What can cause a person to go crazy? In “Berenice”, the protagonist is forced to watch his wife’s slowly passing, causing him to be compulsively obsessed over minor details in his environment. Edgar Allen Poe explores the dark and evil side of human nature by expressing and developing the protagonist’s manic state and his inability to remember his actions. The author also explores this by talking about the removal of the teeth and the uncommon marriage between cousins. Poe truly explores the evil side of human nature when the removal of Berenice’s teeth happens. This event shows the brutality of a human and what we are capable of doing. An example of this brutality is when Poe writes, “...there rolled out some instruments of dental surgery, intermingled with many white and glistening substances that were scattered to and fro about the floor.” This was no monster that snuck into the house in the middle of the night. This was her fiance who did this, someone she should have trusted. This is a good example of the dark side of human nature. Though removing the teeth is a dark, gory thing, the protagonist, Egaeus not being able to remember is another dark thought. …show more content…
This is one of the most shocking point is the story and also is one of the most terrifying things to think about. Poe writes, “...then came the full fury of my monomania, and I struggles in vain against its strange and irresistible influence.”This shows that he is not capable of controlling his own thoughts and actions. The sense of fear is invoked through the lack of control the protagonist has to recall his actions at the very least. The darkness is invoked through revealing the lack of control. Something as common as marriage brings in the dark side of