This thesis is a critical analysis of Edgar Allan Poe's \"The Black Cat\" and The Shining by Stephen King. Mental [in]stability is defined and then used to describe how the protagonist in these stories moves from a place of realism, to a world where they no longer understand their reality. This idea of mental [in]stability is also demonstrated in the three short stories I have written.
In Poe's \"The Black Cat,\" his narrator tells the tale of how he lost his mental [in]stability. By moving away from his realistic world, the narrator lost his ability to reason as his mental [instability declined. Poe executes this decline with the use of isolation and hallucination in order to change his narrator's surroundings.
","abstract_html":"<p>This thesis is a critical analysis of Edgar Allan Poe's "The Black Cat" and <em>The Shining</em> by Stephen King. Mental [in]stability is defined and then used to describe how the protagonist in these stories moves from a place of realism, to a world where they no longer understand their reality. This idea of mental [in]stability is also demonstrated in the three short stories I have written.</p> <p>In Poe's "The Black Cat," his narrator tells the tale of how he lost his mental [in]stability. By moving away from his realistic world, the narrator lost his ability to reason as his mental [instability declined. Poe executes this decline with the use of isolation and hallucination in order to change his narrator's surroundings.</p>","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Krafthefer, Catherine Marshall"],"institution":null,"degree_name":"Art","degree_level":"Thesis","degree_discipline":"Art Department","degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":["Aaron Sanders","Patrick Jackson","Courtney George"],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2015,"date_issued":"2015-01-01T08:00:00Z","date_published":"2015-01-01T08:00:00Z","updated_at":"2026-07-24T01:44:55Z","subjects":["Edgar Allan Poe","Stephen King","Catherine Krafthefer","Horror","Instability","Arts and Humanities","Modern Literature"],"languages":["English"],"rights":[],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"https://csuepress.columbusstate.edu/theses_dissertations/193","outbound_label":"Repository record","outbound_source":"dc:identifier"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor","label":"Contributor","values":["Aaron Sanders","Patrick Jackson","Courtney George"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Krafthefer, Catherine Marshall"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date.available","label":"Dc Date Available","values":["2016-08-23T07:00:00Z"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_discipline","label":"Discipline","values":["Art Department"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_level","label":"Degree Level","values":["Thesis"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["Art"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["Edgar Allan Poe","Stephen King","Catherine Krafthefer","Horror","Instability","Arts and Humanities","Modern Literature"]}]},{"id":"language_rights","label":"Language and Rights","entries":[{"key":"dc:language","label":"Dc Language","values":["English"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier","label":"Identifier","values":["https://csuepress.columbusstate.edu/theses_dissertations/193"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description.abstract","label":"Abstract","values":["This thesis is a critical analysis of Edgar Allan Poe's \"The Black Cat\" and The Shining by Stephen King. Mental [in]stability is defined and then used to describe how the protagonist in these stories moves from a place of realism, to a world where they no longer understand their reality. This idea of mental [in]stability is also demonstrated in the three short stories I have written.
In Poe's \"The Black Cat,\" his narrator tells the tale of how he lost his mental [in]stability. By moving away from his realistic world, the narrator lost his ability to reason as his mental [instability declined. Poe executes this decline with the use of isolation and hallucination in order to change his narrator's surroundings.
"]},{"key":"dc:title","label":"Title","values":["Mental [In]Stability: Isolation and Hallucination in the Horror Genre"]}]}],"canonical_facts":{"dc:contributor":["Aaron Sanders","Patrick Jackson","Courtney George"],"dc:creator":["Krafthefer, Catherine Marshall"],"dc:date.available":["2016-08-23T07:00:00Z"],"dc:description.abstract":["This thesis is a critical analysis of Edgar Allan Poe's \"The Black Cat\" and The Shining by Stephen King. Mental [in]stability is defined and then used to describe how the protagonist in these stories moves from a place of realism, to a world where they no longer understand their reality. This idea of mental [in]stability is also demonstrated in the three short stories I have written.
In Poe's \"The Black Cat,\" his narrator tells the tale of how he lost his mental [in]stability. By moving away from his realistic world, the narrator lost his ability to reason as his mental [instability declined. Poe executes this decline with the use of isolation and hallucination in order to change his narrator's surroundings.
"],"dc:identifier":["https://csuepress.columbusstate.edu/theses_dissertations/193"],"dc:language":["English"],"dc:subject":["Edgar Allan Poe","Stephen King","Catherine Krafthefer","Horror","Instability","Arts and Humanities","Modern Literature"],"dc:title":["Mental [In]Stability: Isolation and Hallucination in the Horror Genre"],"thesis:degree_discipline":["Art Department"],"thesis:degree_level":["Thesis"],"thesis:degree_name":["Art"]},"updated_at":"2026-07-24T01:44:55Z"}