The Cask of Amontillado is centered entirely upon revenge and vengeance. This conflict between the narrator and Fortunato explores his past decision to kill a man based on perceived injustices. Poe uses this conflict to explore the difference between Fortunato and Montresor’s character flaws which led to the major conflict, while simultaneously studying how obsession can control the mind. By studying these downfalls , the story darkly shifts from the carnival celebration to death in the catacombs. The story descends to madness much like how the mind does when it deals with strong fixations.
Even at the story’s opening sentence, there is a sense that the narrator is still grappling with his all-encompassing obsession with the murder. It is only at the end that we learn that the entombment happened fifty years previously, and had been undisturbed. This story’s retelling could be in a journal entry for self-release, a story told to an unnamed listener for gloating purposes, or some other combination for forgiveness. The circumstances surrounding its retelling are up to the reader’s interpretation, especially in relation to the narrator’s aim. He explains why he must be avenged for the unnamed “thousand injuries” that Fortunato insulted him with in terms that reflect a whole minded fixation.
I must not only punish but punish with impunity. A wrong is unredressed when retribution overtakes its redresser. It is equally unredressed when the avenger fails to make himself felt as such to him who has done the wrong. (Poe 1612)
This ending to the introductory paragraph introduces the narrator’s repeated philosophical justification for his actions. Fortunato wronged him, did not apologize, and therefore must be punished to amend the situati...
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...also muddles the conflict’s resolution. A gloating tone is noticeable with the story’s ending, “In pace requiescat!”, or “May he rest in peace!”. Instead of a sincere condolence to Fortunato’s death, this line hints at Montresor’s pride in killing him. Although he succeeded in killing Fortunato to amend the injustices, the narrator remains fixated on the event. This suggests an attachment, or obsession, that leaves the conflict unresolved.
By exploring how various obsessions can overtake the psyche, The Cask of Amontillado takes an unclear position on its murderous plot. The reader can sympathize with the murderer, both Montresor and Fortunato have the same vice, and the entombment does not finalize the conflict. The deeper levels within the conflict further create its impossibility to eradicate in the plot, and the narrator’s obsessions prevail over a resolution.
Montresor, fifty years after it happened, is confessing to the murder of his foe, Fortunato. He justifies his actions by saying that Fortunato caused him a thous...
Montressor had said “In pace requiescat!”, but rest in peace Fortunato did not. As Fortunato took his last breath he heard Montressor yell his name and then leave. A strange sensation then came over Fortunato and he could sense the energy flowing out of him, a rising feeling held him above the ground as he became a restless spirit. He thought to himself “Why am I not allowed to go? What must be keeping me here?”, and then recalled that it was Montressor that had done this to him, Montressor that had led him into the vaults and then sealed him up to die of pneumonia. Revenge, that was what had drove Montressor to murder, and what was keeping Fortunato in the mortal world. Fortunato realized that he must find Montressor, and exact his revenge before he would be able to pass over. And down there, in the deepest, darkest vault, he planned his revenge.
However, the struggle goes deeper once one has read the entire story. With great detail, Montresor is telling this tale fifty years after the fact. Why take the nearly last piece of evidence Poe has left, “For the half of a century no mortal has disturbed [Fortunato’s bones]” as the key source of information to shine the light upon? (Poe) This quote is the link to the growing suspicion that this murder is not so perfect.
The Cask of Amontillado is an eloquent story narrated from the murderer’s point of view. Montressor seeks revenge against Fortunato for numerous insults the reader can only imagine. In order to determine the severity of the apparent injustices, Fortunato himself must be understood. Montressor describes him as being “rich, respected, admired, [and] beloved,” as well as “a man to be … feared” (Poe 274-276). Fortunato was a flawed individual, however. His greatest imperfection was his love for wine. Fortunato’s “connoisseurship” (274) of wine resulted in his intoxicated state throughout the short story. His physical and mental capacities were impaired by his drunkenness, and as a result, he was unable to resist Montressor’s lure into the catacombs.
The author introduces the readers to the narrator who is known as Montresor when he is talking to an unknown audience. In the course of the discussion with the unknown audience, Montresor attests to the fact that Fortunato, who is a close friend of his has morally insulted. Due to the moral insult labeled against him, Montresor intends to revenge. “Part of Montresor's vengeance plan, however, is to ensure that he does not expose himself neither to Fortunato nor to the society at large” (Johnson et.al, 8). To this effect, he does not let open the ill feelings that he harbors against Fortunato. Montresor asserts to the fact that he would consider his vengeance plan a failure if at all Fortunato found out and exerted revenge. That notwithstanding though, he says that he would let Fortunato know that he is the mastermind of all his misfortunes when he will be satisfied that his vengeance plan will not backfire.
but punish with impunity” and “the avenger must make himself felt as such to him who
Vengeance and pride are fundamentally important to this short story. From the inception of the tale it is clear that the narrator is a proud, vindictive man; opening with, “the thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as I best could, but when he ventured upon insult, I vowed revenge,” the narrator immediately alerts the reader to the dark aspects of his own character. Because “insult” and not “the thousand injuries” caused the narrator to “vow” revenge, the reader can infer Montresor is prideful because, although he already had conflict with Fortunato, insult was what made the tense situation unbearable for Montresor––so much so that he vowed to take action. Use of the word “vow” is significant because it indicates that the grievance was meaningful in the mind of Montresor, allowing for the reader to more easily identify with the actions to be revealed throughout the course of the story; if the reader believes that Montresor was provoked in a profound way, ...
