Treehouse of Terror -- "The Raven

That Darn Cat

He almost got away with it! There are many similar themes between The Tell Tale Heart and The Black Cat, one being the fact that the murders are found out by what are seemingly other sources than themselves. I just wanted to pose the idea that in The Black Cat, that maybe it wasn't the cat screaming from inside the "tomb" that gave away the crazy man, but it was in fact he himeself by even opeing his mouth when the detectives were getting ready to leave the house. If he had not said anything he would have been cleared. Does the two tales portray the concept that an act of the perverse will come back to haunt you because your guilt is so vast after committing it?

Poe and Hitchcocok

Here are the videos from my cultural appropriation. I didn't show The Birds, so you may find it pretty interesting.

The Imp of the Perverse

The Imp of the Perverse starts off sounding like a philosophical essay. After a few pages, suddenly it's a story out of the blue! This seriously threw me off. I couldn't get my head around having no transition from essay-style to story-style and yet we're expected to agreeably accept this and somehow understand that the first part relates to the narrator's tale.

When I re-read the essay-part (as I'll now call the first few pages), I realized it was like a prologue to the story-part. With all the talk about impulses , logic, and reasoning, I feel as though the narrator is trying to justify himself to the reader before the reader even knows what actions he carried out. It's like a little kid who has done something bad and builds up their parents for what's happened with the underlying message being 'It's not really my fault' when it really is. The line "Had I not been thus prolix, you might either have misunderstood me altogether; or with the rabble, you might have fancied me mad," clinches it for me. He's stuck in a prison, which I gathered from "fetters" and "tenanting this cell of the condemned." But he's telling us that basically it's not his fault at all. Its the fault of the "Imp of the Perverse" which he spent the past several pages trying to explain to us.

Now really, to me as the reader, all that wordiness does the opposite of what the narrator is trying to achieve: it proves he truly is mad. It reminds me of Shakespeare's quote "the lady doth protest too much." At times though, all the essay-ish words made me lost and confused and I found myself having to go over lines I had just read.

My question to everyone would be, what do you think is the point of this story? The philosophical perverse mind of a murderer who kills with poisoned candles? And I want to know, do you think it was really necessary to carry on as long as he did before getting to the story?

In both Mesmeric Revelation and The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar both men suffer from tuberculosis and are kept alive after death through hypnosis. I looked it up and found these stories were written in August 1844 and December 1845 respectively. January 30, 1847 Virginia died of tuberculosis. My question seems to be do you think that these stories were written as Poe wish for a way to keep Virginia alive? Or for Poe to get his feelings out about the immortal soul, as if to say Virginia may die but its not the end, to make himself feel better?

Its interesting that if these stories are in a way referencing Virginia and his feelings about her situation, then why are the two characters who die men? As a proponent for the death of a beautiful woman you would think he would use a woman as the victim. Could it be that this would bring the event too close to home for him?

And again, if this references Virginia then why did Valdemar die so grotesquely? Do you think Poe had absolutely no hope of Virginia being kept alive?

Did anyone else have any thoughts on these two stories? Honestly, a lot of Mesmeric Revelation went over my head. I had to read analysis online to understand what was going on. So any other thoughts on this would be great for my understanding of the text.

A Portrait of Power

In this story, I see Poe making a statement concerning the power of the artist. Whether the artist is a writer or a painter. The power of words seemed to be the theme of the last stories that we read. He used newspapers as proof to make hisstories believable, yet he was showing the editors the power they held and their obligation to the public. I think Poe is linking the power of creative artists together. The power of the painter to convey the essence of a subject would go along with this story. The picture holds the same power as words and is no less important. Poe believed that the artist has obligations to the audience that is involved with the medium. In this story it was the power of the artist to literally paint the life from his bride in to the portrait. "And he would not see that the tints which he spread upon the canvas were drawn from the cheeks of her who sate beside him" (483). The artist was unwilling to see what he was truly creating. He did not know the power that he held. Without regard to the effect he would have on others with his work, he worked for his own satisfaction. Is Poe saying something about art for the sake of art? Once he had completed the portrait, he realized the power he held as a painter, artist; which was evident when he cried.."This is indeed Life itself!" (484) when he gazed upon his own work. He saw that he not only created for himself, but that his art transcended into therealm of reality. It became a living entity, separate from the artist, the creator. The subject of the art becomes immortalized through the art, not theart through the subject.
April 2, 2008 4:55 PM

"The Oval Portrait" & The Nature of the Artist

Reading "The Oval Portrait" made me think that Poe is doing something with the nature of the artist. Although I'm not such a big fan of the "suffering artist" narrative, I like how Poe has made the subject of the art suffer, rather than the artist. I guess you could argue that the artist suffered too since he was so obsessed with his work, that he didn't notice that his subject had died. Not only did he not notice, but "he would not see that the light which fell so ghastlily in that lone turret withered the health and the spirits of his bride..." (483). It's not as though he couldn't see, but he chose not to. I guess what I'm getting at is: Does Poe want to say that artists are selfish and obsessed people that get so wrapped up in their work, they choose to ignore everything around them? Also, the artist "already [had] a bride in his Art..." and his wife hated "only the Art which was her rival..." (483), so was their relationship never possible because the artist was and will always be tied to his art? I also wonder what we are to make of the woman since she hated his art, but she stayed with him anyway, even though she became the subject of his art. Maybe she thought since she became the subject, somehow he would see past his art and see her.

Here are a couple of images I came across when I googled "The Oval Portrait:"
static.flickr.com/52/109300294_cb0fd6a717_o.jpg
http://www.amazon.com/Edgar-Allan-Poes-Oval-Portrait/dp/0966026616