At first, the narrator of the story is very caring and loves animals; being with animals is "one of [his] principal sources of pleasure" (346). The narrator's favorite pet is his large entirely black cat named Pluto. The narrator's wife "made frequent allusion[s] to the ancient popular notion" that black cats were associated with bad luck, evil, witches, and the devil. Poe's protagonist does not accept this superstition. People still associate black cats with bad luck, evil, witches, and the devil, so this foreshadows that something bad will happen in the story. The cat's name, Pluto, increases the assumption that the narrator will have

bad luck. In Greek mythology, Pluto was the god of the dead and ruler of the underground. The symbolism of the cat's name can be used to show that in some way the cat will be involved with death.

Later that night, the narrator is awakened by fire in his house and immediately exited it. All but one wall of the house was destroyed. After the blaze was put out, a large crowd gathered around the remaining wall and were amazed at how a wall in the middle of the house could remain standing after a fire. The narrator approached the wall and thought that he knew what the audience is commenting about. He saw a gigantic cat with a rope around its neck. He is filled with wonder and terror when he saw that the cat is alive. In reality, though, the cat is not alive; the narrator is just having a delusion, which is a symptom of paranoia. He quickly calms his worries about how the cat survived by saying that an onlooker watching the fire must have seen that the cat was tied to the tree and released it. Making oneself believe what is not true is also a sign of paranoia. The cat could not have been alive because it was hung from the tree in the morning, while the fire started late at night. The cat would have been dead by the time an audience would have formed outside of the burning house.

By putting the body inside the walls of the cellar, the narrator thought that nobody would ever know of his murder. The narrator took "every possible precaution" to make the wall with the stored body identical to the others. Although he killed his wife, the narrator's "labor [was] not in vain" because he felt it was identical to the other walls and would not be caught. Because of the way he killed his wife, and of the lack of remorse shown, one can see the extent of the illness from which the narrator is suffering.

Poe, Edgar Allan. "The Black Cat." The Heath Anthology of American Literature. Ed. PaulLauter. Lexington, Massachusetts: DC Heath and Company, 1990. 346-353.

The new cat began to like the narrator and followed him and this increases his madness. When walking to the cellar with his wife and the cat, the narrator became angry when the cat almost made him fall down the stairs. This sparked "madness" in the narrator and he picked up an ax in order to kill the cat (351). When the narrator's wife stopped him from killing the cat, "demonical" rage came upon him (351). He then "buried the ax in her brain" (351). His irrational decisions and sudden madness show that he is suffering from paranoia. The irrational decisions continue in the story.

After the narrator hid the dead body, he could not find the cat, which he wanted to kill. After three days t

Some common words found in the essay are:
Black Cat, Jesus Christ, Thousands Jewish, Temple Jerusalem, black cat, Heath Company, bad luck, Allan Poe, Romans AD, Wall Jerusalem, white spot, irrational decisions, narrator suffering, cat alive, story narrator, sign paranoia, black cats, mental illness, Edgar Allan, luck evil witches, signs mental illness, narrator bad luck, bad luck evil, sign paranoia cat,
Approximate Word count = 1811
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page double spaced)