The Tell Tale Heart Mood Essay

Edgar Allen Poe used the literary devices of setting to create a dark, threatening tone in his short story “Tell-Tale Heart” by elapsed time, mood and atmosphere, and population.

He used Elapsed time as one of the primary elements of setting to make the tone of the story dark. In the story the narrator takes a full hour to place his head through the opening of the doors he would be able to see him lay on the bed (538:2). That makes the reader think “Why would he take so long?” and it makes the story darker and leaving the readers uncertain of the narrator being “the good guy”. Once he put his head through, the old man sensed someone was there and shouted “Who’s there?” and the narrator didn’t move a muscle, he just stood there for a whole hour (539:2). Once the narrator already killed the old man, he put his hand on the old man’s chest to feel if there was any pulse and he stayed there checking for several minutes (540:6). That proves the narrator is mad and was very committed to kill the old man to get rid of the vulture eye.

Another primary element of setting that Poe used was mood and atmosphere. The narrator, once in the room, had a lantern that was covered, but trying to see the eye, he uncovers one to see just the eye (538:2). This part explains how much the narrator doesn’t like the eye and how much he wants to get rid of it. The narrator kills the man and he has to hide it of course, so in the story the narrator explains how he hid the body (341:1, 2). Hiding bodies isn’t the type of story you would want to be written because they leave a strange feeling behind them. After the death of the old man the narrator hears the sound of the old man’s heart beating louder by the second even though the old man is dead (542:1). While this is happening at the end of the story, it proves that the narrator is a mad man and cannot be