For Friday, answer ONE of the following in a decent sized paragraph (no one sentence or brief resposnes please!). Also, quote from the stories to support your answer. Show us where you see these ideas in the text.
1. Culler writes that narrators are "termed unreliable when they provide enough information about situations and clues about their own biases to make us doubt that the narrator shares the same values as the author" (88). How do any of the four stories for this week exhibit unreliable narration--and where? How do they expose the narrative 'stagecraft' and allow us to see behind the scenes to another--and possibly more reilable--plot?
2. All four stories (The Tell-Tale Heart, The Black Cat, The Cask of Amontillado, and Berenice) feature a confessional narrator--one who unburdens his heart after committing a terrible deed. So what makes each one distinct and interesting? Choose two of them and compare how Poe 'theoretically' approaches the same plot from different directions. How does he use characterization, language, and other perspectives to change how we experience and understand the stories?
3. Poe is writing firmly in the Gothic tradition of storytelling, which usually favors (a) a confessional story, (b) symbolism and allegory, and (c) a setting that contributes to the psychological mood of the story. In what way are these stories "intertextual," in that they write about writing about the Gothic? How do we know he is referencing and borrowing Gothic traditions and using them for his own ends? Can we see his 'winks' to the audience regarding this?
4. Culler also reminds us that "A work from another time and place usually implies an audience that recognizes certain references and shares certain assumptions that a modern reader may not share. Feminist criticism has been especially interested in the way that European and American narratives frequently posit a male reader: the reader is implicitly addressed as one who shares a masculine view" (87). Where do you see passages in the work that imply an "ideal" audience and/or a "masculine view"? Even though we can appreciate them, how are they products of Poe's society with its own unique aesthetics? Consider how little part women play in these stories, and how easily they are controlled/destroyed by the men in the stories.
Macy McDonald
ReplyDeleteThe Black Cat is a good example of when we, especially feminists, are not the ideal audience for the influence of Poe’s time period upon his stories. In The Black Cat we never even learn the narrator’s wife’s name. Now the cat gets a name, Pluto, but his wife, I guess it just didn’t come up. Furthermore the narrator describes the look of both cats and we never receive a description of his wife, physical or otherwise. All that we really know is that she was slightly superstitious, that he beat her, she tried to save the cat, and that he bricked her body up behind a wall. Then of course there is the fact that he describes tears running down his face when he killed Pluto, but all we get about him dashing out his wife’s brains is that he felt “The guilt of my dark deed disturbed me but little,” (Poe 237). Women don’t play large roles in any of the other works either, but this is one of the most blatant.
Yes, we might imagine that his true rage in the story is for his patient, long-suffering wife. All the animals are tokens for her, which is why he beats them all. He saves only one, his cat, which is the true stand-in for his wife (since the cat follows him everywhere). He more or less practices killing his wife through killing it...and then conveniently 'misses' it a second time and kills her. Poe loves playing with animal/human relationships and the idea that a narrator can love animals yet think they are lesser creatures than man. But also at the bottom of this is Poe's tendency to treat women as objects to be idolized and murdered, a very Gothic tradition even among female writers. Fun!
DeleteI feel like the words "murdered" and "fun" shouldn't really go together to explain how women are portrayed in traditional Gothic texts (haha). Now "idolized", on the other hand, most definitely is how women should be viewed. Feel free to idolize me all you want.
DeleteIn The Tell-Tale Heart we see an example of an unreliable narrator. The narrator reveals in great detail how he murdered an old man. He (or possibly she) attempts to show us his sanity by telling us how craftily/stealthily he executes the crime. In the process of doing this the narrator demonstrates paranoia (over being apprehended for the murder and his fear about the old man's “evil eye”) and monomania―focusing on one thing in an abnormal obsessive way (in this case, the narrator's preoccupation with the old man's “evil eye” or “vulture eye” as he describes it in the story). As the narrator tries to explain his sanity he unknowingly reveals his guilt in the matter. It would seem that the narrator, who is also the perpetrator of this crime, is confessing to some individual (police?). The narrator's claim that he isn't insane is based upon his careful precision in executing the crime. He's saying that how could he be insane in since he was able to systematically carry out premeditated homicide―something that a person acting irrationally would be unable to do he wants us to believe. He's offering a rational explanation for what practically speaking has to be irrational action (are all murders irrational acts?). Despite the fact that he doesn't possess a great deal of motivation in committing this crime he thinks about executing his plans on a constant basis. When the narrator expresses his guilt in the final scene of the story, he reveals himself to be a narrator that lacks reliability. The narrator's true nature is revealed in his lack of nerves which is common for characters in the Gothic tradition. His claim that he heard heartbeats under the floorboards of his house where he disposed of the body points to the fact that he's not sane rather than being sound of mind as he was maintaining.
