Essay For The Tell-Tale Heart

翁良權 98121232
Introduction to English Literature, Wed 34
Professor:馬健君
Paper1: Essay for the Tell-Tale Heart(題目太籠統，不要學)
Oct, 21, 2009
Essay for the Tell-Tale Heart(題目太籠統，不要學) This story is described from the murderer. He talks about the process how he killed the old man. The name of The Tell-Tale Heart gives the hint for what will happen next and the heart will do something startled. Using the name can make reader interested in knowing what the story will go. In the beginning, the murderer doesn’t think he has committed the crime. And he tries to convince reader to believe what he did is right. In the story, the author describes what the murderer feels in the whole story. His mood goes from excitement to confidence to guilt and
to breaking down at length. The author uses precise sentences to describe those moods for example:“Oh, you would have laughed to see how cunningly I thrust head in.”,“I could scarcely contain my feelings of triumph.”means the murderer at that time was really exciting;“I smiled,--for what had I to fear?”, “While I myself, in the wild audacity of my perfect triumph, placed my own seat upon the very spot beneath which reposed the corpse of the victim. ”means the murderer was confident to what he did without any mistakes; “No doubt I now grew very pale; but I talked more fluently, and with a heightened voice.”,“I talked more quickly, more vehemently but the noise steadily increased.”means the murderer was guilty;“I felt that I must scream or die.”means the murderer was broken down. Except for precise sentences, the author also describes the actions such as: serious headache, foaming, and raving, and swearing. These actions can make the scene more vivid. First, the old man is described innocence, but somebody around him really hates his eyes. The old man’s mood goes from suspicion to fear. The author also uses precise sentence to describe those moods for example:“The old man sprang up in the bed, crying out,〝Who’s there?〞may mean he started knowing something strange around him and became suspect;“It is nothing but the wind in the chimney, it is only a mouse crossing the floor, or it is merely a cricket which has made a single chirp.”means the old feels afraid in his heart. Besides, the old man’s unwillingness shows by describing the murderer imagination. Those descriptions make readers feel as if they were in the same situation and were under the same pressure. The author, Edgar Allan Poe, uses the murderer’s viewpoint to write down the article and give readers a special concept to enter this story.
It successfully makes the story attract readers. The author uses murderer’s viewpoint to write down the story. Using this viewpoint can let readers know what the murderer thinks in his heart and how he thinks about the case and how he thinks about the old man he has killed. The viewpoint can turn into old man’s. This can make everyone know the old man’s fear, thinking, and feeling to a strange atmosphere around him recently. After he has been killed, he can show readers his anger, his unwillingness, and his aim to force the murderer to confess his crime
etc. Edgar Allan Poe successfully describes the murderer’s personality that is very sick and monomaniacal. The TV news always report some killers’ psychologies have differences between normal people’s. In this story, the murderer first tells us he is under the great pressure. So he is eager to get rid of the thing that makes him feel under pressure. The author also describes the old man is helpless and he is like a bird in the cage. He needs help but nobody finds he is in danger. In the story, it doesn’t clearly mention whether the murderer is male or female.
It may be male, because males tend to be aggressive and mean. However, females are more sympathetic and not mean enough. The process of killing the old man is described very detailed and precise, so it real makes the story very practical. And readers can really feels the fear the author wants to gives. Edgar Allan Poe has written about many horror novels. The theme of this story might be guilt or madness. The Tell-Tale Heart can compare with The Black cat, Poe’s another story. They both have sick people; they hide the person who is killed in the house; they want to pretend nothing happened to lie the police, and they at length confess the crime.
The corpse invariably symbolizes some flawed portion of the narrator's personality, and the house represents the narrator himself. Burying the corpse within the house represents the narrator's attempt to bury his flaws rather than dealing with them. This burial always leads to the narrator's downfall in Poe's stories, because the narrator has failed to deal with his problem, and so it resurfaces later on. The madmen in Poe's stories are usually
monomaniacal.
Reference:
http://www.telltaleheart.info/
內容跟大概格式就是這樣，內容僅供參考喔！你們可以從作品的架構、角色特性、筆法去做essay。例如: 作者怎麼表現人物性格和故事中有什麼東西帶有什麼樣的象徵寓意等！文本多讀幾遍和上網去查相關的資料，這樣你會比較有概念怎麼寫出你的essay，我也有在Facebook上提供兩個實用網站給你們參考。也可以去圖書館查，但切記不准抄襲也不能寫個人心得。然後啊，不能出現〝I think〞〝I consider〞這種主觀想法的句子。記得要引用文章的內容來支持自己提出的結論喔！