Factual information about the book
Title: The Tell-Tale Heart
Author: Edgar Allan Poe
First published in: 1843
Genres: horror, gothic literature
Summary
Disclaimer: The gender of the narrator is not mentioned in the story. For the sake of simplicity, I am going to assume the narrator is male.
The unnamed narrator starts off by trying to convince the reader that he is, in fact, not crazy. He does admit to being a very nervous person, however, he claims that this only sharpened his senses— not destroyed — not dulled them. He is going to tell the story of how he murdered an old man because of his eye. This old man lived in the same apartment as the narrator. This man never hurt him in any way, and the narrator was actually quite fond of him. However, the man had a clouded, blue "vulture-like" eye, which the narrator feared and hated.
This is why the narrator plots to murder this man. The narrator once again tries to convince the reader he is sane by saying that someone insane would not plan out such a precise, well-measured plan. The narrator secretly shows up to the old man’s bedside at night, holding a lantern. He does this seven days in a row, watching him sleep in the light of the lantern. But his vulture-like eye is always closed, which prevents the narrator from murdering him somehow. At daytime, the narrator pretends nothing happened and stays kind to the man.
On the eighth day, the narrator decides that he will murder the man tonight. He chuckles at the idea. On the eight night, the old man wakes up after the narrator makes a noise with his lantern. The old man feels a presence in his room and asks who’s there, but the narrator remains quiet. The room is pitch black, since the blinds are closed. The man becomes scared and the narrator hears a dull, pounding sound, which he interprets as the man’s heartbeat. The narrator opened his lantern, and the vulture-like eye gets exposed. Worried that the neighbours might hear the old man’s heart pounding because it is so loud, the narrator decides that now is a good time to kill the man.
He pulls the old man off his bed and smothers him with the mattress until he does not hear his heart pounding anymore. The narrator dismembers his body, making sure not a single drop of blood touches the floor. He removes the planks from the floor of the old man’s room and hides all the body parts there. Just after he is done, the police knock on his door because the neighbours thought they heard the old man scream.
The narrator is confident the police will not catch him and talks to them in a pleasant, easy manner. He tells the officers that the old man is out of town visiting a friend and that he screamed after having a nightmare. He lets the police do a house search, but they do not find anything. They sit down at the very place the man was hidden, but the police do not suspect a thing. However, the narrator starts getting uncomfortable, since the officers will not leave and he hears a strange ringing in his ears.
The sound grows louder, and the narrator realises it is a ticking noise. He continues to speak to the police officers, but the sound gets louder and louder. The police officers do not seem to hear anything. The narrator becomes convinced that it is the heart of the old man beating and becomes terrified. The narrator is convinced that the police officers hear it too, and that they are just trying to mock him by continuing their friendly chatter. Then, the narrator cannot take it any longer and confesses to the murder. He tells the officers to rip open the floorboards to find the body of the old man.
Characters
The narrator (round character): The narrator is both the protagonist and villain of the story. Even though he remains unnamed and ungendered, and the reader does not get to know much about the narrator, he is still considered a round character because of the changes he goes through throughout the story. In the beginning, he is calm and collected, looking forward to killing the old man. At the end of the story, the sound of the alleged heartbeat of the man drives him crazy, which leads to him being restless and paranoid. What does stay the same throughout the story, is the narrator’s over-sensitivity. From the beginning to end, he insists he has a disease that sharpens his senses, especially his hearing, but also his vision. His over-sensitivity is what makes the narrator hate the man’s blue eye so much. The narrator spends the whole story trying to convince the reader he is sane, instead of feeling remorse over his actions. This makes the reader believe he is not actually sane even more (see ‘Theme’).
The old man (flat character): The reader knows even less about the old man. He seems to be a rich, older man, but his relationship with the narrator remains unclear. They must have a close relationship though, since the narrator can easily access his room, and has friendly talks with him every day. The old man could be a family member, but the narrator could also be his servant, tenant or caretaker. Anyhow, his blue, vulture-like eye seems to be the only part of him that is relevant to the story, since more about him is not mentioned.
Time
‘The Tell-Tale Heart’ is written chronologically. The time that this story covers is around eight days: the protagonist visits the old man for seven days, and kills him on the eighth night. He spends the eighth day dismembering and hiding the body until shortly before 4 AM, when the police officers show up at his house. The story is written in past tense since it is told in retrospect. There are no flashforwards or flashbacks used. There are time jumps of several hours, since only the night of the first seven days is described. Time acceleration and delay are also used, since the first seven days are described swiftly and the last night and morning are described in detail.
The story consists of four pages.
Physical setting
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