"The Black Cat" is a short story by Edgar Allan Poe that tells the tale of a narrator who becomes increasingly deranged and murders his wife, only to be haunted by the ghost of the black cat he killed.
The story begins with the narrator explaining that he has always been an animal lover, and has had many pets throughout his life. However, he becomes especially attached to a black cat named Pluto, who he describes as being "particularly remarkable in intelligence."
One day, the narrator becomes extremely drunk and, in a fit of rage, cuts out one of Pluto's eyes with a pen knife. The cat seems to forgive the narrator, and continues to show affection towards him. However, the narrator becomes increasingly paranoid and superstitious, and begins to see the cat as a symbol of his own guilt.
Eventually, the narrator's wife becomes ill and the narrator becomes even more irrational and violent. He decides to kill the cat, believing that it is the source of his problems. He hangs the cat from a tree, but as he does so, the cat's ghost appears to him, reminding him of his guilt.
The narrator becomes more and more distressed by the ghost, and decides to bury it in the wall of his basement. As he does so, he notices a white spot on the cat's chest, which he had not noticed before. This white spot causes him to become even more paranoid, and he becomes convinced that the cat is trying to communicate with him from beyond the grave.
Eventually, the narrator's wife becomes suspicious of his behavior and decides to investigate the basement. When she finds the cat's body, she becomes enraged and confronts the narrator. The narrator, in a fit of anger, kills her and then hides her body in the same wall where he had buried the cat.
The story ends with the narrator being arrested for the murder of his wife, and with the ghost of the black cat appearing to him one last time as he sits in his cell. The narrator realizes that the cat's ghost was a symbol of his own guilt, and that he has been punished for his actions.
Overall, "The Black Cat" is a chilling tale of madness, guilt, and the consequences of one's actions. It serves as a warning about the dangers of allowing one's passions and fears to get the better of them, and the importance of being responsible for one's actions.
"The Black Cat" by Edgar Allan Poe
Evil thoughts became my sole intimates — the darkest and most evil of thoughts. We had birds, gold-fish, a fine dog, rabbits, a small monkey and a cat. Only one wall remained, and, surrounded by neighbors craning their necks, the narrator looked at it closely—the outline of a large black cat could be seen in it. He had noticed that the white marking on the cat appeared to be slowly changing and each day it seemed to closer resemble the shape of the gallows. Upon the alarm of fire, this garden had been immediately filled by the crowd — by some one of whom the animal must have been cut from the tree and thrown, through an open window, into my chamber. He professes agony over his degradation, but significantly, his sense also thrill to a height of emotion never before experienced. I did not, for some weeks, strike, or otherwise violently ill use it; but gradually — very gradually — I came to look upon it with unutterable loathing, and to flee silently from its odious presence, as from the breath of a pestilence.
The Black Cat Summary
Additionally, he starts the story by recounting how he loves animals and people — he remembers a time when he was more honorable than fellow men. He could barely sleep as he would often find that the beast lay sitting upon his chest breathing into his face. The American Journal of Psychology, 31 4 , 370-402. It was with great difficulty that my wife, a servant, and myself, made our escape from the conflagration. Being a rational and analytical person, the narrator refuses to see a connection between his perverse atrocity of killing the cat and the disaster that consumed his house. Only one wall remained, and, surrounded by neighbors craning their necks, the narrator looked at it closely—the outline of a large black cat could be seen in it. The narrator is consumed by guilt about what he's done.
Poe’s Short Stories “The Black Cat” (1843) Summary & Analysis
He says that he does not try to prove a series of causes and effects but that he must relate a chain of facts. No one could ever find the corpse, and the cat would not return. This circumstance, however, only endeared it to my wife, who, as I have already said, possessed, in a high degree, that humanity of feeling which had once been my distinguishing trait, and the source of many of my simplest and purest pleasures. They are often thought to be witches' companions or witches themselves in disguise. Analysis The Unreliable Narrator One of the most salient things about the tale is the fact that readers cannot trust the narrator. These walls — are you going, gentlemen? I married early, and was happy to find in my wife a disposition not uncongenial with my own.
The Black Cat Summary
At length, I even offered her personal violence. The Lord agrees to let Faust become evil. Life for the two lovebirds seems perfectly normal until the narrator becomes an alcoholic and forever changes his demeanor. Edgar Allan Poe s short story The Black Cat uses an unreliable narrator to tell a story of unrelenting mental instability that ends with a killers self-revelation of his deadly deed. Upon its head, with red extended mouth and solitary eye of fire, sat the hideous beast whose craft had seduced me into murder, and whose informing voice had consigned me to the hangman. Several loving years went by before the narrator's mood began to sour. Hereafter, perhaps, some intellect may be found which will reduce my phantasm to the common-place — some intellect more calm, more logical, and far less excitable than my own, which will perceive, in the circumstances I detail with awe, nothing more than an ordinary succession of very natural causes and effects.
The Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe: Summary & Analysis
A common use for Storyboard That is to help students create a Students can create a storyboard capturing the narrative arc in a work with a six-cell storyboard containing the major parts of the plot diagram. The narrator attempts to explain rationally the existence of the impression, but he finds himself haunted by this phantasm over the course of many months. I knew myself no longer. First, daemons brought about a feeling of oppression, or a heavy weight that could hamper breathing, which the narrator complains of. Poes The Black Cat as Gothic Literature. One night as I sat, half stupified, in a den of more than infamy, my attention was suddenly drawn to some black object, reposing upon the head of one of the immense hogsheads of Gin, or of Rum, which constituted the chief furniture of the apartment.
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