Melville Case

In the stories "Billy Budd" and "The Black Cat", evil is a strong, reoccurring theme. These two stories are very different from each other because of their setting, story line, and authors' opposing beliefs. Although a large theme in both stories, Herman Melville and Edgar Allan Poe have different ideas of where evil comes from. Melville believes one is born evil, whereas Poe believes it is the result of one's past.

"Billy Budd" is set on the Bellipotent, a military ship. Billy Budd is a young, innocent sailor. Although he has done nothing wrong, John Claggart has a strong hatred for him. One night, Billy was awakened by a night guard, and he was asked to meet him at a discreet area of the ship. The night guard asked Billy to commit mutiny with him. Billy got very upset about this; he told the night guard to go back to bed and to never mention it again. John Claggart most likely tried to set Billy up by creating the situation with the night guard. Therefore, he accused Billy of trying to commit mutiny. The narrator implies that Claggart set Billy up due to his own hatred towards Billy. The punishment for mutiny is death. By accusing Billy of mutiny, it is a round about way of attempting to murder Billy.

The "Black Cat" was written by the narrator, from his jail cell, reflecting back on his life, and how it fell apart. As a child, the narrator was a good, young boy who loved animals. As he got older his passion for animals got stronger, and he ended up marrying a woman who loved animals as well. He eventually begins to drink, and when he is drunk, he abuses his wife and animals. One night, when he is completely drunk, he grabs his cat and cuts his eye out with a penknife, because he doesn't think the cat wants to be with him. As time goes on, his drinking because more prevalent and he becomes more abusive. He and his wife are down in the basement one day when he gets extremely mad, and he tries to kill the cat with an axe. His wife tried to stop him; instead, he kills his wife by hitting her with the axe, and "buries it in her brain".

In "Billy Budd", evil is demonstrated through the character John Claggart. The narrator says, "the mania of an evil nature, not engendered by vicious training or corrupting books or licentious living, but born with him and innate, in short "a depravity according to nature"' (Melville). What the author is