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Insanity In The Tell-Tale Heart By Edgar Allan Poe

922 Words4 Pages

Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I will be defending that the accused individual is legally insane, and that because of this, he wasn’t fully aware of his actions and therefore can’t be held accountable for his activities during the time of the murder. He is guilty of murdering an old man, the murder was caused by his insanity and because of this I will be extricating the narrator from this situation. The anonymous narrator is legally insane because he couldn’t distinguish the difference between fantasy and reality. He was subject to uncontrollable, impulsive behavior, and was unable to tell right from wrong during the murder. The first, and perhaps most obvious, symptom of mental illness exhibited by the narrator is nervousness. This nervousness …show more content…

We see these delusions when he describes “the wise precautions that I took for concealment of the body“(Poe 12). He has “replaced the boards so cleverly, cunningly...there was nothing to wash out - no stain of any kind - no blood spots anywhere. I had been too wary for that”(Poe 13). Also, the narrator states “It took me an hour to place my whole head within the opening so far that I could see him as he lay upon his bed. Ha! - would a madman have been as wise as this” (Poe 3)? It is identifiable that even as the narrator brags about himself, he still worries about whether or not the reader thinks that he is a madman, for it is clearly and most definitely the truth. He also places substantial emphasis on his wisdom in dealing with the disposal of the body that he does not affiliate it with the atrocity of the crime. Therefore, he is unable to decipher the difference between right and wrong and cannot be held accountable for his acts due to his …show more content…

He fits into all three categories of insanity. He couldn’t distinguish the difference between fantasy and reality, he was subject to uncontrollable, impulsive behavior, and was unable to tell right from wrong in the situation. However, the prosecution argued otherwise. They insisted that the man could only be considered insane after two years of showing signs of insanity to be considered legally insane. Nonetheless, the legal definition of insanity states “ In criminal cases, a plea of ‘not guilty by reason of insanity’ will require a trial on the issue of the defendant’s insanity (or sanity) at the time the crime was committed,”so the prosecution provided false evidence for the trial and it cannot be proven through this evidence that he is sane. Throughout “A Tell-Tale Heart,” the narrator tries to convince the reader he is not insane and/or a madman. Every event that takes place throughout the story that would indicate a mental disorder is trailed by his persistence in convincing the reader of his mental stability. It is apparent that the narrator is insane. The narrator possesses many aspects associated with insanity. Despite, the narrator’s attempts to convince use of his sanity, every piece of evidence affirms that he is indeed legally

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In Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart”, the narrator should not be guilty by reason of insanity. “Insanity Defense” states that a man is innocent by means of insanity if he has committed the crime because he is “unable to control his impulses” as a result of mental disease (“Insanity Defense” 1). Similarly, the narrator in “The Tell-Tale Heart” viewed the old man’s “pale blue eye, with a film over it” with hatred (Poe 1). When the old man’s eye looked upon the narrator, he would uncontrollably increase in fury and anger. This led the narrator to “[make] up [his] mind to take the life of the old man, and thus rid [him]self of the eye forever” (Poe 1).

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“A mental illness of such a severe nature that a person cannot distinguish fantasy from reality, cannot conduct her/his affairs due to psychosis, or is subject to uncontrollable impulsive behavior. Insanity is distinguished from low intelligence or mental deficiency due to age or injury. If a complaint is made to law enforcement, to the District Attorney or to medical personnel that a person is evidencing psychotic behavior, he/she may be confined to a medical facility long enough (typically 72 hours) to be examined by psychiatrists who submit written reports to the local superior/county/district court. ” This is the definition of insanity, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I, Andrew Harris, am here today to convict Mr. Johnson of murdering Mr. Pete. Mr. Johnson killed Mr. Pete on October twentieth, eighteen twenty.

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Argument writing In the case against Mr. Grey I will be prosecuting for his sanity. Frank Grey was aware of the crime he was committing. Many may try to defend him by saying he’s insane but, the Legal Definition of Insanity states “In a criminal trial, the word ‘insanity’ means something more specific than when we use it in everyday speech. You cannot say that someone on trial is ‘insane’ just because he did something that most of us would consider ‘crazy’”.

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The Style of Poe Analysis In “The Tell-tale Heart” by Edgar Allen Poe, the demented, arrogant and dark tones reflect the man’s guilt and insanity that eventually leds him to admit to the crime he committed. Poe’s diction heightens the arrogant tones which is seen as the man plans the murder and carries it out in a careful, organized way. He goes “boldly” into the chamber, “cunningly” sticks his head in the doorway and feels “the extent of his own power”. Poe’s use of diction shows how cocky the man actually is.

