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Essays on insanity as a defense
Essays on insanity as a defense
Abstract essay on insanity
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In the short story “The Black Cat” by Edgar Allen Poe, the narrator who is telling the story is unreliable. As an unreliable narrator, Poe fails to show his true emotions and thoughts towards his actions. It is almost as if he cannot agree on one thought about how he feels when he does something that is cruel and abusive, which might make others question his sanity. As an abusive and intense unreliable narrator, Poe shows multiple signs of insanity. In the beginning of the story, Edgar Poe stated “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. With these I spent most of my time, and never was so happy as when feeding and caressing them.” The narrator is telling us how he was always known for his tenderness nature and his love for animals, yet he abused and killed his pet cat, Pluto, who showed nothing but affection towards him, and he killed his wife by “accidentally” stabbing her repeatedly with an axe. Poe’s words in the beginning of the story are completely different then the actions he was carrying out. …show more content…
He explained how alcohol was a disease that had grew upon him. Too much alcohol can lead to depression, which can lead to insanity. When Poe arrived home from the bar, he was very well intoxicated from all of the alcohol he had. Poe then snatched Pluto and cut his eye out. Throughout the short story, the narrator explained all of the affection he was getting from Pluto, but for some reason, the more affection Pluto expressed, the more angrier and hateful Edgar would get. He didn’t like it when animals showed affection toward him because he found it
Many of Poe’s stories and poems can be tied to events that have happened in his life. A lot of the hard times that he had had gone through in his life he used as motivation to write his poems and stories. For example the story “The Masque of the Red Death” is thought of to be related to the consumption (aka tuberculosis), which took the life of many of the women he loved. In “The Tell Tale Heart” the dying old man good be seen as Poe’s adoptive father on his death bed, and how the old mans eye made the murderer uncomfortable could be an analogy for how Poe’s father made him feel uncomfortable because he knew that his father did not love him.
Also, in his quote” I blush, I burn, I shudder, While I pen the damnable atrocity”, Poe used the word “I” to create a sense of urgency. He used the words “blush” and “burn” to describe how ashamed he is. "Shudder" shows how anguished he is of what he did. These flashy words did attract us. Murdering is a cruel act. The drama is in killing the cat that he loved. The use of the word “pen” is the mocking and tricky part because Poe meant to write something with the pen. He meant
To begin with is some background information about the author, Edgar Allan Poe. Edgar Allan Poe had a difficult upbringing, as a child he was orphaned when both of his parents died and he lived with another family which was headed by John Allan. Poe attended the University of Virginia and joined the army after college, but soon left the army from his disliking of it. He became a poet and soon became famous, “Poe’s reputation today rests primarily on his tales of terror as well as on his haunting lyric poetry ("Poe's Life").” Poe’s “The Black Cat” is nothing short of being a horror story (Templar).
Often times within literary history, authors have chosen to rely on unreliable narrators to add a veil of mysticism and sympathy to their twisted plots. Numerous authors attempt to make the reader believe that the unreliable narrator is in desperate need of compassion and understanding; however, Poe uses unreliable narrators to twist about the reality of the tale just enough to make the reader doubt everything within the story. This technique, employed by Poe in many of his works, adds a layer of mystery and uncertainty that becomes expected within his unique storylines. No author knows “twisted plots” more so than the morbid and abnormal Edgar Allen Poe. In his story, “The Black Cat, Poe uses an unreliable narrator to intensify the story by making the plotline doused with sporadic moments of truth in order to truly create a fine line between what is the truth and what is not.
I think that when Pluto had moved away from him, that drove him crazy and that’s what made him charge at Pluto and try to kill him. I don’t really think that he should’ve done that because Pluto didn’t do anything wrong but move away from him because he was highly intoxicated. Poe is known for writing about dark and mysterious stories and it leaves people questioning what really happened in the story. The black cat that looked like Pluto probably came back to taunt the man or to teach him a lesson that he should’ve never killed
There are various types of unreliable narrators, each of them having distinct characteristics limiting them from supplying the reader with adequate or completely true information. In the short story, “The Black Cat,” Poe delineates the first person narrator as an insane man who has difficulty perceiving his actions as what they are, making him unreliable. These occurrences pose questions for the reader regarding the legitimacy of what the narrator says. Nevertheless, the man in whose perspective “The Black Cat” is told, is unreliable due to his lack of recognizing the severity of his actions, his questionable sanity, and his succeeding reactions from his doings which are startling to the reader. Initially, the narrator in
Edgar Allen Poe’s short story “The Black Cat,” is a marvelous depiction of how alcohol can be destructive to people’s lives. In the story, the narrator commits multiple heinous crimes all after the consumption of alcohol. From the crimes he have committed, we can say that alcoholism has caused the narrator to lose parts of his sanity. Furthermore, it has also resulted in his enjoyment in being cruel and evil, in other words, known as “diabolical evil.” After psychoanalysing the story, it is believed that there are many reasons why the narrator might behave like that.
