Unit 2: Heroics/Villainy in Texts (20% of the Course Grade)
Important Dates:
Rough Draft due on Blackboard:
Monday, 3/5 by 8AM
PeerMark: Monday, 3/5
Optional Conference Day:
Wednesday, 3/7
Final Draft due on Blackboard: Monday, 3/19 by 8AM
Length and Format: at least 750-1000 words; Standard MLA format with Works Cited
Page; Failure to meet page and/or formatting requirements will result in ten points
EACH deducted from your essay grade; failure to include appropriate MLA
documentation will result in a zero for this assignment.
Constraints: Inductive or Deductive Reasoning; Use of at least ONE primary and ONE
secondary academically credible source; Third Person POV; Literary Analysis
Conventions; Failure to write in third person POV will result in ten points
automatically deducted from your essay grade—even if it’s just one pronoun.
Examples to read for inspiration:
● A Devious Success in the Battle for Popularity
● A Joy that Kills
Grading: English Literary Analysis Rubric
Guidelines: In a literary analysis, you do not review the story or re-tell the plot; instead
you explore a particular aspect of the story in detail, such as character, symbolism,
themes, or setting. Since this is analysis of a text, you are required to use present
tense when describing the story and third person point of view.
For your literary analysis, you will read a variety of short fiction for class, then choose
one of the texts to write about. You may also choose a short story or novel outside of
the class collection. You will support your argument using the story you select and
information gleaned from a secondary source.
Choose from one of the following prompts, or develop one of your own:
1. Does heroism/villainy exist in in the story? If so, how and why? If not, why?
2. How do the characters in the story define the heroic/villainous ideal? Focus on
one or more characters. You may also argue the opposite side—how/why the
characters do not define the ideal.
3. Who is the hero and/or villain of the text? Why? You may focus on one or more
characters.
4. Demonstrate the hero journey present in the story. You may also argue the
opposite side—how/why the story does not follow the monomythic structure.
5. Demonstrate the archetypes present in the text.
6. Make a case for why the text fits or doesn’t fit into one or more of Booker’s
Metaplots.
To complete this assignment, first choose a short story or novel to work with; this can be
a favorite story or novel or just one that you are intrigued by. Not sure where to start?
Check out these short story collections or visit the Unit 2 folder for more stories to
peruse:
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●
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“These Classic Stories Are So Short, You Have No Excuse Not To Read Them“
“100 Great Short Stories”
“13 Short Stories From Classic Novelists You Can Read Over Lunch”
“Classic Short Stories”
These stories are OFF LIMITS. DO NOT USE ANY OF THE FOLLOWING STORIES
(if you do, you’ll get a zero):
● “The Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin
● “The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson
Checklist
Before you turn in your essay, make sure you can answer “yes” to the following
questions.
•
Does your essay have a specific title (other than Essay 2)?
•
Does your introduction capture the reader’s attention?
•
Do you include a clearly written, detailed thesis statement?
•
Have you mentioned the author and title of your short story(ies) in the thesis
statements?
•
Does each paragraph support your thesis statement?
•
Do you use specific examples from the text and secondary source(s) to develop
your body paragraphs and support your points?
•
Do you connect your evidence to your thesis statement through the use of
commentary?
•
Does your concluding paragraph bring your essay to a satisfying close?
•
Is each paragraph well developed?
•
Does each paragraph transition from one to the next?
•
Is the essay written in third person?
•
Is your essay formatted correctly? (See MLA information on eCampus)
•
Do you correctly format the text title every time it is used?
•
Is your essay free of grammatical errors?
•
Is essay at least 750 words?
•
Have you correctly spelled the text title AND the author and character names?
“The Black Cat”
Edgar Allan Poe
FOR the most wild, yet most homely narrative which I am about to pen, I neither expect nor solicit belief. Mad indeed would I be
to expect it, in a case where my very senses reject their own evidence. Yet, mad am I not - and very surely do I not dream. But
to-morrow I die, and to-day I would unburthen my soul. My immediate purpose is to place before the world, plainly, succinctly,
and without comment, a series of mere household events. In their consequences, these events have terrified - have tortured have destroyed me. Yet I will not attempt to expound them. To me, they have presented little but Horror - to many they will seem
less terrible than baroques. Hereafter, perhaps, some intellect may be found which will reduce my phantasm to the commonplace - some intellect more calm, more logical, and far less excitable than my own, which will perceive, in the circumstances I
detail with awe, nothing more than an ordinary succession of very natural causes and effects.
