Summary of The Tell-Tale Heart

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The Tell-Tale Heart was written in 1843 by Edgar Allan Poe.  The narrator is telling his own story from his point of view.  He immediately admits his secret that he has killed an old man, which leads to his nervous mood in the beginning of the story.  He explains that he has all intentions to admit to his crime, but he would like to prove that he is not crazy.  The truth is that the narrator committed this crime out of fright of the old man’s pale blue eye, and that because it was out of fear, it does not make him insane. The narrator explains that for a week it became a routine to wander over to the old man’s apartment and watch him sleep, but in the morning he would pretend like nothing ever happened. At the end of the week, he could not take it any longer; he decided to murder the old man.

On the eighth night, the narrator continues his routine and goes to the old man’s house; but for the first time the old man awakens and yells out in terror and anxiety. This although, did not change what the narrator’s ambition was. He stayed in the apartment peering around, leaving the old man extremely panicked and scared. Suddenly, the narrator hears a soft thumping noise; the only conclusion he could bring for he can bring for the thumping is that it is the old man’s heartbeat. The narrator then begins to fear that the people who live near the old man may be able to hear it, too; in result, he murders the old man. He then carefully tore apart the old man’s body, and then he placed it under the floors in his bedroom. He did everything he could to make sure there was no evidence of what had happened that night.

Just as he was finishing up putting the old man in the floorboards, there is a rapping at the door. It was four o’clock in the morning and the police had arrived because a concerned neighbor called when they heard the old man yell. The narrator stays calm and collected as he begins to engage in conversation with the police, and guides them around the apartment acting as though nothing happened. When he reaches the old man’s bedroom though, he begins to psyche himself out. He begins to hear the beating of the old man’s heart again; yet this time, he hears it through the floorboards. The narrator starts to wonder if the police are pretending to believe him out of humor of the extent of his dishonesty, and he wonders if they can hear the thumping of the heart, too. Finally, he cannot take it anymore. He tells the police to pull up the floorboards and that he committed the awful crime.