An Awakening Edgar Allen Poe’s message in the “Cask of Amontillado” is of revenge that can consume a man and turn him mad. In this story, Montresor has a method to his madness through his thoughts, conversations and finally his actions. Montresor’s thoughts of revenge start off the story like this “When he (Fortunato) ventured upon insult. I (Montresor) vowed for revenge”. This is madness that Montresor has developed. Revenge for Montresor will be a slow process, but he will follow through, Edgar Allen Poe just hasn’t shown the reader how. “I continued, as was my wont, to smiles in his face and he did not perceive that my smiles now was at the thought of his immolation.” Poe tells the reader that Montresor is aware of his thoughts on revenge …show more content…
Montresor says to Fortunato, “As you are engaged, I am on my way to Luchesi. If anyone has a critical turn, it is he. He will tell me- “. This is where Montresor catches the “connoisseurship in wine” Fortunato right where he wants him. He knows Fortunato will not let him go with anyone else to see the Amontillado. Montresor knows the Fortunato wants to see the Amontillado, and he plays reverse psychology on Fortunato to get him to go there alone “but the severe cold… The vaults are insufferably damp. They are encrusted with nitre”. Fortunato’s reply “Let us go, nevertheless. The cold is merely nothing. Amontillado! You have been imposed upon”. Remember Fortunato is drunk already. Montresor goes on to tell the reader,“There were no attendants at home; … These orders were sufficient, I well knew, to insure their immediate disappearance, one and all, as soon as my back was turn.” This dialogue was not in the story but it is still important to the reader to know that no one will pop up to save Fortunato or pin his murder on Montresor. This is a part of Montresor’s method to madness. Montresor goes on to tell Fortunato. “You should use all proper caution. A draught of this Medoc will defend us from the damps.” This is where Montresor lets Fortunato think that he cares about his wellbeing but instead Montresor is getting him even more sedated. This is also Montresor’s madness sinking in deeper and
Montresor tortures Fortunato, both physiologically and physically. Montresor clearly gives Fortunato “multiple chances to escape his fate” (Delany 34), as he gives Fortunato obvious clues to his true intensions. These include leading Fortunato into a place for the dead, telling Fortunato not to go due to his severe cough that made it “impossible to reply” (Poe 5) at times, reminding Fortunato of his family arms, mentioning Luchesi, and showing Fortunato a trowel. Montresor seems to receive morbid joy out of the fact that Fortunato is so intoxicated that, just like the foot on Montresor’s coat of arms, he is unintentionally “stepping into his own destruction” (Cervo
In “The Cask of Amontillado” by Edgar Allen Poe, Montresor is shown as hateful, vengeful, and smart. Montresor is shown to be hateful in the story when he describes that his smile is because he’s thinking of Fortunato’s death. “I continued, as was my want to smile in his face, and he did not perceive that my smile now was at the thought of his immolation”(Poe 372). This quote shows that Montresor is hateful because during this part, he is literally saying that he is thinking about and smiling about someone dying.
Fortunato’s ego will not allow his friend to consult Luchesi. He verbally expresses that “Luchesi cannot tell Amontillado from Sherry.” Therefore, Fortunato tells Montresor that he will come along to the catacombs with him. Another one of Montresor’s intelligent conceptions was to always address Fortunato as friend. By doing this, Fortunato would never doubt him.
This attitude of Montresor showcases how little remorse he feels for Fortunato. He takes pleasure in the deception, knowing Fortunato remains oblivious to his sinister motives. This showcases the little guilt Montresor feels for taking advantage of Fortunato. He feels that everything he does is justified based on the actions of Fortunato earlier. Montresor also defends his actions by emphasizing that Fortunato seems to be a fool.
