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The Cask Of Amontillado Literary Analysis

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Though many critics and scholars like to discuss the “terror” of The Cask of Amontillado by Edgar Allen Poe, the word doesn’t truly suit the story’s mood. The story’s sense of inexorable doom rides on its juxtaposition of ominous characters against a tranquile setting in the introduction, and colorful characters on a bleak background for the remainder of the tale. Poe primes the reader for a grisly ending with visual clues early, so the literal and figurative descent is far less terrifying than it is disquieting. By introducing elements of the macabre early and gradually saturating the story’s atmosphere with ominous details, Edgar Allen Poe crafts a suffocating mood of impending and inexorable doom in The Cask of Amontillado. The Cask of …show more content…

As the torches start “rather to glow than flame,” The man who was once a bright, cheerful character, a character who embodied the idea of hope, now resembles the town drunkard – lost, confused, effectively all alone chained to a block of granite. Fortunato’s choice of attire now serves to mock him, looking almost cartoonish on the body of a sick, drunk, helpless man. The story ends with the immurement of Fortunato; a very appropriate execution given the story’s progression. Fortunato is forced to watch as every last shred of hope is ripped from his hands with each stone Montresor places. It is only natural that Fortunato should get to watch as the darkness slowly consumes him as the reader has seen all along. The Cask is an exploration of totality in four distinct parts: the first signs of danger, the rise, the consumption, and the conclusion. Poe’s story doesn’t conform to the standard mold of horror because it never once promises a modicum of hope; every last ray of light is gradually snuffed out and the reader is never led to believe that Fortunato has any chance of escape. The tale finds a dichotomy between hope and despair not in comparisons between the current situation and what could be, but between the current situation and what used to be. It is not a terrifying example of the macabre, but a sad, even pathetic allegory to a human being’s final

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he!” said Fortunato thinking all of this was a joke (Poe 10). But really it was not a joke, and Montresor was planning to kill Fortunato deep inside the eerie catacombs. This foreshadowing that occurs throughout the story creates the suspense that keeps the reader on

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Poe’s stories “Cask of Amontillado” and “The Tell-Tale Heart” display the dark romantic theme of a man’s soul by the development of the setting, plot, and characterization. As both stories begin, the initial device used to advance the theme is setting, which remains grim and sinister throughout the duration of both stories. Accompanying these physical details is the plot, each of which includes the murder of an innocent man. Most notably, the characterization of each piece’s narrator allows the audience to fully understand their internal struggle and its final resolution. While “Cask of Amontillado” contains an overall intriguing and unexpected plot as well as setting, the narrator’s characterization proves this story to conclude in a less

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In the “Cask of Amontillado” Montressor is a very angry and vengeful man. He says that he was insulted by Fortunato, but fails to give a reason as to why or how. He begins to enact his revenge by luring Fortunato in with the rare wine and when his “friend” Fortunato is drunk, he t proceeds to bring him deeper and deeper underground, while telling him to turn around repeatedly. Once he reached a place where no one can hear them, Fortunato walked into what he thought was another corridor, but it would turn out to be his grave! For as soon as Fortunato hit the wall, Montressor chains him against it.

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Edgar Allan Poe, author of “The Cask of Amontillado” presents readers with several literary elements in his horror short story, such as foreshowing and mystery. Throughout this well-known story, the narrator, Montresor, is leading Fortunato, his “friend” closer to his inevitable death. However, foreshadowing was portrayed throughout the plot of Edgar Allan Poe’s story specifically when Montresor discussed his family’s motto, "No one insults me with impunity.”

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In many circumstances, just like “The Cask of Amontillado” and “The Raven,” his writings tapped deep into the complexities of the human mind, exploring mentally ill genre tropes of madness, inevitability, fear, and hopelessness (Shulman, 1970). In the aggregate, Edgar Allan Poe's works exhibit a consistent use of gothic literature elements which are shaped by both his personal experiences of grief and loss, and his deteriorating mental state. Through his portrayal of complex characters and his use of haunting language, Poe's stories offer a unique exploration of the deepest aspects of the human mind and have had a lasting impact on the genre of horror and suspenseful fiction. Although many argue that an individual’s past doesn’t portray their character, his legacies are renownedly marked by a distinctive style of layered plots, internally-complex characters, and the application of language that is both evocative and haunting. Even to this day, Poe’s influence on the genre of macabre, horror, and mystery provokes readers to dive deeper into the reflection of the mind (Shulman,

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In the short story “The Cask of Amontillado” Edgar Allan Poe uses many techniques to create and heighten the suspense of the story. In the article "Poe and the Gothic of the Normal: Thinking 'Inside the Box'" written by Elaine Hartnell-Mottram says, “this tale is told by an unhelpful first-person narrator, who is also the protagonist, to an addressee who is not directly involved in the action of the narrative and about whom we can deduce nothing with any certainty”. Nothing is certain in this short story. Poe uses many sources of irony and foreshadowing during the short story as well. As the story begins, there is suspense built up between the two main characters, Montresor and Fortunato.

