- dreadfullyadverbChapter 1 →
To an extreme and overwhelming degree; used here to intensify how severely the narrator has suffered from his nervous condition, beyond ordinary worry or fear.
“TRUE! — nervous — very, very dreadfully nervous I had been and am; but why will you say that I am mad?”
- madadjectiveChapter 1 →
Mentally ill or insane; the narrator uses this word to describe the accusation he is desperately trying to deny throughout the story.
“TRUE! — nervous — very, very dreadfully nervous I had been and am; but why will you say that I am mad?”
- wrongedverbChapter 1 →
Treated someone unjustly or caused them harm; the narrator means the old man had never done anything to hurt or offend him.
“I loved the old man. He had never wronged me. He had never given me insult.”
- insultnounChapter 1 →
An act of disrespect or offense deliberately aimed at someone; here used in its older, stronger sense of a personal injury or affront, not merely a rude remark.
“He had never wronged me. He had never given me insult.”
- vulture eyephraseChapter 1 →
The narrator's name for the old man's pale, filmy, diseased eye, comparing it to the cold, predatory gaze of a vulture — a large bird associated with death.
- dissembleverbChapter 1 →
To hide one's true feelings or intentions by pretending; the narrator shouts at the officers to stop pretending they cannot hear the heart, accusing them of faking ignorance.
“Villains! dissemble no more! I admit the deed! — tear up the planks! — here, here!”
- VillainsnounChapter 1 →
Wicked or treacherous people; the narrator hurls this word at the police officers, convinced they are cruelly toying with him by pretending not to hear the heartbeat.
“Villains! dissemble no more! I admit the deed! — tear up the planks! — here, here!”
- deednounChapter 1 →
An act that has been carried out, especially a serious or criminal one; here it refers specifically to the murder the narrator is confessing to.
“Villains! dissemble no more! I admit the deed! — tear up the planks! — here, here!”
- hideousadjectiveChapter 1 →
Extremely ugly, horrifying, or morally repulsive; the narrator uses it to describe the heart's sound as something monstrous and unbearable to him.
“it is the beating of his hideous heart!”
- planksnounChapter 1 →
Long, flat boards of wood; in this story they are the floorboards the narrator has pried up and replaced to hide the dismembered body underneath.
“tear up the planks! — here, here! — it is the beating of his hideous heart!”
The Tell-Tale HeartShort story by Edgar Allan Poe