Fear and Madness in Edgar Allan Poe

Paper Summary:

The paper discusses how Edgar Allan Poe's works, "The Black Cat" and "The Tell-tale Heart", are stories that reveal Poe's incredible technique of establishing mood and tone through fear and madness with his narrators. The paper explains that by making the men in the stories appear normal, Poe tricks us into fear and creates a perfect horror story.

From the Paper:

"Edgar Allan Poe is a master at creating the perfect moss and tone for his horror stories. Two stories that emphasize this fact are "The Black Cat" and "The Tell-tale Heart," in which Poe heightens mood and tone with fear and madness. Both stories are psychological thrillers, a trademark for Poe. Jack Sullivan maintains that Poe transformed the horror story by "endowing it with new psychological insight and consistency of tone and atmosphere" (Sullivan 323). He adds that Poe's stories are "painfully artful" (323). These statements cannot be argued, as Poe delighted in the macabre and making his readers feel uncomfortable. Jay Parini agrees with this, adding that Poe's stories are stories of "intrusion--whether culmination in the act of violent murder or in the psychological violation of another person or in describing the internal war of the divided self" (Parini 269)."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Burduck, Michael. "Fear as a Theme in Poe's Work." Readings on Edgar Allan Poe. San Diego: Greenhaven Press. 1998.
• Parini, Jay. et al. American Writers. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. 2003.
• Poe, Edgar Allan. "The Black Cat." The Essential Tales and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe. New York: Barnes and Noble Classics, 2004.
• ---. "The Tell-Tale Heart." The Essential Tales and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe. New York: Barnes and Noble Classics, 2004.
• Spiller, Robert, et al. Literary History of the United States. New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc. 1974.

More papers on Fear and Madness in Edgar Allan Poe:

• Analytical Essay # 113447 : "Irony and Edgar Allan Poe"
• Analytical Essay # 127174 : "Edgar Allan Poe and the Horror Tale"
• Book Review # 112044 : "Terror in "The Tell-Tale Heart"

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