The Black Cat Research Paper

Afraid of his master, the cat slightly wounded the narrator on the hand with his teeth. Because of the cats reaction to his picking him up, the narrator pokes out one of the cat’s eye. The eye of the cat which is

In conclusion, the story “The Black Cat” is mainly about how violence has consequences. Also how overtime you change based on what you choose to do and how you do it. In the story the narrator takes a wrong path which causes him to change, he starts drinking. This not only affected him but his wife and his very favorite pet named Pluto. Due to his anger issues he ends up killing his wife in an attempt to kill his

The Black Cat is one of Poe’s most memorable stories. The story was first published in 1843, edition of The Saturday Evening Post. This like a study of the psychology of guilt, paired with other works by Poe. “Near the beginning of the tale, the narrator says he would be "mad indeed" if he should expect a reader to believe the story, implying that he has already been accused of madness” (Cleman). Poe is creating a sense of confusion for the readers and making them think more about the story before reading. The story is centered around a black cat and the idea of deterioration of a man. From his prison cell, the narrator is writing the story about his life which is falling apart. He has a love for animals, and for his wife that he married young. One of the things that he takes on as a hobby, is

"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.

Having moved into a new house, the narrator happens across a black cat, which then follows him home. Nerves rattled, the narrator does his best to avoid the cat. When that fails he tries to kill it, accidentally killing his wife in the process. After sealing his wife's body into the basement wall, he is interviewed by the police. Not unlike in “The Tell-Tale Heart”, the narrator of “The Black Cat” cracks under the pressure of his guilt and gives himself up. Symbolism and suspense make “The Black Cat” worth reading.

     Later that night, the narrator is awakened by fire in his house and immediately exited it. All but one wall of the house was destroyed. After the blaze was put out, a large crowd gathered around the remaining wall and were amazed at how a wall in the middle of the house could remain standing after a fire. The narrator approached the wall and thought that he knew what the audience is commenting about. He saw a gigantic cat with a rope around its neck. He is filled with wonder and terror when he saw that the cat is alive. In reality, though, the cat is not alive; the narrator is just having a delusion, which is a symptom of paranoia. He quickly calms his worries about how the cat survived by saying that an onlooker watching the fire must have seen that the cat was tied to the tree and released it. Making oneself believe what is not true is also a sign of paranoia. The cat could not have been alive because it was hung from the tree in the morning, while the fire started late at night.

The Narrator in “The Black Cat” is explained as a man who fell into alcoholism and let deception take control over his mindset (Poe 79). His change of perspective over things causes him to believe his beloved first black cat (Pluto) is evil and demonic when the cat bites him one day (Poe 80). During the illusion from the excessive alcohol, he hangs Pluto (Poe 80). From guilt further on from killing his first cat, the narrator adopts another black cat. A while later, he comes to believe that the new cat has the same characteristics that Pluto had (Poe 82). In an act of fit from the new Black cat almost tripping him on the cellar stairs, the narrator starts to try to kill him with an axe (Poe 84). His wife comes in and tries to stop him, but instead that causes him to kill her. The narrator hides his wife’s body in a cellar wall, meanwhile the cat vanished (Poe 84). Four days later, the police came to do a thorough search. The narrator acted strangely calm and innocent, as if he had done nothing. They discovered her corpse with the cat standing on her head howling in the cellar wall though, and took the narrator into custody. (Poe 85-86).

In the beginning of the book the narrator and main character of the story was kind and mild. In the narrator’s past he has always loved animals since the beginning. He decides to get married to a woman he dearly loves at a young age and wants to make her experience the joys of having a pet or animal to play around and hang out with. Out of all the wild animals around the world and classical American pets, the narrator decides to pick this one cat and named the cat Pluto. Even though the character may love Pluto but he soon suffers from mood swings because of his use of alcohol. These mood swings tend to be very violent affecting the people around him as well such as his wife and his pet cat, Pluto.

From a loving guy, to a bully, to a cold-blooded murder the unnamed narrator had to undergo a series of personality changes. In the beginning, of the short story the narrator was very affectionate, caring, and ever so happy when with his wife and his animals. Throughout the story the narrator becomes very abusive towards his wife and his pets, he becomes abusive since he started to drink alcohol. One night he came home and Pluto was giving the narrator affection and following around until, the narrator had enough of it and became enraged, the narrator gouged one of Pluto’s eyes out and later on hanging to cat outside. In the short story the narrator always blames the cats for his enragement instead of taking responsible for his own actions.

Poe gives many gruesome and frightening details that make “The Black Cat” a horror fiction short story. Horror fiction is a genre of fiction designed to startle, frighten, or disgust the reader by inducing feelings of horror. Poe inducing feelings of horror through things that take place in the story such as the stabbing of Pluto, the first cat. When Poe wrote, “I took from my waistcoat pocket a penknife, opened it, grasped the poor beast by the throat, and deliberately cut one of the eyes from the socket!” (Poe 436), he gives the reader a startled and disgusting feeling due to the gruesome depth of the sentence. Poe “darkens” the story even more with the hanging of Pluto and his wife’s murder. Poe writes about his wife’s murder and he gives evil details on the ideas of burying her in his

The first cat is Pluto, a name that symbolizes death. The cat was killed by the narrator from his violent behavior. The second black cat in this story is the same one as the first just reincarnated with a white mark on it. The narrator finds it on one of his intoxicated nights. The cat came back to seek its revenge on the narrator for all the cruel tortures he was put through.

In the beginning, the narrator gave a confession in retrospect; he was an honorable man born as a sane, kind, loving. Additionally, he had a great love for animals. He married a girl at a young age. Their house was like a mini zoo; birds, gold fish, a dog, rabbits, a small monkey, and a cat. The man singles out a huge, beautiful all-black cat as his favorite, named Pluto. Because of its unusual intelligence, the wife jokes around that the cat might be a witch in disguise. Over the course of time, the narrator and Pluto created a strong bond between them.

“The narrator could not tolerate the cat scratching him nor could he abide his wife’s attempt to save the cat.” He also believes that he is the victim of this story. “I knew myself no longer. My original soul seemed, at once to take its flight from my body.” He blames the “Fiend Intemperance” for his lack of self control.

In the short story, both cats follow the narrator around the house; however, their motives seem to be different. The first cat, Pluto is loved by the narrator. According to the narrator, Pluto was “my favorite pet and playmate”, and it seems the cat reciprocated the love and would follow the narrator throughout the house (Poe). Pluto wanted to be with the narrator so much that the narrator had difficulty leaving the house and making sure the cat did not follow him outdoors. Their companionship lasted for several years, with the narrator being the one to solely feed Pluto and Pluto wanting to be by his side. Until one day, the narrator’s personality changed, and he killed Pluto and gets the second cat out of his feelings of remorse. The second cat was loathed by the narrator, but just as Pluto, the second cat wanted to be near the narrator. Likewise, the second cat would follow the narrator’s footsteps throughout the house, which would irritate the narrator profusely. The irritation seemed to encourage the cat to be around him even more and included the cat sitting under the chair, jumping onto the narrator’s lap and cuddling with him. The cat seemed to enjoy making the narrator angry and the narrator would wake at night and find the cat lying on his chest and as he states, “find the hot breath of the thing upon my face (Poe).” Since the second cat wanted to be near the narrator even though the narrator despised him, enhanced the belief that it was the second life of Pluto wanting the narrator to remember what he had once done, but that was not the only similarity.

the narrator's evil heart and unwillingness to except love. The second black cat gives the reader an insight of the narrator's guilt for what he has done to black cat one. And the white spot helps the reader to realize what type of punishment black cat two is inflicting