How an Unrepressed Wishful Impulse can Lead to an Execution

There are many times in a person’s life when they are plagued by the urge to commit an action that they don’t feel is morally correct. However, they usually hold themselves back, and don’t commit the action.In “The Black Cat” by Edgar Allan Poe, the narrator of the story didn’t hold back his impulses, and it resulted in his eventual execution. In the story, the narrator describes his progression from being a loving man who cared deeply for animals, to a man full of hatred. The narrator’s regression, and lack of ability to repress his wishful impulses caused his eventual execution.

As I stated before, the narrator didn’t always have such an irritable and intemperate character. He explains that when he was a child he had a “tenderness of heart” and adored animals (Poe). He was also happy to be married to a woman who loved pets as much as he did, so they got many pets. However, as he got older he became an alcoholic, and with his addiction his attitude became unpleasant. According to Sigmund Freud, an Austrian psychologist, this intemperate attitude he developed would be described as a regression. Freud states that with every developmental process, there’s a delay, or the process may “run its course incompletely” (Freud 2231). When this happens the individual may experience some abnormalities like regression, a reversion to an earlier state of development. The narrator experienced this regression in his character and reverted to more undeveloped characteristics.

Soon, the narrator began to experience perverse wishful impulses. As Freud states, a wishful impulse is an urge that is “in sharp contrast to the subject’s other wishes and which proved incompatible with the ethical and aesthetic standards of [one’s] personality” (Freud 2212). In the story the narrator states that he began to “ill-use” his animals but refrained from mistreating his cat, Pluto.(Poe). Until, one night when the narrator picked up Pluto, and the cat nicked his hand which angered the narrator, and caused him to pick out the cat’s eye from its socket. At this moment in the story, it’s obvious that the narrator stopped repressing his wishful impulse, which was to maltreat the cat. After his harsh actions, the narrator explains that he felt a bit of guilt, and remorse at the fact that the cat kept running away whenever he approached it. However, his remorse didn’t last long. Remorse soon turned to irritability, and he hung the cat. 

The night the narrator hung the cat, he woke up to a fire in his home. This fire resulted in him losing his “worldly wealth” (Poe). Upon returning to his ruined home the next day, the narrator found an impression of a cat that’s been hung on a wall. The impression on the wall seemed to scare the narrator, and in the following weeks the narrator claimed to miss the cat. He even searched for a new one, until one night a cat similar to Pluto came up to him. The only difference between the new cat and Pluto, was a white streak on the new cat. When the cat first stayed at the narrator’s home, the narrator liked the cat’s company but then he soon came to dread it. Those perverse wishful impulses came back to the narrator. He wanted to kill the cat, but repressed himself because he was still conscious of his harsh actions towards the previous cat. One day, while running an errand with his wife, the cat happened to be walking down with the narrator and almost tripped him. This small cat angered the narrator so much he picked up an axe to kill it. However, his wife stopped him before he could, but “Goaded, by the interference, into a rage more than demonical, I withdrew my arm from her grasp and buried the axe in her brain” (Poe). Without remorse or guilt, the narrator acted out his wishful impulse but displaced his anger towards his wife. Instead of killing the cat he killed his wife. 

This act of aggression towards his wife and the cat display how the narrator’s wishful impulse was never fully repressed. He tried to repress it but it made its way out of his unconsciousness. After killing his wife, he hid her body in his cellar, and looked for the cat so he could also kill it. However, he couldn’t find the cat. The narrator explains that after killing his wife and with the absence of the cat he was able to “soundfully and tranquilly [sleep]” (Poe). His lack of remorse also indicate the perversive state his mind had reached. A few days later the police came to search his house to find his wife, they didn’t find anything but before they could leave a loud shriek plagued the walls of his home. The police found his wife but she was dead, the loud shriek came from the cat.  Evidently, his crime led to his execution. Although, his regression and the fact that he couldn’t successfully repress his perversive wishful impulses were the reasons why he commited the crime of his killing his wife.

Works Cited:

Poe, Edgar Allan. “The Black Cat .” PoeStories.com, Robert Giordano, https://poestories.com/read/blackcat.

Sigmund Freud [1909] Five Lectures on Psych-Analysis (James Strachey translation, 1955)pdf, PDF file