The Tell Tale Heart And The Black Cat Comparison Essay

The Ties between the Two In the stories “The Tell-Tale Heart” and “The Black Cat” written by Edgar Allan Poe both share a sense of suspicion and murder. In both stories, each narrator has flashbacks of the crimes they commit after the wicked deed is done. Also, each narrator confesses to their crime once they start to feel the guilt come upon them. Both stories are also alike because of the unnamed narrators. The major way they are alike is that they both deflect responsibilities alike in several ways. In both stories, each narrator blames other objects for their decision to murder someone. In “The Tell-Tale Heart” the narrator was fixated on the eye of the old man. The narrator simply states it was the eye that bothered him, “I think it was the eye!
For instance, in “The Tell-Tale Heart” the narrator started to hear what he thought was the old man’s heart beat which is what lead him to tell on himself. The narrator states, “It’s the beat of his hideous heart” (8). The narrator also ends up taking responsibility for the murder and showing the police where he hid the remainders of the old man’s body. “I admit the deed! – tear up the planks! – Here, here! – It is the beating of his hideous heart” (8). On another note in “The Black Cat,” the narrator guilt came about when both the narrator and the policemen heard the cat cries from behind the wall. “I was answered by a voice from within the tomb! – By a cry, at first, muffled and broken” (14). Even though in both stories each narrator felt guilty only one narrator owned their wicked deed. In “The Black Cat” and “The Tell-Tale Heart” are both stories of violence. Also, both narrators bury their victims in places nobody would think to look for the bodies. Both narrators are unreliable sources because of their insanity. Every reader that reads both of these stories will forever wonder what happened to the