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590 Words | 3 Pages

Insanity Plea Ray Bradbury once said, “Insanity is relative. It depends on who has who locked in what cage.” In this case, we see a man who trapped himself in the cage of his own mind. In this case, the defendant, a troubled man, murdered his neighbor due to his disliking of the man’s “evil eye”. After committing the crime, he was confronted by the police, to whom he confessed because the defendant believed that he could still hear the beating of the man’s heart.

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707 Words | 3 Pages

The defense’s argument that the narrator is legally insane is flawed; it disregards the evidence and facts that prove that the narrator is not insane by legal definition. First of all, the narrator knew what he did was wrong. In his confession, the narrator states that, “You should have seen how careful I was to put the body where no one could find it. First I cut off the head, then the arms and the legs. I was careful not to let a single drop of blood fall on the floor.

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1236 Words | 5 Pages

Mental illness has typically been a very taboo topic; just a piece of fiction in the minds of our ancestors. With this modern age of technological advancements comes mental health awareness in both our communities and in our courtrooms. Often times when the insanity claim is presented or brought up, what comes to mind is someone is crazy or they are just using the insanity claim for an easy out. This comes with its controversy and boils into the debate on if the insanity claim is justified or should even be used. The insanity claim is one of the only true laws that are present to defend those who just didn’t know any better but due to their own mental state.

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557 Words | 3 Pages

Insanity is a disease capable of making a person lose control of themselves. On the other hand, sanity is when a person is what others call “normal”. In “The Tell-Tale Heart” by Edgar Allan Poe the narrator kills a man and he is confessing to the cops about it. He confesses how long the murder took and what he did each night and how he executed the murder. However, the narrator is not guilty because of the reason of insanity.

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1395 Words | 6 Pages

In Edgar Allan Poe’s tales of criminal insanity, the first-person narrators confess unsound confessions. They control the narrative, which only allows us to see through their eyes. However, they do describe their own pathological or psychological actions so conscientiously that they exhibit their own insanity. They are usually incapable of stepping back from their narratives to detect their own madness. The narrator 's’ fluency is meticulous and often opulent.

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374 Words | 2 Pages

Conclusion In conclusion, insanity should be regarded as a mental condition that describes the lack of some mental capacity, rather than an avenue to be exploited to escape responsibility or punishment. Undoubtedly, the insanity defense is a multipart kind of case in proving that a person does not understand the nature of the unlawful act he/she was involved. It has developed considerably from being a mitigating factor in criminal cases to being a defense through the development of various tests adopted in different cases. The case requires that the accused person was suffering from mental illness during the commission of the crime and that the individual does not understand the nature of the offense.

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945 Words | 4 Pages

His problems may have caused him to become a killer and lose feeling for what is right and what is wrong. Also, when the killer was waiting to make his move, he heard the heart beat of the old man, and that sound repeated itself in his brain and jacked him up to kill. The narrator tried to convince the reader that he was not a mad man over and over again. After the murder he tries again to sell us his sanity: “And now have I [narrator] not told you that what you mistake for madness is but over-acuteness of the senses” (Poe 305). He truly believes, with all his heart, that chopping up another human being heightened his senses and made him a better person.

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434 Words | 2 Pages

The narrator believes himself to be very intelligent and clever when he goes into the old man’s room at midnight. Poe’s word choice of “caution” and “how wisely” represents the man’s view of his own sanity. Yet the act he performs and the reasoning behind his murderous intention convinces the reader that the narrator has lost his sanity. He plots and is driven to kill a man after claiming, “ I loved the old man.

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496 Words | 2 Pages

Ultimately it comes down to this, insane or sane? Insane would be the perfect way of describing a person being mad, killing a man for no reason, and laughing at a horrifying death. After having the narrator showing so many things to prove he is insane rather than sane is pretty clear. The author allows a visual understanding of the narrator in the “Tell Tale Heart” from having many specific details about his point of view.

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780 Words | 4 Pages

Firstly, he killed the old man because of his eye. Additionally , he claimed that he kept hearing the heartbeat when the old man was dead. In closing, he had no control over himself. The difference between a sane person and an insane person is how they think and act. The narrator is obviously insane since he acted easy and normal in situations that are expected to be handled differently, like the time the policemen came to question him about the noises coming out of the house.

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821 Words | 4 Pages

The story of the narrator is untrustworthy at times because he is a madman, gives unbelievable statements, and continues to let what others cannot hear affect him. Some of the things the narrator starts off by saying shows he is a madman or a psychopath. It is hard to trust someone like that because they are good manipulators and at falsifying information to others. The narrator reveals, “I made up my mind to take the life of the old man, and thus rid myself of the eye forever” (Poe 37).

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