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Diction And Syntax In Edgar Allan Poe's The Black Cat

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In Edgar Allan Poe’s short story “The Black Cat”, many things are repeated and follows a similar pattern to the rest of his stories. A black cat is killed and a very similar one is found shortly after, all while the narrator is losing his mind. Through the use of diction and syntax, Poe reveals that the narrator's voice is mad.
The narrator uses syntax to affect his voice and to sound insane. Not only are his ideas insane but also the way he describes them. Through the use of long, run on sentences as a form of syntax, the narrator describes many ideas at once. After stating a few ideas, “...[he] resolved to dig a grave in the floor of the cellar… casting it in the well in the yard---about packing it up in a box as if merchandise…[he] determined …show more content…
It intensifies his voice by creating a powerful and cruel effect. This is demonstrated with many individual words such as: cool blood (392), bitterness of hatred (394), hideous murder (298), wretched (397), radical alteration (391), peevish (392), cruel deed (393), fatal (398), assassination (400), beast (397), and stupefied (395). Diction is important when conveying an idea to the reader and the effect of this technique is positive. Through these words, Poe establishes an eerie feeling in the reader that leaves them unsettled. Imagery is also used throughout the short story along with diction that described "... a black cat--a very large one--fully as large as Pluto, and closely resembling him in every respect but one...but this cat had a large, although indefinite splotch of white, covering nearly the whole region of the breast"(395). The author used imagery to immediately catch the reader's attention and put this creepy vision of this black cat in their head that is generally associated with death and bad luck.
As a result of Edgar Allan Poe using eerie words, imagery, and elongated syntax this is effectively conveyed to the reader and gives off a maniacal tone which creates a mad

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