Archetypal Symbolism In The Black Cat

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In the works of Nathanial Hawthorne and Edgar Allan Poe, both their short stories contain archetypal symbolism. Hawthorne’s story “Young Goodman Brown” is similar but different than Poe’s story “The Black Cat.” These two authors show many different forms on archetypal symbolism. An archetypal symbol are things like characters, plot, feelings and settings. It can also be things like colors and animals. Archetypal symbolism can be, “… love, guilt, redemption, and death are archetypal subjects; the conflict between reason and imagination, free will and destiny, appearance and reality,… are archetypal themes;…the ambivalence of the male-female relationship,…hero, devil, rebel, wanderer, enchantress, maiden, and witch are archetypal characters; and certain animals, birds, and natural phenomena and settings are archetypal images” (N.F. 95). All of these different things can be used as symbolism in …show more content…

The narrator explains himself as a loving and caring person who was fond of animals. The narrator in this story implies, “From my infancy I was noted for the docility and humanity of my disposition. My tenderness of heart was even so conspicuous as to make me the jest of my companions, I was especially fond of animals, and was indulged by my parents with a great variety of pets” (Poe 718). This is shown by the amount of animals he and his wife owned. His favorite pet was Pluto and its name symbolizes evil and misfortune. Pluto is the mythological god of the dead and ruler of the underworld. An article states, “Poe drew upon superstition about cats as sacred and as having special powers, as well as upon medieval beliefs that black cats were Satan’s favorite disguise when he roamed the earth” (Sova 1). Poe probably picked the black cat as the narrators pet because cats are very mysterious creatures and black cats have many myths of being bad luck and associated with

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