ReplyDelete2. Like we had mentioned in class, both The Black Cat and The Tell-Tale Heart feature disturbed men telling their stories, though they approach it in completely different ways. By beginning The Tell-Tale Heart with "TRUE!" (193) and going on to have the narrator talk about how nervous he was (and is), he seems to try to reassure the reader (as well as possibly himself) that he is NOT mad. This is very unlike the tone of The Black Cat, where the narrator seems much more calm, cool, and collected when he states, “Mad indeed I would be to expect it, in a case where my very senses reject their own evidence. Yet, mad I am not”(230). Both of these men committed murder and buried the body in some creepy way. Both of them found something that just seemed to bother them so much that it pushed them to the point of killing another human being (though, technically, in The Black Cat, it’s an “accident”). Common sense would tell most people that if something bothers you, then either get away from it or ignore it. Don’t go killing people off just because some old man has a creepy eye. The man in The Black Cat also theorizes the idea that his madness is, at first, due to his drinking, though we learn later that this isn’t the case. Nice try, narrator.
ReplyDeletePoe not only uses different tones, but it seems like the way he characterizes these characters through their language shows a difference in intelligence, which also plays into how the story unfolds. The narrator in The Tell-Tale Heart seems to be using simpler words to describe the scene, whereas the narrator in The Black Cat seems to use a more sophisticated and educated language such as saying “I would unburthen my soul”(230) as opposed to “I would take some weight off my shoulders” or “I still retained sufficient regard to restrain me from maltreating him”(231) instead of “I tried to treat him right.” With the changes in language, I see the man in The Tell-Tale Heart is just some crazy guy from the beginning, and I see the guy in The Black Cat as some super smart guy who became crazy.
That's a great reading based on class: the Tell-Tale Heart does seem to be of a slightly deranged servant finally letting his rage of authority come out; he doesn't have the command of language he thinks he does, and cannot stand to be laughed at--again, like a servant who can no longer stand being servile. The Black Cat's narrator is much more confident in his social standing and has gradually sucummbed to madness; hence his more 'dignified' telling of the story. And yet, both make the same mistakes!
Delete2. Poe takes The Tell-Tale Heart and The Cask of Amontillado, two stories that both deal with murder and are confessionals, and uses both the characters and the language to separate these stories, making them different and unique.
ReplyDeleteIn The Tell-Tale Heart, the narrator has this insanity about him for I do not think he really knew why he originally wanted to kill the old man, he just wanted to kill him. Notice what he says in regards to him killing the old man, “I think it was his eye! yes, it was this” (193). The way he is unsure, then sure, makes me believe it wasn’t until he started confessing his crime that he had a reason for doing it. If he did not have a reason till he started to confess, then I believe he did it because he simply wanted to. Also, notice the narrators language, it has hints of craziness in it. Like at the beginning he claims he is not crazy, so don’t call him crazy, because he is not crazy. It’s important to notice how the rhythm of the words builds this fast paced tension that seems to make the story speed up.
This is unlike The Cask of Amontillado. Montresor killed Fortunato because of an insult Fortunato said toward Montresor; “… when he ventured upon insult, I vowed revenge” (289). Montresor had a reason for killing Fortunato. I believe Montresor was not insane for notice the way he leads Fortunato to the crypt; “We will go back; you will be ill, and I cannot be responsible. Besides, there is Luchesi” (291). Montresor coaxes Fortunato to go deeper by suggesting the opposite, an act that I believe he couldn’t do properly if he was insane. This also shows that Montresor’s language is also as elegant as it should always be, not having touches of insanity like the narrator from The Tell-Tale Heart. Also the language of the story does build tension, but is slow feels as though you are going for a walk.
The readers experience changes with each story. In The Tell-Tale Heart, you read the killing of an insane man who is not sure of his reasons at first. Thus we see off the back he is insane, and that is how we read it. We cannot fully understand why he killed; and unless we are in that same situation, see us killing without a reason. However, in The Cask of Amontillado we see that the narrator is very much sane, and because he has a reason, and we fully understand his reason, we are able to see ourselves killing someone for the same reason. So even though the stories are similar, in one we can place ourselves in the killer’s shoes and the other we cannot.
