Driven Mad

“My original soul seemed, at once, to take its flight from my body; and a more than fiendish malevolence, gin-nurtured, thrilled every fibre of my frame. I took from my waistcoat-pocket a penknife, opened it, grasped the poor beast by the throat, and deliberately cut one of its eyes from the socket! I blush, I burn, I shudder, while I pen the damnable atrocity.” – The Black Cat

In my opinion, I believe this is one of the most important quotes from “The Black Cat”. Regardless of how unrefined and somewhat vulgar this statement is, it really gives you an insight to the narrator’s mind. This side of the narrator proves unexpected due to how much he claims to adore animals previous to this event. However as the narrator believes this cat is haunting him he begins to go mad and attempt to end the life of the thing that he claimed was the cause of his actions.  This quote reveals the fragile state the narrator’s mind is in and thus being the reason why we understand why he later in the story murders his wife. Although a cat is very much unlikely to drive a person mad it leads us to believe that there was something going on with the man before the cat arrived. Truly, a normal human, would not perform such actions just due to the presence of an animal.