Dark Romantics

As soon as I began reading The Tell-Tale-Heart, I thought the narrator was crazy. It is uncertain of whether it is a male or female, but for the purpose of this response, I will assume it was a male. He tries throughout the entire story to convince himself that he is not insane. His actions speak otherwise when he decides to kill the old man in the story. “For his gold I had no desire. I think it was his eye! Yes, it was this! One of his eyes resembled that of a vulture -- a pale blue eye with a film over it. Whenever it fell upon me my blood ran cold, and so by degrees, very gradually, I made up my mind to take the life of the old man, and thus rid myself of the eye for ever.” I think it is so insane to kill someone just because of the old man’s “Evil Eye”. But that was the whole point of this piece of writing. Dark Romantics focused a lot on imagination, but they also believed that everyone had evil inside them and that some were even insane. The old man in the story had an “Evil Eye” that the narrator did not like and therefore the first thought that came to his mind was to kill the old man. Edgar Allen Poe is just trying to prove that not all thoughts are good and that you should not act on every thought that comes to mind.

The part that I thought was really interesting is how the narrator’s plan was so perfect for killing the man. If it wasn’t for his conscious, no one would have ever known he killed the old man. Obviously the man was insane, but to a certain extent intelligent. He found a way to hide the man’s body beneath the floor boards and even managed to fool the police. “Yet the sound increased -- and what could I do? It was A LOW, DULL, QUICK SOUND -- MUCH SUCH A SOUND AS A WATCH MAKES WHEN ENVELOPED IN COTTON. I gasped for breath, and yet the officers heard it not. I talked more quickly, more vehemently but the noise steadily increased. I arose and argued about trifles, in a high key and with violent gesticulations; but the noise steadily increased….” The narrator was hearing something in his own head that no one else could hear. I think it was probably his own heart beat continuing to go faster and faster just like the old man’s heart rate also accelerated when he was about to kill him. Edgar Allan Poe took us to this moment and very vividly described everything that happened. That is a focus on imagination and as I read the story, I could hear the heart beat of the old man as well as feel the suspense building up inside the narrator.