From my infancy I was noted for the docility and humanity of my disposition. My tenderness of heart was even so conspicuous as
to make me the jest of my companions. I was especially fond of animals, and was indulged by my parents with a great variety of
pets. With these I spent most of my time, and never was so happy as when feeding and caressing them. This peculiarity of
character grew with my growth, and in my manhood, I derived from it one of my principal sources of pleasure. To those who have
cherished an affection for a faithful and sagacious dog, I need hardly be at the trouble of explaining the nature or the intensity of
the gratification thus derivable. There is something in the unselfish and self-sacrificing love of a brute, which goes directly to the
heart of him who has had frequent occasion to test the paltry friendship and gossamer fidelity of mere Man.
I married early, and was happy to find in my wife a disposition not uncongenial with my own. Observing my partiality for domestic
pets, she lost no opportunity of procuring those of the most agreeable kind. We had birds, gold-fish, a fine dog, rabbits, a small
monkey, and a cat .
This latter was a remarkably large and beautiful animal, entirely black, and sagacious to an astonishing degree. In speaking of
his intelligence, my wife, who at heart was not a little tinctured with superstition, made frequent allusion to the ancient popular
notion, which regarded all black cats as witches in disguise. Not that she was ever serious upon this point - and I mention the
matter at all for no better reason than that it happens, just now, to be remembered. Pluto - this was the cat's name - was my
favorite pet and playmate. I alone fed him, and he attended me wherever I went about the house. It was even with difficulty that I
could prevent him from following me through the streets.
Our friendship lasted, in this manner, for several years, during which my general temperament and character – through the
instrumentality of the Fiend Intemperance - had (I blush to confess it) experienced a radical alteration for the worse. I grew, day
by day, more moody, more irritable, more regardless of the feelings of others. I suffered myself to use intemperate language to
my wife. At length, I even offered her personal violence. My pets, of course, were made to feel the change in my disposition. I not
only neglected, but ill-used them. For Pluto, however, I still retained sufficient regard to restrain me from maltreating him, as I
made no scruple of maltreating the rabbits, the monkey, or even the dog, when by accident, or through affection, they came in
my way. But my disease grew upon me - for what disease is like Alcohol! - and at length even Pluto, who was now becoming old,
and consequently somewhat peevish - even Pluto began to experience the effects of my ill temper.
One night, returning home, much intoxicated, from one of my haunts about town, I fancied that the cat avoided my presence. I
seized him; when, in his fright at my violence, he inflicted a slight wound upon my hand with his teeth. The fury of a demon
instantly possessed me. I knew myself no longer. My original soul seemed, at once, to take its flight from my body and a more
than fiendish malevolence, gin-nurtured, thrilled every fibre of my frame. I took from my waistcoat-pocket a pen-knife, opened it,
grasped the poor beast by the throat, and deliberately cut one of its eyes from the socket! I blush, I burn, I shudder, while I pen
the damnable atrocity.
When reason returned with the morning - when I had slept off the fumes of the night's debauch - I experienced a sentiment half
of horror, half of remorse, for the crime of which I had been guilty; but it was, at best, a feeble and equivocal feeling, and the soul
remained untouched. I again plunged into excess, and soon drowned in wine all memory of the deed.
In the meantime the cat slowly recovered. The socket of the lost eye presented, it is true, a frightful appearance, but he no longer
appeared to suffer any pain. He went about the house as usual, but, as might be expected, fled in extreme terror at my
approach. I had so much of my old heart left, as to be at first grieved by this evident dislike on the part of a creature which had
once so loved me. But this feeling soon gave place to irritation. And then came, as if to my final and irrevocable overthrow, the
spirit of PERVERSENESS. Of this spirit philosophy takes no account. Yet I am not more sure that my soul lives, than I am that
perverseness is one of the primitive impulses of the human heart - one of the indivisible primary faculties, or sentiments, which
give direction to the character of Man. Who has not, a hundred times, found himself committing a vile or a silly action, for no
other reason than because he knows he should not? Have we not a perpetual inclination, in the teeth of our best judgment, to
violate that which is Law , merely because we understand it to be such? This spirit of perverseness, I say, came to my final
overthrow. It was this unfathomable longing of the soul to vex itself - to offer violence to its own nature - to do wrong for the
wrong's sake only - that urged me to continue and finally to consummate the injury I had inflicted upon the unoffending brute.
