Related Material
Guidelines for selecting related material:
1. Aim for a unique and sophisticated text
2. You can use speeches but aim for a different text type like a poem, shortstory, film, novel.
3. Your text needs to present a distinctive voice that works towards a certain motive and we need to check if the voice is successful in achieving the motive.
Suggestions:
Short Story – The Tell Tale Heart by Edgar Allan Poe
Documentary – Outfoxed
Analysis of Tell Tale Heart by Edgar Allan Poe:
Purpose:
The narrative is told in first person by a man explaining that he is not mad and trying to justify his murdering an old man.
Context:
The story is filled with drama and suspense and is set in a house at midnight. The night settings adds to the tension and the paranoia of the story tellers voice.
Techniques:
The story is told in first-person by the protagonist who claims he is not mad. He explains his murder of the old man with an aim to justify his actions and that he is not mad.
The constant repetition of phrases ‘MUCH SUCH A SOUND AS A WATCH MAKES WHEN ENVELOPED IN COTTON’ reveals the psychotic nature of the speaker.
“his eyes resembled that of a vulture — a pale blue eye with a film over it” – the eye is symbolic of the speakers hallucinations and alludes the reader to his insanity.
The reasoning and defensiveness of the speaker casts doubt over his insanity until the final paragraph. The final paragraph of the story reveals the hysteria of the speaker with increasingly repetitive phrases and exclamations confirming the insanity of the speaker.
The distinctive voice in the story aims to convince the reader towards a conclusion but is unsuccessful because the language reveals the real nature of the speaker contrary to his objective.
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