Death, Logic and Irony in Edgar Allan Poe´s "The Cask of Amontillado" and "The Tell-Tale Heart"

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In the Edgar Allan Poe stories "The Cask of Amontillado" and "The Tell-Tale Heart" the most prominent and important themes that are used are death, logic, and irony. The characters of the narrator and Montresor in these stories are both coldblooded murders who kill for selfish and inane reasons who firmly believe that their actions are justified even though their justifications only make sense in their own minds. They both try to convince their audience that they are sane by explaining to them their reasons for killing their victims and admitting how they did it, which only helps to prove their insanity. The narrator and Montresor are similar in that they both have impaired senses of judgment encouraged by perverse morals and believe that the horrible things that they do are justifiable. The narrator murders an old man who he is meant to be taking care of. He claims to have nothing against the man and says that he loves him. Regardless of this, he finds the mans filmy, vulture-like eye to be disturbing and thinks this is a valid enough reason to kill him. Montresor feels insulted by his colleague, Fortunado and believes that it is now his duty to end his life. Both claim to not have anything against his victim other than one small detail, being either and eye or an insult, and feel that they are justified in wanting them dead.They both meticulously plan out what they are going to do to their victim long before they carry out their actions. Neither the old man or Fortunado had any idea that their murderer had any reason to want them dead and had no way of anticipating what was doing to happen to them. The narrator smothers the old man with his mattress, chops up his body, and stuffs him in the floorboards. Montresor leads a very d... ... middle of paper ... ...d senses of reality, believing that they have excusable reasons for murdering their victims and truly believe that they are doing the right thing. They want others to believe that they are sane and try very hard to get their audiences to believe them even though they way they present themselves and the reasons they give for doing what they did are not logical to anyone other than themselves, providing further proof that they are in fact insane and do deserve to be punished for their actions.They believe that they have acceptable reasons for doing what they do even though the things that they do are morally inexcusable to everyone else. Neither one sees the doings as anything less than necessary. While they do both admit their actions and do end up displaying some guilt afterwards they are still coldblooded killers with perverse morals and no grasp on actual reality.

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