response+to+literature,+The+Tell-Tale+Heart

Period 2English 8 Amir Sharomi Period 2 October 22,2009

Response To Literature, "The Tell-Tale Heart"

Edgar Allen Poe creates the mood of suspenseful horror in "The Tell-Tale Heart." He creates this mood through word choices and tone of this piece.

An example from the story is when the narrator dismembers the body of the old man, Poe writes, "I cut off the head and the arms and the legs." The simple mental image of this horrific event would send a chill down anyone's spine, wouldn't it? Another example of a horrifying mood would be when the narrator states, "I think it was his eye! Yes, it was this! He had the eye of a vulture-a pale blue eye, with a film over it. Whenever it fell upon me, my blood ran cold; and so by degrees-very gradually I made up my mind to take the life of the old man, and thus rid myself of the eye forever" The reason this was horrifying is because of the way Poe describes the cataract on the old man's eye and the way his blood "ran cold" whenever the old man would look at him would make anyone shudder and shake.

One example of suspense is when Poe writes, "Above all was the sense of hearing acute. I heard all things in the heaven and in the earth. I heard many things in hell." The reason I think that this quote is suspenseful is because when the narrator //claims// that he can hear inside the earth and in heaven and in hell there is some foreshadowing that he will abuse it and something bad will happen.

The tone of the narrator is one of a jittery fashion. He shows this by constantly using hyphens and dashes between his words stating that there is a slight jump from one word to another, much like the speech of an anxious or jumpy person, wouldn't you say so?

In the short story, "The Tell-Tale Heart" Edgar Allen Poe's tone is jittery and jumpy while the mood of the story is suspenseful horror.