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In this passage of Edgar Allan Poe’s short story “The Cask of Amontillado” the mood is eerie. As the first lay of the wall was being laid he started to find out that Fortunato’s intoxication was starting to ware off. The earliest indication of this was when he started to hear Fortunato’s low moaning and crying from the depths of the recess, After that he started to feel furious vibrations from the chains. When the chains stop he got up of the step full of bone and started to finish the fifth, sixth, and the seventh tier of the wall. How this passage shows the mood of eerie is is like he said “I heard the furious vibrations of the chain.

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Poe wrote in the “Masque of the Red Death,” “The scarlet stains upon the body and especially upon the face of the victim, were the pest ban which shut him out from the aid and from the sympathy of his fellow-men,” (Poe 1). It goes to show to what length people will go to survive. In “The Cask of Amontillado”, Montresor's cellar represented the embodiment of death

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Montresor is the story 's protagonist, as well as its narrator, meaning that the story is told in the first person point of view. Because of this, the audience has no idea what is true or what Fortunato is thinking; only the information Montresor remembers and chooses to disclose. Clearly, Montresor is unbalanced, and has a complete lack of remorse for his actions. The audience witnesses this most notably toward the end of the story, when Montresor describes “A succession of loud and shrill screams... I replied to the yells of him who clamored.

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Known for his terrifying and baffling stories, Edgar Allan Poe’s writing has been read by millions around the world. Two of Poe’s prominent works, “The Cask of Amontillado”, a short story published in 1846, and “The Pit and The Pendulum”, which is an 1842 short story that starts out depressing and later distorts into one of his positive endings have many commonalities. In both stories, the characters and the conflicts compare and contrast with each other. The characters of “Cask” and “Pit” were both clever and unusually alike, despite a few differences.

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In his short story, The Cask of Amontillado Edgar Allan Poe creates the suspense by using his narrator Montressor who opens up the story by telling us about his hatred towards Fortunado for the wrong and insults he has inflicted upon him without disclosing any detail so taking his reader by surprise. After this Poe creates another suspense about his costly and rear wine. Montressor entices Fortunado by tell him about the wine knowing his weakness and making him prey for it and fell in to the trap and suspense created by him about the rear quality of wine and takes him to his house. Poe also creates suspense through the settings describing the details about the inside environment of his wine cellar, when they reach the wine cellar.

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Edgar Allan Poe is a renowned author known for his dark twist and horrifying stories. He is known for using the world around him, animals, dark architecture, and weather to produce bone chilling literature that readers can’t seem to put down. Two of his most well known thrillers are “The Cask of Amontillado” and “The Tell-Tale Heart”. Poe had a way of mixing setting, characters, theme, and mood in a way that readers are automatically drawn into reading.

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When reading stories written by Edgar Allan Poe, it is easy to see that Poe is a dark and mysterious author. When comparing “The Cask of Amontillado”, “The Masque of the Red Death”, and “The Premature Burial” Poe consistently incorporates death, suspense, and mysteries throughout his works. These factors throughout Poe’s short stories are seen as one is about a death that occurs during a carnival in the Montresor's home that include numerous events that contain mysteries and suspense that lead to the final possible death of Fortunato. Another is about the deaths that occur when the Red Death makes a presence at a party located inside the castellated abbey. The number of events that occur before the Red Death approaches are also suspenseful

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The quote shows the author's details create a shocking mood in the readers because he describes a detailed image the helps the reader envision what is going on. This action takes the audience by surprise because they know Montresor is getting revenge, but they aren’t told what it will be so they are as clueless as Fortunato. Montresor threw a torch in the niche where he tied Fortunato up and he finished closing up the wall, killing a man who considered him a friend. “I thrust a torch to the remaining aperture and let it fall within… I force the last stone into position; I plastered it up.” (pg7)

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In other words, it was less severe than the punishment. Poe also referred to one of the main fears of the humanity in this story – to the possibility to be buried alive. The Cask of Amontillado shows the result of the mental disorder of the character, but does not say much about its reasons. Readers can only suggest about the character’s childhood and conditions that developed his personality. The Yellow Wallpaper shows the opposite picture.

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