Intrinsic Elements Analysis: Setting in "A Tell-Tale Heart" by Edgar Allan Poe
- 1. INTRINSIC ELEMENT ANALYSIS: SETTING IN “A TELL-TALE HEART” BY EDGAR ALLAN POE Kania Manika Paramahita
- 2. Abstract In this writing, the writer tries to analyze the intrinsic element of “A Tell-Tale Heart” by Edgar Allan Poe. The purpose of this writing is to analyze the setting in the story. From the analysis of the story, the writer finds out that there are two main settings in the drama: setting of place and setting of time. It can be concluded that setting plays an important role in the story. Keywords: intrinsic element, setting, setting of place, setting of time
- 3. Introduction According to Samuel Coleridge, prose is “words in their best order, where poetry is the best words in the best order.” Prose includes fiction and non-fiction. Fiction has various genres such as mystery, action, romance, and others. Meanwhile, the examples of non- fiction works are essays, scientific reports, or newspaper articles.
- 4. Edgar Allan Poe Edgar Allan Poe was born in Boston, Massachusetts, on January 19, 1809. His first poem collection, Tamerlane, and Other Poems, was published in 1827. In 1835, Poe became the editor of the Southern Literary Messenger in Richmond, and he married his cousin Virgina in the next year. Over the next ten years, he established himself as a poet, story writer, and an editor. After his wife’s death in 1847, Poe struggled with depression and alcoholism. He died on October 7, 1849 due to “acute congestion of the brain”.
- 5. Summary “A Tell-Tale Heart” tells the story about a man who commits a murder to an old man just because (according to the man’s point of view) the old man has blue eyes that resembled of a vulture. The man dismembers the old man’s body part and hides them under the wooden plank in the old man’s chamber. When the policemen come the investigate, he can hear the old man’s heart beating. Frightened, he finally confesses that he have committed a murder.
- 6. Discussion 1. Setting of place The story only revolves around the old man’s chamber. Poe does not describe the place in detail to give the eerie feeling to the readers. He only gives the description that the old man’s chamber is pitch black and dark. “His room was as black as pitch with the thick darkness (for the shutters were close fastened, through fear of robbers), and so I knew that he could not see the opening of the door, and I kept pushing it on steadily, steadily.” (Poe: 245)
- 7. 2. Setting of time There are three settings of time that the writer can find: around the midnight, the morning, and four o’clock. From those settings of time, we can see that the main focus of the story happens just in overnight.
- 8. The most important setting of time in the story is in the midnight because most of the story happens around this time. The man always watch the old man sleeping in the midnight, and he murders the old man in the midnight as well. “And every night, about midnight, I turned the latch of his door and opened it—oh, so gently!” (Poe: 244) “So you see he would have been a very profound old man, indeed, to suspect that every night, just at twelve, I looked in upon him while he slept.” (Poe: 244-245)
- 9. Meanwhile, the story tells us that after watching the old man sleeping in the night, the man always speak courageously to the man in the morning, pretending nothing has happened. “And every morning, when the day broke, I went boldly into the chamber, and spoke courageously to him.” (Poe: 244)
- 10. The last setting of time, four o’clock, is the time when the man finished his “labors”: murdering the old man. “When I had made an end of these labors, it was four o’clock—still dark at midnight.” (Poe: 246)
- 11. Conclusion From the analysis of the story, we can see that Poe only gives brief explanation about the setting. He only describes the setting of place and time, without giving elaborate description about those settings. Poe does this on purpose: to give the eerie feeling to the readers, since they do not know the exact settings of the story. It can be concluded that as one of the intrinsic elements, setting plays important role in a story.
- 12. Bibliography Poets.org. Edgar Allan Poe. Accessed at November 28th, 2016 from Poets.org: https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poet/edgar- allan-poe Reference.com. What is Prose. Accessed at June 5th, 2017 from Reference.com: https://www.reference.com/education/prose -6714f4411a8c8259