5附带单词表17元爱伦坡恐怖故事American Horror.docx

1、5附带单词表17元爱伦坡恐怖故事American HorrorAmerican Horror(Three Terrifying Tales)by Edgar Allan PoeContentsThe Black Cat 3Chapter One 3Chapter Two 4Chapter Three 6The Oval Portrait 7Chapter One 8Chapter Two 8The Tell-tale Heart 9Chapter One 9Chapter Two 10Chapter Three 15The Black Cat Chapter OneI do not think

2、 people will believe my story. But I am not mad, and I am not dreaming. Tomorrow I will die and I want to make a confession. The events which I am going to describe here have terrified me, have tortured me, have destroyed me. To me they seemed horrible and supernatural, but perhaps somebody who is c

3、almer and more rational will find a logical explanation. This is my story. I was a very kind and gentle child who loved animals. As I grew up this love for animals became greater. This is easy to understand: it is difficult to trust people, but you can always trust a faithful dog. I married when I w

4、as young and my wife liked animals too. We had birds, gold-fish, a dog, rabbits, a small monkey, and a cat. This cat was quite large, beautiful, completely black and extremely intelligent. In fact, my wife sometimes said that our cat was probably a witch in disguise. She was not really serious about

5、 this, and I mention it now only because by chance I remember it. Pluto this was the cats name was my favorite pet and playmate . He followed me everywhere. Unfortunately, I became a victim of alcohol. I drank more and more. Of course, my personality changed. I became moody and irritable with my wif

6、e and pets. At the beginning, though, I respected Pluto and never hurt him. But one night I returned home very intoxicated. I thought that Pluto was avoiding me. I held him violently and in his fright the cat bit my hand. I became furious. I was possessed by a demon. I caught the cat again. Then I t

7、ook a pocket-knife from my pocket, opened it and cut out his eye!I blush, I burn while I now write these facts. The next day I felt horror for my action, but I continued to drink, and wine made me forget the horrible thing I had done. The cat got better. The empty eye socket I was frightening, but t

8、he cat was no longer in pain. He went about the house as usual, but, obviously, he ran away from me in terror. At first I was sorry about this, but soon it made me angry. And then came the spirit of PERVERSENESS. Philosophy does not talk about this spirit, but it is a fundamental part of the human h

9、eart. We have all done stupid or terrible things simply because we know that we should not do them. This, then, is PERVERSENESS. This spirit of perverseness, I say, destroyed me because one day I decided to kill poor Pluto. With tears in my eyes and sadness in my heart I put a noose around his neck

10、and hanged him from a tree. I hanged Pluto only because I knew he loved me, only because he had never hurt me, only because I knew that God would never pardon me for the crime. Chapter TwoThe night of this crime there was a fire in my house. My wife, my servant and I just managed to escape. My entir

11、e wealth was destroyed in the fire and I lost all hope. I do not want to say that there is a connection between my crime and the fire. I only want to record the facts of my story. The day after the fire I went to visit the ruins of my house. Only one wall remained, and around this wall was a group o

12、f people. They were saying things like strange!, singular!. I went closer and saw a strange bas-relief on the wall, the figure of a gigantic cat. The image was extremely accurate. There was a rope about the animals neck. When I first saw the image of the cat I was terrified, but I thought about it a

13、nd found a good explanation. I had hung the cat in the garden next to my house. When the fire began, this garden was filled up with people. Somebody probably threw the cat into my bedroom window in order to wake me. The other walls of the house fell in and pressed the body of the cat against this wa

14、ll. The great heat of the fire and a chemical reaction then made the image. Although I had a logical explanation, that bas-relief made a great impression on my imagination. For months I could not escape the phantasm of the cat. I even tried to find another cat to substitute it. Then, one night in a

15、bar, I saw a black object on top of some hogsheads of rum. I looked closer. It was a large black cat. It was almost identical to Pluto except it had an indistinct white area on its breast. I caressed the cat and it immediately got up and purred. It was happy. This was the animal I was looking for. I

16、 asked the bartender if I could buy it. He said that it was not his. I continued to caress the cat and when I left the bar, the cat followed me home. My wife liked this cat very much. But I began to dislike it. I had thought that I would be happier with a new cat. Instead, the affection of the cat o

