Poe wastes little time in setting the mood in his famed
short story, "The Tell-Tale Heart." From the opening sentences, he assaults the reader
with an atmospheric barrage of evil thoughts and ideas. Dreadful nervousness, madness,
supernatural senses and murder are just a few of the ideas presented in the first two
paragraphs. He grabs the reader's interest immediately and continues to build the
tension as his narrator tells the rest of his story. When the murder is finally
committed, Poe does not stop there. The dismemberment of the body only magnifies the
horror of the act, leaving the reader wondering what can happen next. But unlike the
narrator of Poe's other short story of macabre murder, "The Cask of Amontillado," the
killer in "The Tell-Tale Heart" has not covered all of his bases: His crime is not
perfect; screams have been heard and police have come to investigate. More tension
arises and the narrator's nervousness increases until he does the unthinkable: He cracks
and reveals all.
Saturday, January 2, 2016
Explain how Poe develops the creepy tone and builds the suspense in "The Tell-Tale Heart".
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