While the term madness has no standard definition, I understand it as a state of mind where a person is not in a position to make informed decisions. This essentially means that a mad person always or at most times portrays irrationality in their decisions. They lack reason and cannot be judged as being objectively right in their thinking. However, mad people do not see the insanity in them, for this reason, many philosophers, including the famous Rene Descartes, have argued that perhaps we, who think we are normal, are the mad ones, and those we perceive as being mad, are the normal ones. Philosophy aside, madness is judged by rationality – and rationality is that which is acceptable to the average human being. The average human being defines the majority. This paper focuses on the theme of madness through a comparison between Montresor, the narrator in The Cask of Amontillado and the anonymous narrator of The Tell-tale Heart, both short stories by the famous Alan Poe. The essay specifically endeavors to explicate that the narrator of The Tell-tale Heart is madder than Montresor.
Secondly, madness is characterized by self doubt and unfounded justifications. At the beginning of the story The Tell-tale Heart, the narrator already doubts that the reader will doubt their sanity. That is where he starts to justify himself through such words as “How, then, am I mad? Hearken! And observe how healthily --how calmly I can tell you the whole story.” (Poe 1244, Paragraph 1). This is an indication of lack of confidence in oneself – a big indication of insanity. Apparently, under normal circumstances, no one has confidence in mad people; not even the mad people themselves. This extends to the fact that the narrator keeps hearing the sounds that are not heard by the officers. On the contrary, Montresor is quite confident and sure of his intentions. This is a big difference between the two narrators. Even if they are both unreliable narrators, the narrator in The Tell-Tale heart, comes out as being more unreliable as he focuses too much on only three things – his insanity, the eye of the old man and the heartbeat of the old man.
Madness is associated with hallucinations and imaginary perceptions, which cannot be perceived by a normal mind. Clearly, the narrator of The Tell-Tale Heart is insane, judging from his hallucinations and imaginary perceptions, which lack sense at all. For instance, at the beginning of the story, the narrator argues that a disease that he had suffered previously had not affected him negatively. On the contrary, it had sharpened his hearing senses (Poe 1244). This is beyond irrationality. It lacks reason and justification since, rationally, when a person is affected by a disease; they should expect nothing positive out of it. Such irrational thinking is also manifested in the 16th and 17th paragraphs where the narrator hears heartbeat sounds that terribly haunt him. Contrary to these experiences, Montresor is quite sure and takes well calculated moves. Similarly, in the eleventh paragraph, the narrator expresses his insane judgments by saying that the neighbor could hear the heart beats of the old man (Poe 1246). While his madness is manifest in the fact that he buries a man alive, he is careful enough to lead his victim to a place where no one hears.
Looking at madness from the power of reason, it is clear that The tell-tale heart narrator is more mad. Montresor has a reason for killing his friend – he seeks revenge. Although his reason is vague, it is a reason first. On the contrary, the narrator in The tell-tale heart has an unjustifiable reason. That the old man’s eye is unpleasant is not reason enough to kill an individual. This coupled with the irrational and weird acts, such as the midnight stalking of a defenseless old man qualify this narrator as a mad person – more mad than his counterpart Montresor. Overall, there are some similarities between the two narrators, but the difference comes in the extent to which the features of madness manifest in them.
Works Cited
Poe , Alan. " The tell-tale Heart." Making Literature Matter: An Anthology for Readers and Writers. Fifth Edition. Boston, MA: Bedford/St. Martins, 2012. 1244 - 48. Print.
Poe , Alan. "The Cask of Amontillado." Making Literature Matter: An Anthology for Readers and Writers. Fifth Edition. Boston, MA: Bedford/St. Martins, 2012. 1238 - 44. Print.
