“The Tell-Tale Heart” (1843) has been described as a “supreme artistic achievement” (

3:789) and is, together with “The Cask of Amontillado”, a fine example of Poe’s later economy of language that was typical of many of his tales of the 1840s. It was first published in the January 1843 edition of James Russell Lowell’s short-lived journal

and later slightly revised and published in

for August 1845, with reprints being carried by the Philadelphia

already as early as January of 1843, and the

also in Philadelphia, in August of 1845 (

3:791-2). The first edition of the tale included as an epigraph a quotation from Longfellow’s poem “A Psalm of Life” (1838), but Poe omitted this in later…

3305 words

Citation: Sucur, Slobodan. "The Tell-Tale Heart". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 18 September 2013 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=7893, accessed 26 November 2024.]