“The Black Cat”: Is He Crazy? -Brent Reed

            In “The Black Cat”, by Edgar Allen Poe, the narrator commits a brutal murder of his wife and also tortures and kills many of his own pets. This leads to the question, is he crazy? At first glance, his actions do seem to make him appear insane but there is evidence in his story that shows that he is not really crazy.

            The narrator opens his story by telling the reader that he knows what he did was unbelievable and therefore crazy, “I neither expect nor solicit belief. Mad indeed would I be to expect it, in a case where my very senses reject their own evidence” (Poe, 230). A truly insane man would not be able to recognize that what he has done is irrational.

            The narrator offers a couple explanations for why he did what he did and one is alcohol. He says, “But my disease grew upon me—for what disease is like Alcohol!—and at length even Pluto—even Pluto began to experience the effects of my ill temper” (Poe, 231). Alcohol does not justify the actions of the narrator, but it probably impaired his judgment. He may not have murdered his wife and pets if he had not been under the influence of alcohol, which is another piece of evidence that shows that he is not crazy but rather an alcoholic.

            When the house catches fire and an impression of the black cat is left on a white surface, the narrator uses reason to explain what he was seeing. He says, “By some one of whom the animal must have been cut from the tree and thrown, through an open window, into my chamber. The falling of other walls had compressed the victim of my cruelty into the substance of the freshly-spread plaster… had then accomplished the portraiture as I saw it” (Poe, 233). The narrator tries to explain the impression of the cat, instead of thinking superstitiously and believing that it is haunting him. This shows that he is not crazy because he makes a clear argument as to how the impression could have gotten there.

            I think that what the narrator did was crazy. It is crazy to kill your pets and murder your wife and stuff her in the wall of the basement, but there is a difference between being crazy and doing something crazy. Alcohol may have been what caused him to commit the murder. He also reasons and explains throughout his story like a man that knows what is sensible and what is not. Therefore I do not think that the narrator is crazy.

"THe Black Cat" Morgan Myers

A significant question posed by the tone of Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Black Cat” is the debate over whether or not he is confessing his guilt to murdering his wife and the black cat, or rather defending his actions. Tying closely into this question is the concept of “perverseness” that is addressed by the narrator, as well as his mentioning of alcohol abuse. By examining the both of these topics, I feel as though I can more closely come to a conclusion to the question posed of “confession” vs. “defense”.

In examining only the tone of the short story, there are many conflicting statements made by the narrator that can confuse the reader as to whether or not he is confessing to the atrocity, or defending his actions. His continuous mention of alcohol abuse makes it seem like he is, in fact, using alcohol as an excuse for his actions. The narrator states that it was, “…through the instrumentality of the Fiend Intemperance” (Pg. 231) that he developed the malevolent disposition that was so different from his natural state. He continues to place the blame on alcohol by claiming that his, “…disease grew upon me—for what disease is like alcohol!” (Pg. 231). By displacing the blame for his murderous actions, the narrator leads the reader to believe that he his trying to defend his actions. A full confession would conclude that he knew what he was doing in his natural state, without the need to blame a third contributor to the murders.

The narrator also implements the concept of “perverseness” as a trait of the human condition to use as another crutch to support his defense of his heinous crime. On Pg. 232 he further shapes his defense by stating, “And then came, as if to my final and irrevocable overthrow, the spirit of PERVERSENESS.” He claims that perverseness is one of the “indivisible primary faculties” (Pg. 232) of the nature of man. If this is so, then it further implies that he is not offering a confession, but rather a defense of his actions. That he could not escape perverseness because it is a part of his human nature, just like that of all mankind, once again takes the blame from himself to strengthen his defense. It is much like the “temporary insanity” plea that is often offered in cases on horrific crimes, where the defense tries to take the blame from the deliberate actions of the defendant, and place it on this inherent part of the defendant’s nature that he could not control.

In conclusion, I feel as though the narrator is offering his defense of his actions. Noting the fact that he has now been caught, and is awaiting his fate from a prison cell, only further leads to the sensibility of a defense over a confession. Why would he feel the need to confess when he is already detained for his actions? It seems to be much more logical that he would try to defend his actions in a last minute approach to forgiveness and freedom.

"Demon" Cat Haunts Man to Crime

I think that in the short story, “The Black Cat” by Edgar Allan Poe, that the narrator of the story is telling this story for a few different reasons. One reason is a confessional and another as a defense for his inhumane actions against his animals, mainly his cat, as well as his wife.

There is ample evidence of this story as being a confession by the narrator. The first of which is in the opening lines of the story. He says that his purpose for writing this story is to “Unburthen my soul” and that what happened has “terrified”, “tortured” and destroyed” him (Poe, 230). That right there indicates to me that what he has done is something which is very wrong and disturbing and that this will be turning into a confession story on his part. The narrator goes on to describe that he loved his cat Pluto, who was a big, black cat which was very keen and wise. He first describes how he removes an eye from Pluto one night while in a drunken stupor. The next morning after remembering the deed he “drowned in wine all memory of the deed” (Poe, 232). The narrator would eventually go on to hang the cat.