The Black Cat is a short story describing the events that take place after a normal man experiences the struggles of alcoholism which seemingly cause him to go insane and perform many unethical actions. The short story begins with the narrator who is situated in prison and he is discussing the unfortunate event he must partake in the following day. He continues his narrative by describing his downfall into a state of anguish fueled by alcohol and hate which drives him insane eventually causing him to murder his wife and pet. In Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Black Cat,” the titular cat is a symbol of the characters struggle with alcohol and his poor actions and hatred throughout the short story.
In the middle, the narrator cuts Pluto’s eye because he was drunk. When the narrator cut out Pluto’s eye they both change. Pluto had stopped loving the narrator(Poe 2). The cat would not come near him”, yet he continued to love the wife.
Edgar Allan Poe’s horror short story “The Black Cat” is about an unnamed man who goes through a major personality change. In the begin of the story the protagonist is described as an animal lover but after getting married he becomes a killer. The narrator’s perverse spirit develops from his alcoholism and from the feeling of guilt and it is relieved when he becomes temperamental and uncontrollable, killing his wife: sinful, seeing the large imprint of the cat: cursed, murdering his wife then when the police come showing them that everything is typical: abnormal. Poe was an intelligent student he went to go study in England for five years. But after starting college his life took a turn for the worst.
Because of that, we think Pluto represents death. Poe talks about his alcoholism a lot in this short story. He talks about how it's like a disease, and he wouldn't ever wish it upon anyone. He admits to treating his animals and even his wife very poorly, all except for Pluto. Until one day he came home raging drunk and became mad at the cat, he grabbed it and to his surprise, it bit his hand.
I knew myself no longer... I took from my waistcoat-pocket a pen-knife, opened it, grasped the poor beast by the throat, and deliberately cut one of its eyes from the socket!” This shows how the narrator was violent and often mad when he was intoxicated and may relate to Poe's behavior with alcohol himself. Poe also has many other stories that include themes of alcohol. Overall alcohol was a major problem in Poe's life and even many people believe it's what cause his death, but impacted his
Edgar Allen Poe’s short story The Black Cat immerses the reader into the mind of a murdering alcoholic. Poe himself suffered from alcoholism and often showed erratic behavior with violent outburst. Poe is famous for his American Gothic horror tales such as the Tell-Tale Heart and the Fall of the House of Usher. “The Black Cat is Poe’s second psychological study of domestic violence and guilt. He added a new element to aid in evoking the dark side of the narrator, and that is the supernatural world.” (Womack). Poe uses many of the American Gothic characteristics such as emotional intensity, superstition, extremes in violence, the focus on a certain object and foreshadowing lead the reader through a series of events that are horrifying and grotesque. “The Black Cat is one of the most powerful of Poe’s stories, and the horror stops short of the wavering line of disgust” (Quinn).
In The Black Cat, Poe creates a tale of strange confusion and morbid mystery. The tone is serious, as the narrator is writing his account of the events the day before he is going die, presumably for his crimes. The narrator, and the villain of the story, begins by saying he is "noted for the docility and humanity of my disposition." This statement is ironic, because as the story continues, we see he is anything but docile and humane. He becomes a driven man, passionate about getting rid of the cat that haunts him.
The story revolves around a man and his cat that loves him very devoutly. At the start of the story he is very fond of his loving companion the cat, Pluto. The cat's love for his master eventually becomes Pluto's demise. The cat would follow its master's every move. If the narrator moved the cat was at his feet, if he sat Pluto would clamor to his lap. This after a while began to enrage the narrator. He soon found himself becoming very irritable towards Pluto and his other pets. One night he came home "much intoxicated" and he grabbed Pluto. Pluto bit his hand and this sent him into a rage. "The fury of a demon instantly possessed me. I knew myself no longer. My original soul seemed, at once, to take its flight from my body; and a more than fiendish malevolence, gin-nurtured, thrilled every fibre of my frame"(Poe 103). At this point he seems to have lost it. This description is not that of someone of sane mindset. His soul taking flight from his body appears to be symbolic for the loss of his rational thought. The fury of a demon gives you the imagery of something not human. Poe takes every opportunity to use the narrator, and the point of view, to give you insight into the mind of the madman. He uses eloquent imagery and symbolism to further your understanding of the main character's rational.