psychologically imprisoned perspective (madness of obsession) but also from a physically imprisoned setting.

When the narrator relates to the reader what he considers a "series of mere household events," he describes various settings where these events occurred. The first of these is his first home, in which he and his wife begin a seemingly idyllic life with numerous pets, including the black cat of the title:

I married early, and was happy to find in my wife a disposition not uncongenial with my own. Observing my partiality for domestic pets, she lost no opportunity of procuring those of the most agreeable kind. We had birds, gold-fish, a fine dog, rabbits, a small monkey, and a cat.

However, this peaceful home environment is gradually destroyed by the narrator's increasing use of alcohol, as he admits in his reference to "the Fiend Intemperance." According to the narrator, it is his increasing abuse of alcohol that contributes to his poor treatment of all around him, as well as his violent steps in killing Pluto, the black cat.

After a fire destroys his home, he and his wife are forced to move to an "old building" because of the financial losses he suffered with the fire:

The destruction was complete. My entire worldly wealth was swallowed up, and I resigned myself thenceforward to despair.

This second home has quite a few disadvantages. As it needs to be affordable to the narrator in his time of "poverty" after the fire, it is no doubt less pleasant than his first home. The neighbors with whom he shares the building are also portrayed as observant, or at least they must live in close proximity to him, as he feels unable to dispose of his wife's body without their notice:

I knew that I could not remove it from the house, either by day or by night, without the risk of being observed by the neighbors.

The narrator also reveals to the reader that at least part of the building has undergone renovations that were not particularly effective and that the building suffers from damp. Overall, the setting is clearly portrayed as an unpleasant living environment:

Its [the cellar’s] walls were loosely constructed, and had lately been plastered throughout with a rough plaster, which the dampness of the atmosphere had prevented from hardening. Moreover, in one of the walls was a projection, caused by a false chimney, or fire-place, that had been filled, or walled up, and made to resemble the rest of the cellar.

An additional setting to consider is the "den of more than infamy," a tavern or bar in which the narrator meets the second black cat. The tavern is described as having little furniture, and the only noteworthy item the narrator describes is "the immense hogsheads." It is significant that the second cat is discovered sitting on top of one of these hogsheads. The hogshead can be seen to symbolize the debauchery and intemperance that sit at the core of the narrator's perverse actions toward Pluto.

It is interesting to consider the physical setting of the story as a series of concentric circles. The narrator moves from a happy life in a homely setting, or the large circle, to a smaller environment after the fire, or the "old building." Within this old building, he moves to the confined space of the cellar, and then finally to the smallest setting, the "felon’s cell." This decreasing nature of physical setting fits the change the narrator undergoes mentally: his psychological world shrinks with his alcohol abuse and his twinned obsession with and dread of Pluto and the second black cat.

One final consideration one should make is the idea of the psychological setting of the story. It is being told from the perspective of a murderer, who attempts to convince the reader of his sanity. As such, one could interpret the narrator’s mind as the overarching setting of the narrative. How is one to fully trust or believe the descriptions or perspective provided by a narrator who is psychologically flawed?

Having written so many grotesque stories, the reader might think that Poe’s personality was similar to the characters in his stories. According to critics of the time, Poe maintained many loving relationships and surprisingly even liked animals, particularly cats.

Edgar Allan Poe explored the psychology of the criminal mind; in addition, he often investigated evil in the hearts of men. “The Black Cat” becomes then an example of Poe’s probing the mind of someone so obsessed that he commits murder for no sane reason.

The narrator of the story is the main character, a nameless murderer.  As in many of Poe’s stories, the speaker intends to convince the reader that he is not insane, and he should not be held responsible for the crimes of which he is accused.  Of course, since he is to be hanged the next day, he is desperate to persuade the reader of his innocence.

Poe provides few details about his settings.  Unlike many of his stories with elaborate decorations, this story focuses more on the action of the main character.  There are several settings:

the  jail cell

This is a small space where the narrator is forced to examine    his    actions and his life.  He still refuses to take responsibility for his actions.

the narrator’s home

The first house becomes a prison cell for the wife and the pets. The reader discovers that the family has been rich and even had servants. When the house is destroyed by fire, after years of abuse, the pets finally escape their awful "home," and die tortured by the flames.

The bedroom wall that is left standing after the fire with its raised image of the cat foreshadows the second cat’s arrival in the man’s life.  It also represents the psychological hold that Pluto has on the narrator. 

the yard of the burned house

This is the place where Pluto is hung.  This foreshadows the death of the narrator as he will be hung the next day after his story is completed.

the new house

The second house is old and depressing.  The family has lost their wealth in the fire.

the bar where the second cat is found

The bar is a dirty, dank place where the narrator notices the cat sitting atop a huge barrel of wine.

the cellar

The cellar is another important aspect of setting.

One day she [the wife] accompanied me, upon some household errand, into the cellar of the old building which our poverty compelled us to inhabit…

It becomes a horrific scene because the wife innocently tries to protect her pet but is brutally killed. Her tomb becomes the cellar wall where her body will decompose and eventually be mutilated by the second cat, who has to live there for four days

It is unclear how much time elapses during the story. The span of time is detected only by the narrator’s perverted thoughts and actions which determine the course of the story.

That is almost a trick question. The story has the classic trope of a narrator you can not trust, but from his words we can infer that he lives in a major city. Since Poe lived for much of his life in Baltimore, Maryland and the East Coast, it is no great stretch to believe that the story takes place somewhere in that general region, but as I said before, the unnamed narrator is possibly mad. If he says he lived in a large house, with servants, and that he owned several animals how can we trust him? A rural setting, for the narrator's first house, is a possibility, but after the fire the narrator moves to another house within walking distance, apparently, of a tavern. That would imply some degree of civilization. So we know he lives near a tavern, but that a sparse clue. In the end, we have little clue of just where exactly the narrator is, assuming the man was even telling the truth in the first place.