One morning, in cool blood, I slipped a noose about its neck and hung it to the limb of a tree; - hung it with the tears streaming
from my eyes, and with the bitterest remorse at my heart; - hung it because I knew that it had loved me, and because I felt it had
given me no reason of offence; - hung it because I knew that in so doing I was committing a sin - a deadly sin that would so
jeopardize my immortal soul as to place it - if such a thing wore possible - even beyond the reach of the infinite mercy of the Most
Merciful and Most Terrible God.
On the night of the day on which this cruel deed was done, I was aroused from sleep by the cry of fire. The curtains of my bed
were in flames. The whole house was blazing. It was with great difficulty that my wife, a servant, and myself, made our escape
from the conflagration. The destruction was complete. My entire worldly wealth was swallowed up, and I resigned myself
thenceforward to despair.
I am above the weakness of seeking to establish a sequence of cause and effect, between the disaster and the atrocity. But I am
detailing a chain of facts - and wish not to leave even a possible link imperfect. On the day succeeding the fire, I visited the ruins.
The walls, with one exception, had fallen in. This exception was found in a compartment wall, not very thick, which stood about
the middle of the house, and against which had rested the head of my bed. The plastering had here, in great measure, resisted
the action of the fire - a fact which I attributed to its having been recently spread. About this wall a dense crowd were collected,
and many persons seemed to be examining a particular portion of it with very minute and eager attention. The words "strange!"
"singular!" and other similar expressions, excited my curiosity. I approached and saw, as if graven in bas relief upon the white
surface, the figure of a gigantic cat. The impression was given with an accuracy truly marvelous. There was a rope about the
animal's neck.
When I first beheld this apparition - for I could scarcely regard it as less - my wonder and my terror were extreme. But at length
reflection came to my aid. The cat, I remembered, had been hung in a garden adjacent to the house. Upon the alarm of fire, this
garden had been immediately filled by the crowd - by some one of whom the animal must have been cut from the tree and
thrown, through an open window, into my chamber. This had probably been done with the view of arousing me from sleep. The
falling of other walls had compressed the victim of my cruelty into the substance of the freshly-spread plaster; the lime of which,
with the flames, and the ammonia from the carcass, had then accomplished the portraiture as I saw it.
Although I thus readily accounted to my reason, if not altogether to my conscience, for the startling fact just detailed, it did not the
less fail to make a deep impression upon my fancy. For months I could not rid myself of the phantasm of the cat; and, during this
period, there came back into my spirit a half-sentiment that seemed, but was not, remorse. I went so far as to regret the loss of
the animal, and to look about me, among the vile haunts which I now habitually frequented, for another pet of the same species,
and of somewhat similar appearance, with which to supply its place.
One night as I sat, half stupefied, in a den of more than infamy, my attention was suddenly drawn to some black object, reposing
upon the head of one of the immense hogsheads of Gin, or of Rum, which constituted the chief furniture of the apartment. I had
been looking steadily at the top of this hogshead for some minutes, and what now caused me surprise was the fact that I had not
sooner perceived the object thereupon. I approached it, and touched it with my hand. It was a black cat - a very large one - fully
as large as Pluto, and closely resembling him in every respect but one. Pluto had not a white hair upon any portion of his body;
but this cat had a large, although indefinite splotch of white, covering nearly the whole region of the breast. Upon my touching
him, he immediately arose, purred loudly, rubbed against my hand, and appeared delighted with my notice. This, then, was the
very creature of which I was in search. I at once offered to purchase it of the landlord; but this person made no claim to it - knew
nothing of it - had never seen it before.
I continued my caresses, and, when I prepared to go home, the animal evinced a disposition to accompany me. I permitted it to
do so; occasionally stooping and patting it as I proceeded. When it reached the house it domesticated itself at once, and became
immediately a great favorite with my wife.
For my own part, I soon found a dislike to it arising within me. This was just the reverse of what I had anticipated; but – I know
not how or why it was - its evident fondness for myself rather disgusted and annoyed. By slow degrees, these feelings of disgust
and annoyance rose into the bitterness of hatred. I avoided the creature; a certain sense of shame, and the remembrance of my
former deed of cruelty, preventing me from physically abusing it. I did not, for some weeks, strike, or otherwise violently ill use it;
but gradually - very gradually - I came to look upon it with unutterable loathing, and to flee silently from its odious presence, as
from the breath of a pestilence.
