The Black Cat

Synopsis

"The Black Cat" is a short story by the American writer Edgar Allan Poe. It was first published in the August 19, 1843, edition of The Saturday Evening Post. In the story, an unnamed narrator, who suffers with alcoholism, has a strong affection for pets, until he perversely turns to abusing them. His favorite, a pet black cat, bites him one night and the narrator punishes it by cutting its eye out. The narrator then becomes conflicted when the black cat fears him. In a drunken rage, he then hangs it from a tree. His house later burns down, but one remaining wall shows a burned outline of a cat hanging from a noose. He soon finds another black cat, similar to the first except for a white mark on its chest. But he develops a hatred for it as well, for it resembles the cat he killed in his drunken rage. He attempts to kill the cat with an axe but his wife stops him; instead, the narrator murders his wife. He conceals the body behind a brick wall in his basement. The police soon come and, after the narrator's tapping on the wall is met with a shrieking sound, they find not only the wife's corpse but also the black cat that had been accidentally walled in with the body and alerted them with its cry.