Poe and Psychology

Paper Summary:

This paper compares the roles of the leading characters in three of Edgar Allan Poe's books, "The Imp of the Perverse", "The Black Cat "and "The Tell-Tale Heart". The paper notes that in all three books Poe connects a logical and rational argument with an irrational plot. The paper discusses how, without motive, the main characters exhibit all acts of evil while participating in horrific crimes. The paper concludes that the stories written by Edgar Allan Poe always combine the psychological with the supernatural, hinting at the connection between the human psyche and some hidden forces of the universe.

From the Paper:

"Evil is therefore inextricably related to irrationality, and therefore almost uncontrollable. Although psychoanalysis had not been born yet in Poe's time, it is obvious that the writer's psychological investigation of evil is very deep. Poe recognizes the influence of the subconscious over the human reason, and many times, its overwhelming power. He compares the man sitting on the edge of a precipice with someone who is ready to plunge into his own irrationality and obey his darkest impulses: "And because our reason violently deters us from the brink, therefore do we the most impetuously approach it. There is no passion in nature so demoniacally impatient as that of him who, shuddering upon the edge of a precipice, thus meditates a plunge. To indulge, for a moment, in any attempt at thought, is to be inevitably lost."(Poe, 296) This simile between the free plunge into the abyss and the modern definition of the subconscious gulf underlying our minds reveals Poe as a predecessor of psychoanalysis."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Madden, Fred. "Poe's 'The Black Cat' and Freud's 'The 'Uncanny'.'" Literature and Psychology. 39.n1-2 (Spring-Summer 1993): 52(11)
• Piacentino, Ed. "Poe's 'The Black Cat' as psychobiography: some reflections on the narratological dynamics." Studies in Short Fiction 35.2 (Spring 1998): 153(16).
• Poe, Edgar Allan. The Collected Tales and Poems of Edgar Poe. New York: Random House, 1992.
• Pritchard, Hollie. "Poe's The Tell-Tale Heart." The Explicator 61.3 (Spring 2003): 144(4). General OneFile. Gale. http://find.galegroup.com/ips/start.do?prodId=IPS>.
• Stark, Joseph. "Motive and meaning: the mystery of the Will in Poe's 'The Black Cat'." The Mississippi Quarterly 57.2 (Spring 2004): 255(9). General OneFile. Gale. 13 Nov. 2007 <http://find.galegroup.com/ips/start.do?prodId=IPS>.

More papers on Poe and Psychology:

• Comparison Essay # 23443 : "Poe and Melville"
• Analytical Essay # 44895 : "The Structure of Symbolism in Poe and O'Connor"
• Analytical Essay # 26536 : "Edgar Allan Poe"

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