Although being two different categories of texts, “The Black Cat” and “Self Reliance” have similarities and differences as well. Both texts share the common upbringing of the idea of learning from mistakes. In “The Black Cat”, the narrator realizes his killing of his cat was wrong. Recalling, “I experienced a sentiment half of horror half of remorse, for the crime of which I had been guilty…”(Poe 5). Despite his murderous actions and recent corrupt behavior, the narrator still learned to recognize that what he performed was a mistake or wrong, and even sensed guilt. The narrator of “Self Reliance” also contributed to the topic of becoming aware of mistakes, but instead, aimed it at society instead of himself. He says, “we recognize our own rejected thoughts...and we shall be forced to take with shame our own opinion from another” (Emerson 4). To summarize his message, Emerson believes that people of society emphasize their mistakes, and by doing so, it teaches people to learn from them. Akin to what was previously mentioned, a difference between the two pieces is the subject of the Oversoul. “The Black Cat” does not mention this. In fact, the opposite is the case. The narrator is disconnected from the other characters in the text due to his nefarious actions, unlike the innocence portrayed by the cats and the wife. On the other hand, the Oversoul is talked about by Emerson when he states, the ‘deep force' through which we ‘share the life by which things exist'...this self
Rat infestations have swarmed throughout the world, looking for food, and spreading diseases, so of course people attempt to get rid of them. First off, they spread disease. It states in Source 1, “Around 60% of the rodents carry Weil's disease...” This quote states that the majority of all rodents, have Weil’s disease. That means that if you see a rat, it is probably infected with disease. This is incredibly dangerous for people walking the street, or someone without a home. That person who does not have a home, could get a disease very easily. The rats can carry disease and they can spread that disease, it even states in Source 4, “It was this rat which ushered in the Black Plague.” In this piece, they are speaking of Black Rats. These rats were probably one of the unlucky 60%, or it was a carrier something that was on them.
	In Edgar Allan Poe’s "The Black Cat," symbolism is used to show the narrator’s capacity for violence, madness, and guilt. "The Black Cat," written by Edgar Allan Poe serves as a reminder for all of us. The Capacity for violence and horror lies within each of
Edgar Allen Poe’s short story The Black Cat immerses the reader into the mind of a murdering alcoholic. Poe himself suffered from alcoholism and often showed erratic behavior with violent outburst. Poe is famous for his American Gothic horror tales such as the Tell-Tale Heart and the Fall of the House of Usher. “The Black Cat is Poe’s second psychological study of domestic violence and guilt. He added a new element to aid in evoking the dark side of the narrator, and that is the supernatural world.” (Womack). Poe uses many of the American Gothic characteristics such as emotional intensity, superstition, extremes in violence, the focus on a certain object and foreshadowing lead the reader through a series of events that are horrifying
“The Black Cat” is an old short story written by Edgar Allan Poe an American Writer. It is a horror fiction story which demonstrate the fascinating changes that the human mind has during the abuse of alcohol. The protagonist is physiological corrupter by the abuse of alcohol and his mind play games with itself. He changes his personality as the story progresses and the way that he treats others around him. Everyone is affected by his behavior even his lovely cat. The cat becomes the object of his hate and in some way it is the first thing that he blames about his irrational acts. In the short story “The Black Cat”, Edgar Allan Poe, uses a varied forms of Irony, dramatic Irony, verbal Irony, and situation irony to produce a transformation of love threw hate along of the story.
The events that unfolded in Edgar Allen Poe’s, “The black Cat,” are all due to one person, the narrator. It is because of his Mental state, being an alcoholic, and being abusive to his wife and pets that the fault lies heavily on the narrator. What this paper will entail is all three of the reasons why it is the narrator's fault for what happens in the story and it will come to a conclusion based off the findings in the story.
The fact is that the way the narrator starts off the story, by describing himself in an overly immaculate way, leads one to the assumption that he is unreliable. However, if he was not as pure of heart from his youth as he insists then the explanation must be that the potential to be evil was contained within the narrator from the day he was born. Indeed, what Edgar Allen Poe was trying to illustrate in the “Black Cat” is that the potential to get to a point where conscience doesn't exist lies within each and every one of us.
Psychologically both narrators seems to be troubled by beings that have not committed any tangible transgression against either narrator. The narrator of the “The Black Cat” even being caught by his own bravado, this does not seem to have humbled him. He still does not seem remorseful for killing his wife though he is still plagued by the cat. The narrator of “The Cask of Amontillado”
Edgar Allen Poe’s short stories, “The Black Cat” and “The Cask of Amontillado” are both about murder. In “The Black Cat”, the narrator is a man who becomes an alcoholic and kills his wife in the cellar. In “The Cask of Amontillado” Montresor is a man who takes revenge on a friend by leaving him to die in the catacombs. Both characters are guilty of murder, but reader may think that the narrator deserves a milder punishment for the following reasons: he lost control, he did not plan his murder, and he was an alcoholic and had no control over his actions.
