The Tell-Tale Heart

By Edgar Allan Poe

"The Tell-Tale Heart" is a short story by Edgar Allan Poe first published in 1843. It follows an unnamed narrator who insists on his sanity after murdering an old man with a "vulture eye". The murder is carefully calculated, and the murderer hides the body by cutting it into pieces and hiding it under the floorboards. Ultimately the narrator's guilt manifests itself in the hallucination that the man's heart is still beating under the floorboards.

It is unclear what relationship, if any, the old man and his murderer share. It has been suggested that the old man is a father figure or, perhaps, that his vulture eye represents some sort of veiled secret. The ambiguity and lack of details about the two main characters stand in stark contrast to the specific plot details leading up to the murder.

The story was first published in James Russell Lowell's The Pioneer in January 1843. "The Tell-Tale Heart" is widely considered a classic of the Gothic fiction genre and one of Poe's most famous short stories.

• Language: English
• Publisher: MVP
• Release date: Dec 12, 2018
• ISBN: 9782291062295

Edgar Allan Poe

Edgar Allan Poe was born in Boston in 1809. His parents, both touring actors, died before he was three. He was raised by John Allan, a prosperous Virginian merchant. Poe published his first volume of poetry while still a teenager. He worked as an editor for magazines in Philadelphia, Richmond and New York, and achieved respect as a literary critic. In 1836, he married his thirteen year-old cousin. It was only with the publication of The Raven and other Poems in 1845 that he achieved national fame as a writer. Poe died in mysterious circumstances in 1849.

Reviews for The Tell-Tale Heart

[kristelh_15 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The graphic novel does a good job with the short story.ReviewI chose to read the graphic novel of the Tell-Tale Heart for a reread of this one. Now I feel like I have to find the read short story and read it. I need to think about this a bit. The graphic novel was retold by Benjamin Harper and used black and blue and spot lights for effects. It is the story of one man’s decent into madness. I felt like the old man might be the father to the younger because it stated, “The old man had been kind to me my whole life”. If not the father he certainly must have been a caretaker of the younger. So I did compare it to the original. The graphic novel is less graphic of the violence that is in the actual short story. The short story is only 4 pages long so the graphic novel does cover it all very well though there were no death watch beetles. In the original there is a mention of a vulture and the comparison to the old man’s blue eye to a vulture.

[roses7184_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This was SO GOOD.

Now, I might be slightly biased seeing as how I am completely in love with all things Poe and "The Tell-Tale Heart" is my all time favorite story. Still, I feel like that makes me even more picky about how it's presented.

The art in this graphic novel is magnificent. Our narrator is so real looking, so harried and wild, that it makes his stance as an unreliable person all the more vivid. Each panel was excellent. The blue eye, oh that evil blue eye, was piercing in its color. Add in some wonderful panel placement choices, and you had a graphic novel that I flew through.

MORE! I want more. "Murders in the Rue Mourge" and "The Pit and the Pendulum" are the two others in this series that I haven't tackled yet. That will soon be remedied.

[bearlyr · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Graphic adaptation of a classic, explore one mans plunge into madness. Illustrations do a good job of portraying a slow descent into loss of mind and paranoia. The classic by Poe is interpreted for a young adult audience, complete with questions at the end to provoke reflection.