Cask Of The Amontillado Literary Analysis

The Dark Side

Death. It’s not a very heart warming word. Edgar Allen Poe does an amazing job at creating a story but twisting it into a creepy read. He shows a lot of symbolism that all ties into death. In the “Cask of the Amontillado” Poe works with symbolism with the setting, the name Fortunado, and the word cask.

Subsequently, the setting sets the tone of death. Up above is where the fun is and down below is death. “To the buried those repose around us.” (Poe) Poe set the setting up to be feeling very eerie. The wine cellar was down below where the bones of the dead lie. It was a dark, damp dungeon. It was normal for people to store their wine down in the vaults. “It was about dusk, one evening during the supreme madness of the carnival season, hat I encountered my friend.” (Poe) Death being below the citizens, up above was the time of freedom. The people would throw a marvelous carnival in preparation of the sacrifice for

Very ironic that fortunado has the word fortunate in it but not at all in any ways is he fortunate. Fortunado played the role of an arrogant man who knew “everything” about wine. “The thousand injuries of Fortunado.” (Poe) Fortunado repeatedly insulted or injured Montresor. Montresor was fed up with his actions and wanted to seek revenge on the Fortunado. The quote suggests that because of the way Fortunado was, Montresor would go to desperate measures to seek his “injuries” upon Fortunado. “He prided himself on his connoisseurship in wine.”(Poe) His pride in himself leads him to his death. Fortunado was the expert of wine. Montresor flattered him by obsequiously asking his opinion on a newly acquired cask of Amontillado. As they walked deeper into the vaults the dampness of nitre was getting stronger and stronger causing Fortunado to cough a lot. He was still determined to show off his smarts to Montesor. Montresor wrapped himself in a cloak so he was