"I grew day by day, more moody, more irritable, more regardless of the feelings of others" (Poe 671). Poe had a very complicated relationship with transcendentalism, and you can clearly see this rocky relationship in two of his works. One of these works is "The Black Cat". A brief summary of this short story; the narrator of this story is an insane man who knows he's about to die. The story talks about a cat that he used to have, named Pluto. He was very close to the cat until he starts to abuse his wife and other animals. The cat no longer likes the narrator, then the cat gets hung. While this happens the narrator's house burns down. Later a new cat comes alone, much like Pluto, and at first, he has a close relationship with this cat. Once it's noticed the cat only has one eye, he hates the cat. Later the narrator strikes his wife on the head with an axe, and hides her body. What he didn't know is while burying the body of his wife, the cat ends up with her. The police then show up just to look around, and the cat starts making noise. The police hear this and break down the wall, and here they find the cat and the man's dead wife. The other literary work that refutes transcendentalism is the poem "Annabel Lee". A condensed summary of that poem; the narrator of the poem, and Annabel Lee fell in love while they are young. Even after Annabel Lee passes, the narrator does not give up on the love they shared. After reading "Annabel Lee" and "The Black Cat", it is clear that Poe denies many concepts of transcendentalism. In looking for the answers to life's questions, Poe relies on the idea that human intuition is harmful. The narrator in "Annabel Lee" alludes to this selfish intuition when his obsession with himself and the idea of love causes him to lose his Annabel Lee. Then again in "The Black Cat", he focusses purely on finding answers within the dark. Transcendentalist does not believe in a dark intuition, they like to look at nature and its light side for the answers to life's questions.
Love is a feeling that affects human’s actions. Lots of people are willing to sacrifice everything to find love. Romeo And Juliet, they committed suicide because they thought their loved ones were dead. And in the short story, THE BOAT, by Alistair Macleod, the narrator loved his parents. He tried to do both things his mother and father wanted him to do. This feeling caused troubles in his life. I felt relatable with the author, because I also had been trying to achieve what my grandfather and father wanted.
Overall, the argument of The Great Cat Massacre was that a historian could use the writings of a particular point in history to determine the psychology of the people of that time. In this case, it was of the French people in the decades before the French Revolution. Like Natalie Zemon Davis, Darnton claimed he had the ability to know the mental landscape of the people he studied, understanding their motives based on the few words that were placed before him. But is this determination of a people’s mindset possible? How much of the cat massacre was Darnton’s thoughts and beliefs and how much were of the people he was studying? The truth is that there is no way of knowing what is history and what is Darnton’s perception of history. Like Davis, Darnton ran the fine line of telling history as it was, and using that history to support his own beliefs and opinions, and the critics, as before, had a problem with this practice.
Anger “ I withdrew my arm from her grasp and buried the axe in her brain, she fell dead on the spot, without a groan.” (p120) This was a quote from The Black Cat written by Edgar Allan Poe. The nararater wanted to kill someone but afterwards he got caught. So he got exacuted.
In Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Black Cat” the story tells how the narrator falls into alcoholism and turns into a violent, mad person. His change in personality causes him to kill his first cat. While in his fit of killing the second cat, his wife tries to defend the cat, then her husband accidently kills her. “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman clarifies how the narrator has a wild imagination, but for treatment of depression, her husband keeps her confined to her bedroom (Gilman 88). With him taking away any way for her to use her imagination, it causes her to become extensive and turn it into craziness (Gilman 96). Both stories show significant similarities of the main characters suffering and how it affected their regular lives, but there’s a contrast between the two stories also.
Edgar Allen Poe was one of the most influential and important writers of the nineteenth century. He was the first writer to try to make a living only writing. One of Poe’s most popular short stories, “The Black Cat”, is considered horror fiction or gothic fiction which Poe is known for in his books and short stories because it was a popular genre during his days. In Poe’s short story, “The Black Cat”, Poe uses a horror fiction genre, a mentally deranged and evil narrator/character, and symbolism of death to make a thrilling story with tons of suspense, drama, and gruesome detail.
Within us, we have the dark and the bright side. We do the good, but have evil thoughts and some people act on it, thinking it may drag them to feel good in doing so. This informative short-story provides a perfect example on how we take control of our mind. Edgar Allan Poe, the author of “The Black Cat”, develops the central idea that violence solves problems. On the eve of an unnamed narrator’s death, he writes a story of how his life collapsed, turning around his love for everybody and falling into a big pile of a hopeless mess and madness by committing brutal actions.