Is the narrator of Edgar Allan Poe's "The Black Cat" insane?

The
narrator of "" is what's called an unreliable narrator. This means that we can't be
sure that what he's saying is true; we simply can't take him at face value. Instead, we need to
read his words carefully and see if we can construct a plausible account of what happened. Very
few of us are trained psychologists, so we can only surmise as to his true mental
state.

The narrator starts by telling us that he isn't mad; but he does
acknowledge that some degree of psychological disintegration has taken place. We sense that the
narrator is reluctant to acknowledge madness because of the shame and stigma that such an
admission will bring. In reading the story, we need to remember that people with mental health
issues in the nineteenth century were often treated appallingly by society, so we can understand
why the narrator doesn't want to be tarred with the brush of insanity.

Yet
the narrator undermines his own case by his meticulous account of the killing of his wife and
the...