The+Tell-Tale+Heart

**Summary**
"The Tell-Tale Heart" is a first-person narrative of an unnamed narrator who insists he is sane but suffering from a disease which causes "over-acuteness of the senses." The old man with whom he lives has a clouded, pale, blue "vulture-like" eye which so distresses the narrator that he plots to murder the old man. The narrator insists that his careful precision in committing the murder shows that he cannot possibly be insane. For seven nights, the narrator opens the door of the old man's room, a process which takes him a full hour. However, the old man's vulture eye is always closed, making it impossible to do the deed.

On the eighth night, the old man awakens and sits up in his bed while the narrator performs his nightly ritual. The narrator does not draw back and, after some time, decides to open his lantern. A single ray of light shines out and lands precisely on the old man's eye, revealing that it is wide open. Hearing the old man's heartbeat beating unusually and dangerously quick from terror, the narrator decides to strike, jumping out with a loud yell giving the old man a heart attack and then smothering the old man with his own bed. The narrator proceeds to chop up the body and conceal the pieces under the floorboards. The narrator makes certain to hide all signs of the crime. Even so, the old man's scream during the night causes a neighbor to call the police. The narrator invites the three officers to look around, confident that they will not find any evidence of the murder. The narrator brings chairs for them and they sit in the old man's room, right on the very spot where the body was concealed, yet they suspect nothing, as the narrator has a pleasant and easy manner about him.

The narrator, however, begins to hear a faint noise. As the noise grows louder, the narrator comes to the conclusion that it is the heartbeat of the old man coming from under the floorboards instead of the possibility that it's his own nervous beat. The sound increases steadily, though the officers seem to pay no attention to it. Shocked by the constant beating of the heart and a feeling that the officers must be aware of the sound, the narrator confesses to killing the old man and tells them to tear up the floorboards to reveal the body.

Quotations
What picture do we gather of the character of the NARRATOR? What do we learn about the cause, enactment and consequences of his CRIME? How does Poe use language to create, develop and sustain TENSION?