2) Though Poe's works contain an underlying theme of murder, death, and torture, how he approaches and weaves each story is nevertheless distinct and original. In The Black Cat and The Cask of Amontillado, both tales and their subsequent narrators are different from one another in extreme and polar ways. Montresor is composed and sly throughout the entire story of The Cask of Amontillado, while the narrator from The Black Cat (who I will henceforth call N) devolves into insanity. An example of Montresor’s collective coolness appears at the very beginning of the story; “I continued, as was my wont, to smile in his face, and he did not perceive that my smile now was at the thought of his immolation” (289). N, on the other hand, slipped into a state of utter lawlessness and depravity; “I grew, day by day, more moody, more irritable, more regardless of the feelings of others” (231).
ReplyDeleteBoth Montresor and N commit murder under reasons of insult, however the circumstances in both cases are quite unique. Montresor uses alcohol (wine) to lure Fortunato to his death after Fortunato offends him. In the case of The Black Cat, though, N's affliction with wine leads to a drunken incident where N startles Pluto after returning home and Pluto reacts accordingly; “...in his fright at my violence, he inflicted a slight wound upon my hand with his teeth” (231). This occurrence causes N to lash out and remove one of Pluto’s eyes, and then later hang the poor cat. Thus, in the Cask of Amontillado, alcohol plays a role in the narrator’s success, while in The Black Cat, alcohol serves as a main downfall for the narrator.
At the tail end of both short stories, each narrator has opposite endings. Montresor remains calm, yet cocky as Fortunato cries out for help in the deep recesses of the catacombs; “I replied to the yells of him who clamored. I re-echoed – I aided – I surpassed them in volume and in strength” (294). Yet N is unable to contain his madness, smacking the wall that hides his wife’s corpse and alerting the police to the cat he had accidentally walled up with her; “No sooner had the reverberation of my blows sunk into silence than I was answered by a from voice within the tomb!” (238).
As such, both narrators may have been mad, but the way Poe handled their madness and vices ultimately led them to have different endings from one another. The Cask of Amontillado is a very intimate and personal tale - the calm before. The Black Cat, on the other hand, is the storm.
I love the last sentence: the 'intimacy' of one story and the wild 'storminess' of the other. I agree; Amontillado is stripped down to its bare essentials, as a story would be over wine. The Black Cat is a performance--not overblown, but terrifying, confusing, and unbelievable. The alcohol bit is a magician's trick, to make us look away and forget how he's staging the final reveal. Great reading.
Delete2.
ReplyDeleteEach piece of Edgar Allan Poe's writing can be considered structurally similar, having erratic and diseased men committing rather unspeakably odd crimes against other human beings and animals. However, two of his works could be considered parallel in their plot structure but differing in characters and objects of fascination. In both "The Tell Tale Heart" and "Berenice" the narrator becomes transfixed on a particular body part of another human being and that person somehow ends up dead by the end of the story.
In "The Tell Tale Heart" the narrator cannot stand one of the eyes on an old man with whom he is close to has. Likewise in "Berenice" the narrator becomes obsessed with his cousins long, flawless, beautiful teeth. Both narrators in both tales claim to have a disease. In "The Tell Tale Heart" his introductory paragraph of the story tries to wane off the reader by giving reasoning as to how it is not possible that he is 'mad.' He say " the disease had sharpened my senses- not destroyed- not dulled them," (193). So he therefore knows that his thoughts and actions could be considered of a mad man. Also in "Berenice" the narrator claims to have a disease. "In the meantime, my own disease- for I have been told that I should call it by no other appellation- my own disease, then, grew rapidly upon me..." (14-15). By claiming to have a disease it's as if the author is trying to take some of the guilt off of themselves. Despite this fact, both confess to their wrong doing. The way each character does their dirty deed is also very similar, very calm and very calculatedly. The way the narrator in "The Tell Tale Heart" stalks his victim and then so effortlessly dismembers him is very disturbingly calm. The speech an drug out talking done by the narrator in "Berenice" also suggests calm and calculation to his act of unburying his cousin and stripping out her teeth. Each man claims to be diseased so they are slightly admitting to madness. This is the only real way in which the narrators differ. The man in "The Tell Tale Heart" is erratic, twitchy, heightened in his senses. However, the narrator in "Berenice" seemingly blacks out during his actions. The way he talks so elaborately and how he drags out each explanation could be deciphered as a way of pushing off his guilt for his crime.
Both narrators are odd, hair-brained men and their story's plot lines can definitely be considered "theoretically" similar.
