2.2 Gothic Tradition in The Black Cat
　　In The Black Cat, as in Metzengerstein, as the narrator who reveals that he is indeed quite sadistic and mad-or animalistic-while the cats seem to become quite human bit by bit (to create a buildup of suspense), that he is indeed quite sadistic and maniacal-or animalistic-while the cats seem to become quite human. Alcohol complicates his nature, although there is no comedy in this alcoholic's story as there had been in the Folio Club narratives. His torturing and hanging of his first cat prove his cruelty, and the conflagration that destroys his home, leaving him to ponder the significance of the cat relief on one undestroyed wall, recalls a similar supernatural display in Metzengerstein. His rationalizing of this circumstance only plunges him into deeper irrationality. The narrator reveals that evil minds have mastered him, and within a short time he comes to hate this second cat as strongly as he had its predecessor, intends to kill it with an axe, but, by mere chance-so he says-he murders his wife when she fends off the blow. He walls up the corpse in the cellar, and, as the cat has vanished, he assumes that he is freed from this tormentor. When the police come to investigate and having discovered nothing amiss, are about t depart, what the narrator has described as the spirit of perverseness motivates him to tap the wall, whence a terrifying howl sounds. The wall is opened, the corpse revealed, with the car atop its head, and so the narrator has conducted a near live burial. The cat represents the man's non-rational nature, a fitting bit of symbolism for this animal because of long cherished folk beliefs about the cat as familiar cat along with his intentional burial of his wife's corpse may imply that the narrator has walled up, or, in psychological terms, repressed the feminine, nurturing elements in his psyche. He moves from a kindly, mild frame of mind and actions to increasing personal isolation and violent hostility toward others. The Black Cat may, in its inclusion of masculine and feminine traits as parts of an integrated self show an advance over the manonly in The Pit and the Pendulum, and an alignment with Berenice, Morella, The Assignation, Ligeia, The Fall of the House of Usher, The Oval Portrait, and Eleonora-the group generally designated Poe's tales about women. One might say that in The Black Cat, as in several of the others, the narrator is bested by an avenging woman whom he has wronged. But this wite remains dead; there is no actual supernaturalism to thicken the plot; and it is the very alive cat that brings about the denouement. Here, then is another Presque modification of Gothicism.
3 Conclusion
　　Gothicism figures significantly in many of Poe's fictions and poems. The reading offered above are representative of the masterpieces to which he subjected Gothic tradition. From Poe's tales and poems, often through some pathways as twisty or coiled as those to be found in Masque, Metzengerstein, The Assignation, and Tarr and Fether (which in part may parody, under the guise of reality-madness models. The Gothic effect in Masque, and Murders). Poe's most persisting topics are those of horror or the horror coming. Because it is most probably Poe's intention to reveal, from the workings of an irrational or criminal mind. The mind is driven to evil or insanity by a illogical, irrational force which is an primary impulse in man. A number of Poe's tales treat a number of different people who are all along aware that they are going mad, thus showing the believable stages of mental disintegration Poe's position in world literature is secure. His influence is world-wide in modern literature. His aesthetics and conscious craftsmanship, his attack on "the heresy of the didactic," and his call for "rhythmical creation of beauty" have influenced French symbolists and the devotees of "art for art's sake." Poe is father of many things, one of which is psychoanalytic criticism, the other being the detective story. Some of his tales have left a visible impression on such major English authors as H.G. Wells. American authors like T.S.Eliot and William Faulkner all owe a large deal to him. He became more and more popular in the last half-century. Poe's relationship to Chinese literature is significant. A recent study has showed an interesting fact that modern Chinese masters like Lu Xun and Guo Mo-ruo all felt his influence on the Chinese literary scene of early decades of this century: they read and commented upon his works. It is obvious that further research need be done in this field.
　　
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