Written by Edgar Allen Poe in 1843 “The Black Cat” is a short story about a man whose love for animals and his wife are overcome by his alcoholism. The narrator who remains unnamed throughout the whole story starts as a gentle and kind man. As his love for drinking overtakes his life, he soon becomes abusive, and even worse, a murderer. Poe’s short story, through a well thought out plot, shows a variety of emotions, such as remorse and simply the cause and effect of his actions.
The “Black Cat” opens up with the narrator telling a story from his deathbed in prison. He starts to tell the reader his past. The man tells of his younger life when he was happily married with numerous animals, one specifically named Pluto. Pluto was a black cat and grew to be the narrators best friend. The narrator loved the cat, but he loved drinking more. Alcoholism had taken over his life. One night he came home drunk and believed that Pluto who was supposedly his best friend was ignoring him. Instead of just going to bed the narrator became so paranoid and angry that he cut out the cat’s eye. Though the man regretted his drunken decisions in the morning, the damage was done:
“When reason returned with the morning- when I had slept off the fumes of the night’s debauch- I experienced a sentiment half of horror, half of remorse, for the crime of which I had been guilty; but it was, at best, a feeble and equivocal feeling, and the soul remained untouched. I again plunged into excess, and soon drowned in wine all memory of the deed.” (pg. 204)
The cat no longer cared for his beloved owner and instead continued to ignore him. This along with more alcohol made the narrator hit his breaking point. So, he decided to hang the cat from a tree outside. That was the last of Pluto… or so the narrator thought. “It was now, I say, the image of a hideous-of a ghastly thing-of the GALLOWS! – oh mournful and terrible engine of Horror and Crime- of Agony and Death.” (Pg. 207)
The narrator went on to live semi-normal life, full of alcohol and no cats. Until one day a cat befriends him. The cat, who looks similar to Pluto, follows him home despite the narrators wishes. In the beginning, the narrator tolerates the cat, but the longer he was around the cat, the more he hated it, but the more he hated it, the more the cat liked his owner. The narrator becomes so fed up with the cat that he eventually tries to kill it. Here, his wife intervenes and instead of killing the cat, he kills her. Traumatized by what he did he quickly hid the body. Though he knew he could not dispose of her outside the house, he simply built a wall in the basement and placed his dead wife behind it. A couple days go by and finally the police show up at the narrator’s house looking for his wife. They search the house and come to the wall that his wife is laid behind. Overcome by guilt and emotions, the narrator taps on the wall, and hears a sound:
“For one instant the party on the stairs remained motionless, through extremity of terror and awe. In the next a dozen stout arms were toiling at the wall. It fell bodily. The corpse, already greatly decayed and clotted with extended mouth and solitary eye of fire, sat the hideous beast whose craft had seduced me into murder, and whose informing voice had cosigned me to the hangman. I had walled the monster up within the tomb.” (pg. 209)
This is why the narrator writes to us from behind a prison cell.
What I found interesting about this short story is how Poe from the first sentence hooked his reader. He sent his readers and narrator on a whirlwind of emotions. From the very beginning you could sense that the narrator had a sense of guilt. Guilt from killing his cat and even self-guilt. I believe that killing Pluto was the one true sense of guilt that narrator felt at that moment. “One morning, in cold blood, I slipped the noose about its neck and hung it to the limb of a tree; – hung it with the tears streaming from my eyes, and with the bitterest remorse at my heart…” (pg. 205) The narrator didn’t initially feel guilt for killing his wife. “The second and third day passed, and still my tormentor came not. Once again I breathed as a freeman.” (pg. 208) It wasn’t until day four and the police to show up at his house for the narrator to come to terms with what he had done to his wife. The narrator could have possibly gotten away with murder until he was overcome with so much guilt and without thinking it through, he tapped on the wall which concealed his wife’s corpse but also the meowing cat.
On the contrary I felt as though the narrator didn’t exhibit guilt in the time of the “episodes.” He felt no remorse cutting out Pluto’s eye. “I experienced a sentiment half of horror, half of remorse, for the crime of which I had been guilty; but it was, at best, a feeble and equivocal feeling, and the soul remained untouched.” Secondly, he felt no remorse killing his wife until after the fact. “This hideous murder accomplished, I set myself forthwith, and with entire deliberation, to the task of concealing the body.” (pg.207) The narrators first thought was not “what have I done” but instead he chooses to take the route of “where am I going to hide the body.” This makes me as a reader believe that Poe uses reverse psychology to make the readers side with the narrator to make you feel as though the narrator is disturbed and feels remorse for his actions when in return I believe it is the total opposite.
Lastly, the use of cause and effect greatly plays into “The Black Cat.” The cause of Pluto to lose his eye was alcohol, paranoia exhibited by his owner and rejection displayed by Pluto. The rejection Pluto displayed to his owner was the cause of his death. Therefore, you can trace back Pluto’s death as a cause of paranoia, alcohol, and the thought of rejection. The effect of Pluto’s death created nightmares for the narrator along with a growing hatred towards animals, especially cats. The cause of hatred/remorse for killing Pluto causes the narrator to hate his new cat, who resembles Pluto. The effect then allows the narrator to become so paranoid that he too tries to kill the second cat. This causes his wife to step in and try to save the cat which eventually gets her killed. This completes the whole circle… The alcohol, paranoia, and rejection sends the narrator into a downward spiral that finally ends with him locked inside a jail cell on death row.
In conclusion, the narrator writes his last final goodbye from a jail cell, telling about his life journey which was full of guilt, remorse, and the cause and effect of his actions. “But to-morrow I die, and to-day I would unburden my soul… I detail with awe, nothing more than an ordinary succession of very natural causes and effects.” (pg. 203)
..