17、nly disgusted me. And slowly this disgust became hatred. I avoided it because I felt some shame for killing Pluto and I did not want to hurt it too. In addition, this cat, just like Pluto, had only one eye. However, the more I hated this cat, the more it followed me. It is difficult to explain how t

18、errible this was. When I sat down it would jump on my legs and cover me with horrible caresses. When I got up to walk it was between my legs and I would almost fall. This made me so angry that I wanted to kill it, but I was stopped - not by the memory of my first crime - but by absolute dread of the

19、 beast. This dread was not exactly a dread of physical evil, but I do not know how to define it. I am almost ashamed to admit as I wait here in my prison cell that my terror was caused by something incredibly insubstantial. My wife had often talked about the indistinct white patch on the cats breast

20、, the only difference between him and Pluto. But this indistinct white patch gradually became distinct. I tried to ignore what I saw. I said to myself that it was just my imagination. But this distinct image was the real reason why I did not dare hurt the beast. It was an image that I feared. It was

21、 the image of the GALLOWS! That terrible instrument of Horror and of Crimeof Agony and of death!Chapter ThreeOh how I suffered! You cannot imagine. I had killed a brute beast, and now another brute beast was destroying me. Day or night I could not rest. During the day the creature never left me alon

22、e, and at night I woke up hourly from terrible dreams with that thing on my face. It was a living nightmare always there in my heart. All my good thoughts had gone. Evil thoughts filled my brain. I began to hate all things and all mankind. My wife, I am sorry to say, suffered the most. One day we ha

23、d to go down into the cellar. The cat went between my legs. I almost fell. I became furious. I grabbed an axe and tried to kill the animal, but my wife blocked my arm. This made me even more furious and I lifted the axe again and buried it in her brain. She fell dead immediately, without a groan. I

24、had murdered her. Now I had to eliminate the body. There were many possibilities. I could cut the body into little pieces and then burn them, or I could bury it. Finally, I decided to put it inside the wall of the cellar. There was a projection in the wall. I pulled out the bricks with a crowbar. I

25、put the body in there and then I carefully put back the bricks. Nobody could see the difference. It was perfect. Then I went to look for the cat to kill it too. But the beast had escaped. I did not see it that night. I was finally free of its torment and that night I slept tranquilly, even if I had

26、just killed my wife. The second and the third day passed. The monster did not return. My happiness was supreme. The police came and searched the house, but, of course, they found nothing. I would be happy forever! Then on the fourth day the police came again. They told me to come with them while the

27、y searched the house. They went down into the cellar again and found nothing. I was so happy that I wanted to say something. I wanted to show that I was really not guilty. Gentlemen, I finally said, I am glad that you have no more suspicions. Oh, by the bye, isnt this a well constructed house. (Now

28、I cant really remember what I said.) In fact, I think its an excellently well constructed house. These walls are you going, gentlemen? are really solid. Then in that moment I hit the walls with my cane. May God protect me! The noise of my cane was answered by a voice from the tomb! At first, the voi

29、ce was difficult to hear. It was like a child crying. Then it became louder and louder. One long, loud, and continuous scream, completely inhuman that came directly from hell! For a moment the police and I did not move. But then they easily opened the wall. There inside was the standing corpse, alre

30、ady greatly decayed and covered with blood. On the corpses head, with its red mouth open and one eye, was the beast, the beast that had made me murder my wife. And now that monster had given me to the hangman . I had walled the monster up within the tomb! The Oval PortraitChapter OneMy valet Pedro a

31、nd I were traveling through the Apennine Mountains in Italy. I was badly hurt and had a high fever. We finally saw a very strange and gloomy castle that had been recently abandoned. It was the kind of castle that you can read about in certain old novels about ghosts. Pedro knew that I couldnt remain

32、 outside in my condition, so he decided to break into the castle. When he had broken in, he took me to a small room in a turret of the castle. This room had many very old paintings, tapestries and arms. There were also many spirited modern paintings. I looked closely at them all. They fascinated me greatly, perhaps because I was delirious from the fever. I also found a book that told the story of each of the paintings in the room. Pedro lit the candles of a large candelabrum and I began to contemplate each piece of art in this bizarre room. I lay in my b