Issac Newton said that “I can calculate the motion of heavenly bodies, but not the madness of people. ”(Newton). “The Cask of Amontillado” written by Edgar Allan Poe is a story about hidden intrinsic lunacy of human by applying 3 literary devices to explain its theme: irony, symbolism and foreshadowing. Through the literary devices, the story succeeded to reveal peculiar atmosphere, features of characters and an allusion to Fortunato’s death. To start with the first literary device, “The Cask of Amontillado” used 2 kinds of ironies such as verbal and situational irony to imply Montresor’s murder plan.
Knowing that Fortunato had a passion for wine, Montresor gave him a large amount of wine and made him drunk and told him that he had a rare wine named Amontillado at his home. Even though he was sick, Fortunado wanted to taste the wine and so he went to Montresor’s home. There, Montresor takes Fortunato down into the catacombs of his home. After walking far in, he shackled Fortunato inside a damp room and threw in a torch before completely sealing the room with bones. Being drunk, Fortunato died there without even fighting it.
Montresor is a grudge holder. In the beginning, Montresor, explains why he is angry with Fortunato, but didn’t come into detail of what he did to him. Evidently, Fortunato injured and insulted Montresor, who says that he has endured peacefully as Fortunato repeatedly offended him thousands of time. Fifty year ago, Fortunato use to deny what Montresor would say about, who he was or what he had done, as if it was untrue. Montresor would argue back and forth with him explaining that it was true.
Montresor asks Fortunato to use his expert wine test tasting skills to tell if a bottle of wine is authentic or not. Since Fortunato is an arrogant person, he does not suspect or have any suspicion to his ‘friends’ request. Once Montresor and Fortunato make their way down deep into the catacombs, Montresor tricks Fortunato into a corner. Then, Montresor handcuffs Fortunato to the wall. Fortunato is fasten to the wall with no escape.
The narrator explains that Fortunato prides himself on his connoisseurship in wine. Later in the story the narrator asks Fortunato to come over to his house to taste the Amontillado that he has recently purchased. The narrator states, “ He prided himself on his connoisseurship in wine. In painting and gemmary, Fortunato, like his countrymen, was a quack- but in the matter of old wines he was sincere. ”(2)
Fortunato shows a sense of wanting to be better than his rivals. This helps Montresor in a few ways. First, Fortunato might want to prove to Montresor that he is the superior connoisseur of wine. This makes him more likely to want to go with Montresor. Second, it allows Montresor to bring up Luchesi, who is obviously an individual that Fortunato is opposed to.
In life, mostly everyone will want revenge on someone they know that did wrong to them. When Montressor wanted revenge, he went insane and planned to kill the person who did him wrong. In the real world, most people do not try to kill someone if they did them wrong. Montressor is insane because of the way he got revenge on Fortunato. Poe proves in this story that some people use different, harsher ways to get revenge on
At the carnival he informs Fortunato that he has a pipe of Amontillado, and he has his doubts. Then, using reverse psychology, he says he can see that Fortunato is engaged in something, and he will turn to Luchresi for connoisseur services. This makes Fortunato’s desire to taste the wine even deeper. Fortunato refuses and insists he taste the wine, completing step one in Montresor’s master plan. Then Montresor manipulates him a second time, says it’s not the engagement, but the severe cold Fortunato has.
Montresor never clarifies Fortunato’s insult, but it is offensive enough for him to want his death. Additionally, Montresor carries arrogance and will not harm his dignity. In fact, he desires for Fortunato to suffer from all sincere regret. Furthermore, Montresor has to “punish, but punish with
Initially, Fortunato denies any possibility of Montresor having the Amontillado, saying, “Amontillado? A pipe? Impossible!” However, he later disregards his instincts and says, “Come, let us go to your vaults.” The Amontillado displays how big Fortunato’s ego is, since he insists to go seek the wine and show off his tasting skills.
Fortunato wears a jester clothes and he is very drunk from drinking during the celebration. Fortunato is a wine lover, an alcoholic. From that, Montresor uses that advantage and show his friend a barrel of a rare wine called Amontillado. Apparently, Fortunato is very interested in wine and he wants to