Great response! Yes, Aegeus (from Berenice) claims that his disease of monomania kills Berenice rather than himself; like the narrator of "William Wilson," he is inacapble of seeing himself as anything other than a harmless scholar or bookworm. That monomania is essentailly a selfish, and even ruthless addiction is not something he can grasp. On the other hand, the narrator of the "Tell-Tale Heart" makes vague references to his senses being sharpened (a disease?) yet wants to remain sane throughout. Indeed, his senses being sound is proof of his sanity! Niether are very convincing, which is the true heart of the story: narration is the true vault of horror, since a simple murder becomes much more horrific when we understand WHY someone committed it.
Delete2. All four stories (The Tell-Tale Heart, The Black Cat, The Cask of Amontillado, and Berenice) feature a confessional narrator--one who unburdens his heart after committing a terrible deed. So what makes each one distinct and interesting? Choose two of them and compare how Poe 'theoretically' approaches the same plot from different directions. How does he use characterization, language, and other perspectives to change how we experience and understand the stories?
ReplyDeleteThere are two diametrically different narrators between The Cask of Amontillado and The Tell- Tale Heart. Both are mad and both have done a terrible crime. However, the two narrators differed in how they handled themselves.
In ‘Amontillado’, Montresor plans to kill Fortunado for his ‘thousand injuries’. What the injuries are or whether they actually happened is never specified. Like many of Poe’s narrators, Montresor seems a little (a lot) insane. Take this passage:
‘It must be understood, that neither by word nor deed had I given Fortunado cause to doubt my good will. I continued, as was my wont, to smile in his face, and he did not perceive that my smile now was at the thought of his immolation.’
Montresor interacted with Fortunado; he did not shy away. He says he actually smiles, much to his distaste, and is very personable to dear Fortunado. The language between the two, while Montresor is getting Fortunado drunk, is very nice and helpful until it is time to do the deed.
In the second story, the narrator is obviously mad right from the onset, with his opening statement. This statement can be seen as answer to someone he telling the story to; maybe an interrogator or a fellow prisoner.
‘TRUE!- nervous- very, very dreadfully nervous I had been and am; but why will you say that I am mad? The disease had sharpened my senses-no destroyed- not dulled them. Above all was the sense of hearing acute.’
This narrator is insane. We know that from the first line. Montresor’s insanity is harder to divine. His psyche is projected on others. Ironically, this is his undoing. As he hears the heart beating, the narrator projects his own pride and his hatred of the people who might ‘be laughing because they know’. He did the same thing with the man that he killed. He saw himself in the old man’s vulture eye.
Poe presents a theory in both of the stories that takes the story in two different directions. This is because the narrators are two different people with two different temperaments. Theoretically, Poe postulates that humans are capable of such terrible acts. But the stories play out very differently.
Good points--character creates the plot. There is no story without the narrator's perception; that is, there would be a very different story told from someone else's. What makes the stories interesting to me is how each narrator wants to convince us of something, and netiher time is it what we expect of a human being...which makes their failure all the more spectacular to behold!
DeleteWhen I think of two works that are distinct, and similar I can't help, for me at least, think of The Cask of Amontillado and The Tell-Tale Heart. Both tales are confessionals go what someone did to another person. However, his approach to the stories are very different. The Tell-Tale Heart is of a man who stays with an older man. The narrator is furious at the older man's eye. No reason for it...He starts the story by saying "True! Nervous very nervous I am and was!" This let's the reader know that there's something different about this guy, and that you can't really believe fully what he says. it's my belief, that by the first paragraph you can tell that the man had disorders. Think about it...He claims that because he hears voices, he's sane...He also approaches this story as if being interrogated by another set of police. Obviously, police caught him at then end (due to his unveiling of the crime).
ReplyDeleteAmontillado is a bit different, but the same premise. Fortunato has really committed nothing against Montressor. But Montressor tells the story as if over a glass of amontillado. Both are very similar, but this person gives dialogue of how the event occurs, therefore causing him to possibly be a bit more reliable. And, but the end of the tale, he feels some sort of remorse for the deed he has committed. This show that Montressor wasn't crazy like the narrator was in The Tell-Tale Heart.
An interesting distinction between the two stories. So Montrestor, because he feels some remorse, is not insane...and yet he acts as coldly as the other killer. Possibly the question isn't whether one is more or less insane than the other, but why they tell their stories...what they hope to convince us of. Montresor doesn't really want forgiveness, does he? He simply wants, in a way, to be justified so he can live with his guilt; the other narrator simply wants to be judged sane. He's happy with what he's done! They're quite a pair! (Dr. Grasso)
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