a question. Is this man just not sane or was he guilt for what he did is why he ratted himself out?
I do not agree with it being a stream of conscience based story. Yes, it was all of his thinking’s, but the story made sense; he did not just ramble on. I agree that he was crazy though. He would not have even had a problem with the eye if he was a normal person. I think he told the police because he felt guilty and he was paranoid. The noise that he was hearing when the cops were sitting down could have been the man’s heart beat, but because he did give himself away could mean that he was in a way normal because he could not deal with the guilt of killing the man.
Well your argument towards the end goes into the question of “What is really sane?” Perhaps, if you were placed in this man’s circumstance, you too would be driven “mad” and “insane” by the guilt upon your heart with the old man’s blood on your hands.
And @Kaylee, I’m fairly sure the sound was not truly the old man’s heart beating, due to the um…separation of limbs.
True, it would not have been his actual heartbeat, but the narrator is certainly interpreting it as such. I think this was just a wording mishap.
I agree, he starts the story off by saying he isn’t insane, that first detail tell you something isn’t right. When he does something a mad a person would do he tells you he is not mad, but he his brilliant. Only someone who crazy would say they were brilliant for hiding a body. The punctuation in the story show you he is on his last nerve, as they say. I think Poe was on the verge, if not already insane as the character in this story.
Good conversation here, everyone.