A key theme of the short story is mental health. The narrator struggles with his sanity. He begins by asking the reader directly, 'How then am I mad? Hearken! and observe how healthily, how calmly, I can tell you the whole story.' this then leads into a paragraph that essentially says that he is going to kill an old man with a fierce eye, described as a vulture eye, that has done nothing wrong to him aside from have an eye. The tone is set. The rest of this short story is going to be about the anticipation of committing a murder. The excitement in the tone of the narrator is a clear indication that there is something immoral with his mental health. His enthusiasm to rid himself of this eye resembles that of a vulture, a 'pale blue eye with a film over it.' The imagery and symbolism here may initially appear contradictory. That is intentional. The eye usually is a symbol of intelligence but this isn't just any eye. It is described as a vulture's eye.
A vulture is a scavenger bird that eats the dead, flying high and well above humans searching for a carcass. Perhaps the narrator has done something wrong to the old man that is not given to the reader. Due to his mental health and sanity issues, he may see this eye as something always watching him and peering at his every move. Much as a vulture peers from above to see everything. The symbols of the vulture eye are unified in their sense of the power of the narrator. The narrator then describes how he entered the room of the old man every night at midnight for seven nights.; taking a lantern and creating a 'single ray of thin light [to fall] upon the vulture eye.' The lantern is symbolic of an artificial sun. The narrator may want to blind the vulture's eye or to highlight that the end is near specifically for the eye.
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The tone remains grim however the theme of mental health instability is still present. The narrator attempts to normalize his thoughts and actions about murdering the old man, 'Ha! Would a madman have been so wise?' As the narrator opens the door on the eighth night he awakens the old man. He mocks the old man's attempts to calm himself, 'Yes he has been trying to comfort himself with these suppositions; but he had found all in vain. ALL IN VAIN, because Death in approaching him had stalked with his black shadow before him and enveloped the victim.' The mocking comes from the repetition of 'all in vain.' The narrator is essentially laughing at the old man knowing he has personified Death. The D in death is capitalized to create it as a person. Death is no longer a noun to describe the consequence of what happened. It is now something that stalks and envelopes the old man in shadows. The narrator highlights the eye again with his lantern. This time it is so thin it is like the thread of a spider directly to the eye.
The narrator then describes how acute and accurate his senses had become, describing tunnel vision and auditory exclusion. He then can hear the beating heart of the old man and how the, 'so strange noise as this excited [him] in uncontrollable terror.' He becomes fearful that the neighbors will hear his beating heart. The hyperbole of the sound is so dramatic to create the insane mindset the narrator has. That he is unable to accurately be coherent with reality. Then, he acts on his compulsion to murder. To rid himself, and the world of the eye and now the beating heart. The imagery here creates someone ready, capable, and happy to commit murder. He suffocated the old man to death with the bed. He cut the old man up, cleaned the room of any blood, and buried him underneath three floorboards in his bedroom. A neighbor had reported a shriek in the middle of the night to police. Three police came knocking in the morning.
The narrator shows them how clean, neat, pristine, and peaceful the house is. They make their way up to the bedroom where the stone-dead body is. They all sit down and begin chatting. The narrator is sitting over the chopped-up body, underneath the floorboards. This creates the setting as to where police are about the location of the body. He then begins to show his sense of delusion, his lack of reality. He begins to hear the beating heart of the chopped-up old man beneath him. He cannot possibly hear the heart but the sense of hyperbole of how much louder the sound is becoming. So loud that the police can also hear it. So loud, that they are laughing at the narrator and not at their pleasant conversation. The tone remains dark and murderous but adds a sense of guilt. The dead man's beating heart is symbolic of that guilt. It overcomes the narrator. This leads the narrator into a rage. He insults the police, ' 'Villains!' I shrieked, 'dissemble no more! I admit to the deed! --tear up the planks! -- here, here!-- it is the beating of his hideous heart!' There is alliteration in the last line of the story. Taking only the alliteration, 'here, here! ... his hideous heart!' Bringing the story back to the title, 'Tell Tale Heart' The heart or guilt of a murder that told the tale and ultimately gave police a confession. The theme remaining entirely throughout the short story on the sanity of the narrator, and his mental health.
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