Samuel Koch Mrs. Smith DC: Composition II 19 February 2018 The perfect short story "The Cask of Amontillado" was written in 1846 by Edgar Allen Poe and is considered his most perfect short story. Many critics consider it one of the world's most perfect short stories, because it demonstrates most of Poe's literary theories of how a short story should be constructed. For Poe, a short story should be able to be read in one sitting, it should be a concise and a completely unified work and although simple, it is full of ironies of many kinds. The plot of “The Cask of Amontillado” is fairly simple. Written in first-person narrative, by a man called Montresor, who seems to take perverse pride in his recounting of this gruesome act that he committed some fifty years ago. He tells the reader that a man named Fortunato has repeatedly insulted him and that he can stand it no longer and vows to take revenge upon Fortunato. The remainder of the story describes in detail Montresor's methods of tricking Fortunato and exacting his revenge upon him. Montresor sets his devilish plan into motion, confident that he would never be discovered. Poe demonstrates his use of irony here by having Montresor commit the ultimate revenge, a slow, torturous death, for some seemingly slight and insignificant insults to his honor. The setting …show more content…
Montresor quickly chains Fortunato to the wall and begins to wall him up, using the trowel, and some mortar and stone, he had hidden away. Fortunato, who is very drunk, starts to sober up quickly once he realizes what is happening to him and starts to moan and cry out. Montresor continues his slow, methodical work and mocks Fortunato’s cries for help by joining him in screaming, to show that there is no hope in summoning