The Tell Tale Heart

Have you ever felt that feeling that someone was watching you? Do you ever get those chills that make feel so alone? Edgar Allan Poe had that way of writing that made you get the chills. Your entire body trembles, it makes you feel alone. Even though there could be lots of people around you, you are still alone. It could make you want to cry, curl up in a little ball and hide from everyone. In The Tell Tale Heart, Poe writes to play with your mind; are you going to let it work? The old man is in terror, the butler is half crazy and people of the world are surrounded by the darkness coming off the butler like a haze. Darkness and other symbols are prominent in Poe's story.

First, the old man in this story, is the main character and he is afraid of the darkness that comes around at night. The darkness can be a very powerful thing that makes you afraid. And without the light your soul can become lost and never find the light again. That is what happened to the old man’s butler, he fell into darkness and now he is alone and half crazy. He can hear the Heavens and hell, he can hear everything. Yet, he doesn’t think that he is crazy but, that we are. He says “I loved that old man, he had never wronged me.” Yet, Poe had wronged the old man by talking about the half blind, old man in ways that are too cruel to be delt with. Saying things such as mocking the old man’s eye and calling it a vulture eye. The old man slumbers during these occasions without a doubt in his mind about that faithful butler of his.

Secondly, the symbols in this story are mostly darkness and evil. Evil that possessed the butler, darkness that surrounded the old man, and darkness that seems to have surrounded our world. The darkness that follows us everywhere like a shadow or a creeper in the silent night. The shadows, darkness and evil basically run our lives, but the light can out shine the darkness. When Poe slips into the old man’s room every night he shines the light on his vulture eye, only to find out that the old man is awake, it can symbolize the hope that the old man had to try and stay awake by looking into the light.

In conclusion, The Tell-Tale Heart can relate to life in many ways with how we often find ourselves in darkness, lost and full of guilt for a crime we’ve committed or things that we did to make others mad. People like the butler are all over the world waiting for the light to find them, and there are people like the old man too. They sit in the light afraid of the darkness, that might come around to swallow them whole. When it does, who will be there to stop it?

Quotes

"Literature adds to reality, it does not simply describe it. It enriches the necessary competencies that daily life requires and provides; and in this respect, it irrigates the deserts that our lives have already become."