Irish author Oscar Wilde once said “It is the confession, not the priest, that gives us absolution.” This idea is clearly reflected in Edgar Allan Poe’s The Tell Tale Heart (1843), a short story about a man who attempts to convince the reader of his sanity after having confessed to an obsessive act of murder. Similarly so, Wilde’s statement on guilt can also be analyzed in Charles Dickens’ A Confession Found in a Prison in the Time of Charles The Second (1841). What is almost inarguably interesting, though, is not only the similarity in the theme of guilt between both short stories but many other elements in narrative that leads us to inquire upon a possible influence. For the purpose of this essay, I shall discuss how the elements of The Tell-Tale Heart demonstrate a strong similarity between the text and Dicken’s A Confession. The prescribed question that serves as a framework for this essay is how has the text borrowed from other texts, and with what effects? This connects directly to Part 4 of the Language and Literature Course which is Literature – Critical Study, specifically the exploration of literary works in detail. The main focus of this task not only consists of discussing how The Tell-Tale Heart borrows from Charles Dicken’s A Confession, but also to consider the similarities in narrative to justify the relationship. It is also important to review the effect that the influence has on the reader as well as the effect on the author’s style. Firstly, it is