What added, no doubt, to my hatred of the beast, was the discovery, on the morning after I brought it home, that, like Pluto, it
also had been deprived of one of its eyes. This circumstance, however, only endeared it to my wife, who, as I have already said,
possessed, in a high degree, that humanity of feeling which had once been my distinguishing trait, and the source of many of my
simplest and purest pleasures.
With my aversion to this cat, however, its partiality for myself seemed to increase. It followed my footsteps with a pertinacity
which it would be difficult to make the reader comprehend. Whenever I sat, it would crouch beneath my chair, or spring upon my
knees, covering me with its loathsome caresses. If I arose to walk it would get between my feet and thus nearly throw me down,
or, fastening its long and sharp claws in my dress, clamber, in this manner, to my breast. At such times, although I longed to
destroy it with a blow, I was yet withheld from so doing, partly by a memory of my former crime, but chiefly - let me confess it at
once - by absolute dread of the beast.
This dread was not exactly a dread of physical evil - and yet I should be at a loss how otherwise to define it. I am almost
ashamed to own - yes, even in this felon's cell, I am almost ashamed to own - that the terror and horror with which the animal
inspired me, had been heightened by one of the merest chimaeras it would be possible to conceive. My wife had called my
attention, more than once, to the character of the mark of white hair, of which I have spoken, and which constituted the sole
visible difference between the strange beast and the one I had destroyed. The reader will remember that this mark, although
large, had been originally very indefinite; but, by slow degrees - degrees nearly imperceptible, and which for a long time my
Reason struggled to reject as fanciful - it had, at length, assumed a rigorous distinctness of outline. It was now the representation
of an object that I shudder to name - and for this, above all, I loathed, and dreaded, and would have rid myself of the monster
had I dared - it was now, I say, the image of a hideous - of a ghastly thing - of the GALLOWS ! - oh, mournful and terrible engine
of Horror and of Crime - of Agony and of Death !
And now was I indeed wretched beyond the wretchedness of mere Humanity. And a brute beast - whose fellow I had
contemptuously destroyed - a brute beast to work out for me - for me a man, fashioned in the image of the High God - so much
of insufferable wo! Alas! neither by day nor by night knew I the blessing of Rest any more! During the former the creature left me
no moment alone; and, in the latter, I started, hourly, from dreams of unutterable fear, to find the hot breath of the thing upon my
face, and its vast weight - an incarnate Night-Mare that I had no power to shake off - incumbent eternally upon my heart!
Beneath the pressure of torments such as these, the feeble remnant of the good within me succumbed. Evil thoughts became
my sole intimates - the darkest and most evil of thoughts. The moodiness of my usual temper increased to hatred of all things
and of all mankind; while, from the sudden, frequent, and ungovernable outbursts of a fury to which I now blindly abandoned
myself, my uncomplaining wife, alas! was the most usual and the most patient of sufferers. One day she accompanied me, upon
some household errand, into the cellar of the old building which our poverty compelled us to inhabit. The cat followed me down
the steep stairs, and, nearly throwing me headlong, exasperated me to madness. Uplifting an axe, and forgetting, in my wrath,
the childish dread which had hitherto stayed my hand, I aimed a blow at the animal which, of course, would have proved instantly
fatal had it descended as I wished. But this blow was arrested by the hand of my wife. Goaded, by the interference, into a rage
more than demoniacal, I withdrew my arm from her grasp and buried the axe in her brain. She fell dead upon the spot, without a
groan.
This hideous murder accomplished, I set myself forthwith, and with entire deliberation, to the task of concealing the body. I knew
that I could not remove it from the house, either by day or by night, without the risk of being observed by the neighbors. Many
projects entered my mind. At one period I thought of cutting the corpse into minute fragments, and destroying them by fire. At
another, I resolved to dig a grave for it in the floor of the cellar. Again, I deliberated about casting it in the well in the yard - about
packing it in a box, as if merchandize, with the usual arrangements, and so getting a porter to take it from the house. Finally I hit
upon what I considered a far better expedient than either of these. I determined to wall it up in the cellar - as the monks of the
middle ages are recorded to have walled up their victims. For a purpose such as this the cellar was well adapted. Its walls were
loosely constructed, and had lately been plastered throughout with a rough plaster, which the dampness of the atmosphere had
prevented from hardening.