As the story is unfolding there are a few questions as to whether this is actually a confession. It very well could be a defense to his terrible actions toward his cat and eventually his wife. One defense that I think that is being employed is that the alcohol drove him into the act of murdering his cat, Pluto. As the new cat returns as nearly the same cat as it was before, the narrator soon beings to loath the cat again solely based on the “remembrance of my former deed of cruelty” (Poe, 234). Not only does he hate the new cat he is seeing the “phantasm” of the cat which went on for months (Poe, 233). Along with the mental images that keep reoccurring for the narrator of the murdered cat, he believes that the cat had to do with some sort of haunting that had occurred with the burning down of his house. Finally, when down in the cellar with the cat and almost falling down stairs by the “evil” cat, he decides that he has had enough. He goes to kill the cat when his wife intervenes and stops the murder. He would kill his wife instead and bury her in the wall of the cellar. I think that the story turned into a defense of his actions dealing with the cat as well as his alcohol disease. I think that he was so convinced within his own mind that the cats were there to mentally destroy him for his actions of murder.

As he buries his dead wife in the wall of the cellar and is unable to find that cat anywhere he is supremely relieved. He had a “deep, blissful sense of relief which the absence of the detested creature” (Poe, 237). He would then go to sleep that night, and for the first time since the new cat had entered the house, he slept tranquilly (Poe, 237). In my opinion he is trying to use this as a defense to insanity. No, I do not think that he was clinically insane, but I believe that he has described this story as to prove that though he murdered his wife, the “monster” cat was involved and drove him to the unthinkable crime. He even goes on to state in the final paragraph of the story when describing the discovery of his wife’s body and the cat that the “hideous beast whose craft had seduced me into murder” was staring at him (Poe, 238).

Do I think that the narrator is confessing to the murder of his wife in this short story? Yes, of course I do. But I think that in this story the man is also trying to implicate the cat for the wrong doing as well. The way he describes that cat through out the story as well as how it haunted him into exhaustion and lack of sleep, and his visions of the cat which he continually saw is an indication to me that the cat led him to this and was able to mentally disturb him. Along with his plea that he was driven to this murder by the demon cat, I think that there is some remorse from him, but it does not outweigh the burden the was relieved by the disappearance of the cat as he says that the cat had “fled the premises forever!” and the “guilt of my dark deed disturbed me but little” (Poe, 237).

"The Black Cat" confession or defense?

            After reading Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Black Cat,” the story prompted several questions during class. One being whether the narrator’s horrific, twisted story should be considered a confession or a defense. Specific moments in the story led me to believe that this story is a defense. As the narrator begins to reveal his horrendous abuse towards his animals; specifically the black cat he always tries to justify his actions. As his hated and rage develops towards the cat he justifies his feelings as a “disease,” he goes further saying that “my disease grew upon me- for that disease is like alcohol” (231). It is no secret that the narrator seems to be suffering from alcoholism; therefore his initial defense towards his rage is to blame it on the alcohol. It is the alcohol that holds this “disease” that is causing him to abuse, and ultimately kills this helpless cat. If it were really the alcohol that was to blame he would be showing more remorse and genuine guilt towards his horrifying actions. He states that he felt “a sentiment half of horror, half of remorse, for the crime which I had been guilty; but it was, at best, a feeble and equivocal feeling and the soul remained untouched” (231-32). The fact that he states that he only felt half remorse and horror shows how unauthentic his emotions towards the situation are. He might have felt slightly guilty at some point but at that exact moment when he is retelling his story he doesn’t and his conscious remains unaffected. After stabbing the cat’s eye out he continues to justify his actions by suggesting that his body was taken over by some type of spirit of “perverseness.” Suggesting that because of this spirit he tortured and killed the cat.  

            When he kills his wife he also seems to provide a defense for his actions. As the narrator is ready to kill off the second cat his wife unfortunately intervenes and is left to face her husband psychopathic rage. He states “Goaded, by the interference, into a rage more than demoniacal, I withdrew my arm from her grasp and buried the axe in her brain” (236). The narrator seems to suggest that his wife’s death is his wife’s fault; if she wouldn’t have intervened then she wouldn’t have gotten an ax to the head. Also, once again he makes the reference to being demonized.  This seems to suggest that he was taken over by some type of demonic force. However, I believe he was fully aware of his actions. The fact that he doesn’t exhibit any type of emotional response or reflection towards killing his wife shows that his actions could have been premeditated. He just needed some type of excuse or situation to act on. Although, there are also some moments which would lead the reader to believe that this could story could also be seen as a confession, for the most part this seems to be a defense. As he is getting ready to die for his crimes it makes sense that he would try to justify to and defend his actions to the reader and attempt to victimize himself. To try to make it seem like he was the one who is the victim in this situation and the cat’s, alcohol, perverseness and his wife are the ones who provoked him to act in this violent rage. He even makes reference to the cat as his “tormentor” as if he is the one that is being tortured and terrorized. It’s almost as if he is trying to convince us that he is innocent but his justifications don’t validate the fact that he killed a cat and his wife.

            As the narrator is closing off his story in the last paragraph he states “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” (238). He is trying to make one last attempt to try to justify what he did to the reader placing the blame on the cat again. The narrator stands behind his story that the cat “seduced” him into committing his crimes. Ultimately, it is left for the reader to interpret what they think the narrator was trying to do confess to his crimes? Or defend his actions?