The Tell-Tale Heart Literary Analysis

The short story “The Tell-Tale Heart” by Edgar Allan Poe, is told from the point of view of a man who, who has an ever growing obsession to kill this old blind man. The story takes place with the narrator and the old man living together. The narrator is obsessed with the old man’s vulture like eye, which he stalks every night until he takes actions into his own hands and murders the old man getting rid of this obsession. After the murdering of the old man and hiding his body the narrator is questioned by police officers, saying they heard screams and making sure everything is alright. The narrator offers the officers to sit and question him inside the house, while sitting in the exact same spot the man hides the dead body of the old man. Afterwards,

The narrator walks throughout the night in the empty house waiting for the old man to fall asleep. This shows the persistent of the man as he even props open the door ever so slowly to the old man’s room just so he can watch as the old man sleep. The obsessive narrator proceeds with this for seven long nights watching and waiting at the same exact time each night, the curious thing thou is what does the narrator gain from this. If killing the old man are his intentions, he could have already killed by now. However, on the eighth night the narrator describes himself as even more cautious than usual. The narrator takes an hour just to open the door, which is unusual because it literally does not take that long just to open a door. He creeps into the sleeping old man’s room slowly which increases the paranoia of the man. The narrator obviously has an obsession with the old man, as he comes into closer contact with the old man he even lights his lantern in the room, the sanity of the narrator shows from this because he does not care nor fear the reactions since the old man is sleep. As the narrator turns the lantern on “at length, a single dim ray, like the thread of the spider, shot from out the crevice and fell upon the vulture eye” (Kirkland). The old man is believed to awake from his slumber and has risen out of his sleep. One would think that this reaction from the old man would

Throughout the whole circumstance the man still tries to prove how wise he is even after the fact that the old man is no more. The officers check the house after hearing screams from the neighbors. Under intense pressure not many people could react in a certain manner but the narrator isn’t like certain people. “I smiled for what had I to fear? I bade the gentlemen welcome” (Poe39). The pressure of having officers search the house for any evidence should make the man nervous or at least worried, for if any evidence were to be found he would surely be punished, but he doesn’t feel pressured which allows him to keep his sanity. The mindset of the narrator now is to keep his wits high as he continues his conversation with the officers. He shows no ill feelings nor reaction while speaking with the officers. “The officers were satisfied. My manner had convinced them. I was singularly at ease. They sat and while I answered cheerily, they chatted of familiar things” (Poe