Black Cat Symbolism

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Jessie Lappin Mr. Weaver Pre-AP English 22 October 2014 TITLE (??) Edgar Allan Poe was known for his short stories on dark romanticism. Many of his stories had a dark and mysterious tone behind them. “The Black Cat” focuses on the psychological aspects of the narrator’s mind. Poe uses a lot of irony to portray the events going on in the story. Symbolism is a major part of Poe’s technique of writing in this short story. He uses symbolism to express his thoughts and feelings while describing the events that occurred in “The Black Cat”. In “The Black Cat”, Poe applies symbolism and psychological themes to illustrate the narrator's growing insanity. In “The Black Cat”, Poe starts off the story saying “My immediate purpose is to place before…show more content…
There are many symbols found in “The Black Cat”. One of the symbols would be his black cat’s name. His black cat’s name is Pluto which is the Greek god of the underworld. The underworld symbolizes the narrator eventually succumbing to the alcoholic fiend and violence (Prinsky). The narrator gives into the alcohol which would eventually overall be the result of his death. The phrase “Fiend Intemperance” was mentioned earlier dealing with an alcohol problem. That phrase can also symbolize the narrator’s “intemperate transgression of rational thought and behavior” (Prinsky). Poe accentuates the insanity of the narrator when he focused not on the murder of his wife, but on the different ways he could get rid of the body (Badenhausen 490). Poe only used two sentences to describe the wife’s murder and it took seven vivid sentences to describe the ways he could hide the body. The sentences describing the ways of getting rid of the wife’s body were extremely descriptive and they were the most brutal options he could have chosen. This again shows the increasing insanity that the narrator is going through. He does not care at all that he just killed his wife but yet he thinks of so many reasons of how to hide the body. He does not even think of calling the police or anything. He obviously had no remorse after killing his wife and that again proves his insanity throughout the…show more content…
This adds to the surprise at the end when the narrator all of a sudden strikes his wife for no reason whatsoever. “The Black Cat” is a great example on how Poe’s stories are typically dark. Many of his stories tie into each other as well. “The Black Cat” was obviously somewhat inspired by “The Cask of Amontillado” because of the dead buried within the walls in that story. In “The Black Cat” the cat and the dead wife were found buried in the wall of the house. Poe’s use of symbolism and the psychological themes tied into this short story magnify the human thoughts and actions of a typical man who succumbs to the evils of alcohol. Works Cited Badenhausen, Richard. “Fear And Trembling In Literature Of The Fantastic: Edgar Allan Poe’s ‘The Black Cat’.” Studies In Short Fiction 29.4 (1992): 487. Literary Reference Center. Web. 22 Oct. 2014. Poe, Edgar Allan. The Fall of the House of Usher and Other Tales. New York: Penguin, 2006. Print. Prinsky, Norman. “The Black Cat.” Masterplots II: Short Story Series, Revised Edition (2004): 1-3. Literary Reference Center. Web. 22 Oct. 2014. Werlock, Abby H. P. The Facts on File Companion to the American Short Story. New York, NY: Facts On File, 2010. Print. Womack, Martha. "Edgar Allen Poe's "The Black Cat"" The Poe Decoder. N.p., 1997. Web. 22 Oct. 2014.
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