Suspense is an integral part of storytelling. Without suspense, certain stories would not create their intended effect. Edgar Allen Poe wrote many books and poems, which were all under a gothic theme. His writings were very dark and mysterious, and they all contained suspense. Poe’s novel “The Tell-Tale Heart” and his poem “The Raven” contain suspense, which is created through point-of-view, irony, and diction. The Tell-Tale Heart contained suspense created through point-of-view, irony, and diction. Point-of-view is the how the story is being observed. The Tell-Tale Heart is told in an unreliable first person point-of-view, meaning that the reader only knows the thoughts of the narrator. Throughout the Tell-Tale Heart, the reader is never sure what the narrator will do next. The story started with the narrator trying to …show more content…
For example, in the beginning of the story, the narrator tries to prove to the reader that he is sane. “How, then, am I mad?” Later on in the story, he tells the reader “I was never kinder to the old man than during the whole week before I killed him.” This is verbal irony since right after he said that he is sane, he confesses to the reader that he killed the old man. After the narrator asked how he was mad, suspense kept building, making the reader question if he was really sane and going to kill the man, until he actually killed the man. Another example of irony in this text is dramatic irony. The reader knows that the narrator is planning to kill the man very soon, while the man has no clue that he is about to be killed, and he is just sleeping. “To think that there I was, opening the door, little by little, and he not even to dream of my secret deeds or thoughts.” The readers know that the narrator is stalking the old man, while the old man is just sleeping. Suspense is created since the reader does not know what the old man will do, whether he will be killed, or whether he will notice the