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Tell-Tale Heart Theme Essay

990 Words4 Pages

Many authors incorporate some of the different literary elements throughout their stories to help demonstrate the purpose or theme of their work. By tying together the different elements, this allows authors to be creative and use different methods and mechanisms for everything to come together to form a theme in stories. In “The Tell-Tale Heart”, the author, Edgar Allen Poe, utilizes many different literary elements to be certain that his theme for the story is eye-catching in his work. In this chilling story, the theme of guilt is demonstrated throughout the whole story. The narrator’s sanity is definitely in question. Edgar Allen Poe incorporates the theme of guilt by using various literary elements such as plot, symbolism, and character …show more content…

Early in the story, the narrator explains his confidence in the deeds he commits stating that, “In the enthusiasm of my confidence, I brought chairs into the room, and desired them here to rest from their fatigues, while I myself, in the wild audacity of my perfect triumph, placed my own seat upon the very spot beneath which reposed the corpse of the victim.” (Poe, pg. 106.) The narrator sees his scheme as brilliant and sees himself as a mastermind until the guilt takes over his mind. This allows readers to think that he gets away with murdering the old man until the end, but soon his conscience takes over which causes the guilt from the deed to flood his conscience. The narrator guilt begins to overpower him, during the climax, and he screams, “Villians! Dissemble no more! I admit the deed! Tear up the planks! Here, here! It is the beating of his hideous heart!” (Poe, pg. 106.) The narrator’s guilty conscience takes over his mind making him confess his evil deed to the police officers. This overwhelming reaction with guilt and the narrator’s sudden outburst and anguish over his evil deed of murder demonstrates that this drives him crazy and causes him to reveal that he had murdered the old man. This proves that Poe implants the theme of guilt into the

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