The Tell-Tale Heart, Edgar Allan Poe

                        The Tell-Tale Heart

Summary

        The story, The Tell-Tale Heart was written by an American short story writer, poet and critic, Edgar Allan Poe. In this story, an unnamed narrator tries to convince his audiences of his sanity while revealing many folds of a mystery of a murder. In the beginning of the story the narrator tries to justify his sanity with a claim that he can hear all the sounds from Heaven, Earth and Hell. As further evidence to his sanity, he tells why and how he killed an old man.

    The narrator used to live in a house with old man. He loved the old man because he hadn’t done anything wrong to the narrator. He didn’t have any desire to posses the wealth of the old man either. But the old man had a pale blue eye with a film over it. The eye, that looked like the eyes of the vulture irritated the narrator. So he made up his mind to take the life of old man in order to get rid of his eye.

    The narrator went into the chamber of the old man with a lantern at about mid night. As he turned on the lantern with its light focused on the eyes of old man, he found them closed because the old man was fast asleep. He repeatedly went into his chamber for 7 nights. During the whole week he found the old man’s eyes closed which made it difficult for the narrator to kill him. On the eighth night the narrator entered the old man’s room with even more patience and precaution. This time, his thumb slipped on the lantern making a sound which caused the old man to wake up. The old man sat on his bed and the narrator kept on standing in front of him quietly. Soon, the narrator started hearing low, dull and quicksand getting louder and quicker. He suspected that the sound might be heard by his neighbors. Losing no time, he jumped upon the old man, dragged him off the bed and covered him with bed clothes. The old man’s heart beating stopped as he was stoned now then he dismembered the dead body into pieces and buried the pieces under the wooden floor. It was 4 o'clock in the morning when he accomplished  his mission without leaving a single trace of murder behind.

    At about 4 in the morning, 3 people entered the old man’s house introducing themselves as police officers. They had been informed of the shriek(crime) made at night and had come there to investigate on it. The narrator told them that the old man was not in the country  and the sound had been made by himself in his dream. He also asked them to search the house. The police officer investigated thoroughly but didn’t find anything wrong. In his enthusiasm the narrator asked them to sit on chairs and he himself sit on the chair just above the old man’s body pieces. Then they started chatting on familiar things. But very soon the narrator began to hear the same low, dull and quick sound getting louder and quicker. When the police officers laughed, the narrator thought that they knew everything and were making fun of him. Since he couldn’t stand the sound and mockery(tease) of police officers, he confessed his crime.

   1.    Write the summary of the story in one paragraph.

    The story follows an unnamed narrator who insists on his sanity after murdering an old man with a “vulture eye”. The murder is carefully calculated, and the murderer hides the body by dismembering it and hiding it under the floor boards. Ultimately, the narrator’s guilt manifests itself in the hallucination that the man’s heart is still beating under the floorboards.

   2.    Justify the title “The Tell – Tale Hear”.

     A tale tell heart is one which reveals or indicates something covert or concealed. The narrator seems to have very sensitive ears because when he entered the old man’s room to kill him his ears hear a low, dull, quick sound, such as a watch makes when enveloped in cotton. The sound was possibly of the watch the old man was wearing or alternatively, the sound of the watch beetle that is known to surround a dying body. But for the narrator it was the old man’s heart. He was excited to uncontrolled terror and finally, dragging the old man to the floor, kills him. He even places his hand over the heart, which didn’t pulsate. Anyway after he kills the old man that night, he dismembers body parts, and places them under the floor boards. Meanwhile, the policemen, they have arrived at the old man’s house upon receiving information. Sit on the chairs placed for them and talk with each other. The sound of the beating heart starts growing on him again. This must have happened as he must have forgotten to remove the watch off the old man’s hand or the watch beetle may have continued buzzing but with each passing moment, the narrator’s mental equilibrium takes a nasty turn. In his mental fit, he believes the sound reaching his ears was the beating of the dead old man’s heart. Now unable to control the continuous sound, he confesses of the murder. It was the supposed beating of the dead heart that led to the revelation of the crime. Thus, the title of story is justified.

   3.    Write the character sketch of narrator.

   The narrator is a complex character is not mad but he suffers from mental derangement. He speaks like a man who has lost touch with today world. He kills the old man for not any valid reason rather he has a disease- Homicide. A mad person cannot think and argue like the narrator. In brief, we may say there is something abnormal in his mind, on the one hand. And on the other hand he peacefully and cleverly unlatches the door keeping his head inside. A mad man cannot know the game of word as the narrator plays with police officers.

                   By the deep psychological study he seems to be a man of high intellect. He claims that he has killed the old man not for worldly affair but to get rid of his vulture eye. Generally, a mad man does not think such noble thought. On the other hand, he kills him for very private reason. So, we cannot say he is mad rather he has an obsession of killing.

     The narrator is mad :- The story is driven out by the narrator’s insistence upon his innocence but by insistence on his sanity. This, however, is self- destructive because in attempting to prove his sanity he fully admits he is guilty of murder. His denial of insanity is based on his systemic actions and precision a rational explanation for irrational behavior. This rationality however, is undetermined by his lack of motivation. Despite this, he says the idea of murder, “haunted me day and night”. The story’s final scene, however, is a result of the narrator’s feeling of guilt. His nerves dictate his true nature. Despite his best efforts at defending himself, the narrator’s “over acuteness of the senses”, which help him hear the heart beating in floor boards, is actually evidence that he is truly mad.