Moreover, in one of the walls was a projection, caused by a false chimney, or fireplace, that had been filled up, and made to
resemble the red of the cellar. I made no doubt that I could readily displace the bricks at this point, insert the corpse, and wall the
whole up as before, so that no eye could detect anything suspicious. And in this calculation I was not deceived. By means of a
crow-bar I easily dislodged the bricks, and, having carefully deposited the body against the inner wall, I propped it in that
position, while, with little trouble, I re-laid the whole structure as it originally stood. Having procured mortar, sand, and hair, with
every possible precaution, I prepared a plaster which could not be distinguished from the old, and with this I very carefully went
over the new brickwork. When I had finished, I felt satisfied that all was right. The wall did not present the slightest appearance of
having been disturbed. The rubbish on the floor was picked up with the minutest care. I looked around triumphantly, and said to
myself - "Here at least, then, my labor has not been in vain."
My next step was to look for the beast which had been the cause of so much wretchedness; for I had, at length, firmly resolved to
put it to death. Had I been able to meet with it, at the moment, there could have been no doubt of its fate; but it appeared that the
crafty animal had been alarmed at the violence of my previous anger, and forbore to present itself in my present mood. It is
impossible to describe, or to imagine, the deep, the blissful sense of relief which the absence of the detested creature
occasioned in my bosom. It did not make its appearance during the night - and thus for one night at least, since its introduction
into the house, I soundly and tranquilly slept; aye, slept even with the burden of murder upon my soul!
The second and the third day passed, and still my tormentor came not. Once again I breathed as a freeman. The monster, in
terror, had fled the premises forever! I should behold it no more! My happiness was supreme! The guilt of my dark deed
disturbed me but little. Some few inquiries had been made, but these had been readily answered. Even a search had been
instituted - but of course nothing was to be discovered. I looked upon my future felicity as secured.
Upon the fourth day of the assassination, a party of the police came, very unexpectedly, into the house, and proceeded again to
make rigorous investigation of the premises. Secure, however, in the inscrutability of my place of concealment, I felt no
embarrassment whatever. The officers bade me accompany them in their search. They left no nook or corner unexplored. At
length, for the third or fourth time, they descended into the cellar. I quivered not in a muscle. My heart beat calmly as that of one
who slumbers in innocence. I walked the cellar from end to end. I folded my arms upon my bosom, and roamed easily to and fro.
The police were thoroughly satisfied and prepared to depart. The glee at my heart was too strong to be restrained. I burned to
say if but one word, by way of triumph, and to render doubly sure their assurance of my guiltlessness.
"Gentlemen," I said at last, as the party ascended the steps, "I delight to have allayed your suspicions. I wish you all health, and
a little more courtesy. By the bye, gentlemen, this - this is a very well constructed house." [In the rabid desire to say something
easily, I scarcely knew what I uttered at all.] - "I may say an excellently well constructed house. These walls are you going,
gentlemen? - these walls are solidly put together;" and here, through the mere frenzy of bravado, I rapped heavily, with a cane
which I held in my hand, upon that very portion of the brick-work behind which stood the corpse of the wife of my bosom.
But may God shield and deliver me from the fangs of the Arch-Fiend ! No sooner had the reverberation of my blows sunk into
silence, than I was answered by a voice from within the tomb! - by a cry, at first muffled and broken, like the sobbing of a child,
and then quickly swelling into one long, loud, and continuous scream, utterly anomalous and inhuman - a howl - a wailing shriek,
half of horror and half of triumph, such as might have arisen only out of hell, conjointly from the throats of the dammed in their
agony and of the demons that exult in the damnation.
Of my own thoughts it is folly to speak. Swooning, I staggered to the opposite wall. For one instant the party upon the stairs
remained motionless, through extremity of terror and of awe. In the next, a dozen stout arms were toiling at the wall. It fell bodily.
The corpse, already greatly decayed and clotted with gore, stood erect before the eyes of the spectators. Upon its head, with red
extended mouth and solitary eye of fire, sat the hideous beast whose craft had seduced me into murder, and whose informing
voice had consigned me to the hangman. I had walled the monster up within the tomb!
Source: Poe, Edgar Allan. “The Black Cat.” Complete Stories and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe. New York: Doubleday, 1996. 6369. Print.
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