Episode 35: Edgar Allan Poe and The Heavy Conscience

We're playing with the big boys this week, children. Arguably, with one of the fathers of weird fiction, none other than: Edgar Allan Poe! Like in the Kafka episode, there's an endless sea of suitcases to unpack here so we're going to be focusing on one tiny shoebox in the pile. Guilt. Many of Poe's characters fit the profile of the tortured villain, and many of these stories are often superficially analyzed in the context of the murderer with the heavy conscience. But is that really all there was to stories like The Black Cat and The Tell-Tale Heart? In this episode, we will be dissecting two of Poe's most well known stories to understand just why this was such a recurring theme in his works...

TRIGGER WARNING for violence against animals in The Black Cat from 13:00 to 27:50.

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Intro music: Beeckmans: Hymne for Theremin, Oboe, String Quartet and Piano (2018) - The Alba Septet (Listen to the whole thing on youtube, you'll thank us later).

Outro music: Magic Hour by Three Chain Links

References:

https://www.oldstyletales.com/single-post/2019/03/25/edgar-allan-poes-morella-a-two-minute-summary-and-analysis-of-the-classic-horror-story

https://www.oldstyletales.com/single-post/edgar-allan-poe-s-the-black-cat-a-two-minute-summary-and-literary-analysis

https://engl105fa2020sec079.web.unc.edu/2020/11/the-anguish-of-guilt-the-tell-tale-heart-by-edgar-allan-poe/

Murder in The Family: An Analysis of Two Poe Short Stories: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF00901034

Edgar Allan Poe’s Black Cat Forensic Psychology: https://muse.jhu.edu/article/561947/pdf