A main theme presented in “The Cask of Amontillado” by Edgar Allan Poe is that Montresor shows obsession with the murder of fortunato. This is exemplified by Montresor’s precise planning, carefulness and slowness of speed in the process.
The Cask of Amontillado is a horror short story, which revolves around the themes of revenge and pride. The plot involves two men: Montresor, the narrator, who is an Italian aristocrat seeking revenge against the second main character: Fortunato, a proud man that flaunts about his knowledge of wines and who finally walks into his own death.
Likewise, Poe employs the perception of perversity and remorse in “The Cask of Amontillado.” The reason of burying Fortunato is not only vengeance, but also a robust reaction that is described in “The Black Cat”. There is a passionate yearning in Montresor to hurt Fortunato even if he has not made any harm to him. Although Montresor asserts that he has been injured several times by Fortunato, he cannot defy calling him “respected, admired, beloved,” admitting his “good nature,” and also calling him “noble” (Little 212). These expressions confirmed that Fortunato is a good quality person and the expression “injuries” used in the first phase of the story is simply a hyperbole that Montresor’s psyche has fabricated. Furthermore, wickedness does not come unaccompanied, but it carries itself a sense of remorse. Even if Montresor reflects himself as the diplomat of his family for deafening down rivals, he suffers remorse while walling up and killing Fortunato. Consequently, Poe’s clasp of unreasonableness and culpability of the human mind is
The Cask of Amontillado, the narrator, Montresor, want to seek out revenge after Fortunato because Fortunato irreparably insulted him. Throughout the whole story, Montresor made it his mission to get back at Fortunato. The major theme is vengeance as it can drive a person to go as far as committing murder. The author uses many literary devices to elaborate this theme in the story, such as where the story is taken place, Irony, and Foreshadowing.
In her article, Renee utters that when the thought of vengeance build up in an individual’s brain, it coerces him insane and does not tolerate him to present it a second thought. The first sentence of the story, “The thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as I best could, but when he ventured upon insult I vowed revenge,” clearly describes the whole theme of the story as a deeply enrooted revenge in Montresor’s mind” which is an absolute portrayal of retribution that occurs due to arrogance and jealousy. Author sees himself as a superior individual and was victimized by a superiority complex which is quite visible through the phrases which he wrote in the story that Montressor expresses superiority as showed his victim as a foolish person by attributing weird physical appearance and dress appearance in which he described his dress code of “tight fitting parti striped dress and head was surmounted by the conical cap and bells.”
Thompson states, “He similarly shows confidence in the rightness of his action in his last words to Fortunato. Fortunato, desperate for his life, pleads, ‘For the love of God, Montresor!’ Montresor, with what must strike Fortunato as biting irony, replies, ‘Yes,... for the love of God!’. He is doing this ... not ‘For God and Country!’but for ..., "For God and family!"(555) This shows the irony of the situation. Fortunato expected this all to be a joke, but he soon realizes that it is not. This also shows the final example of poetic justice. Montresor commits murder for the love and the name of his family which Fortunato has disgraced.
Edgar Allen Poe’s tale of murder and revenge, “The Cask of Amontillado”, offers a unique perspective into the mind of a deranged murderer. The effectiveness of the story is largely due to its first person point of view, which allows the reader a deeper involvement into the thoughts and motivations of the protagonist, Montresor. The first person narration results in an unbalanced viewpoint on the central conflict of the story, man versus man, because the reader knows very little about the thoughts of the antagonist, Fortunato. The setting of “The Cask of Amontillado”, in the dark catacombs of Montresor’s wine cellar, contributes to the story’s theme that some people will go to great lengths to fanatically defend their honor.
In Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Cask of Amontillado,” Montresor sets out on a vengeful mission that will end Fortunato’s life in an untimely fate. Montresor appeals to Fortunato’s love for wine to tempt the unsuspecting fellow to his impending doom. While Montresor tricks the foolish Fortunato frightfully, it is ultimately Fortunato’s pride that leads to his demise in the crypt. Poe uses several literary devices to foreshadow this murderous exploit of Montresor. Through the use of irony, symbolism, and imagery, the story entices readers to delve into the relationships and differences between Montresor and Fortunato.