A Psychological Occurance of Montresor as an Obsession of Revenge with Impunity in Edgar Allen Poe's "The Cask of Amontillado"
Edgar Allen Poe is an American short story writer,poet and literary critic.His famous short stories are based on not only horrific events,but also on psychological distortations as in "The Cask of Amontillado".In his literary critic on short story writing style,he says a short story should turn around a central event and all the other things must have use for that main point.In this short story,his main point is the result of obsession of revenge with impunity and all the other actions serve for the protagonist's punishment against provoking.Poe uses the elements of symbolism generously and for this purpose,he benefits from mythology.He uses Dionysos,the god of wine,to define Montresor's inner self.He uses the feast for Dionysos,the time when people get crazy and can get revenge in that chaos,to justify the murder.All his methods -symbolism,irony,pun,foreshadowing,etc.- create the subject; the psychological obsession for revenge which occurs by coming up against an indignity and having the feeling inside by not making victim's personality felt.
We have a mad protagonist named Montresor and a drunk antagonist named Fortunado,which means luck-adverse to his bitter end.Montresor begins his story by mentioning to an unknown person/thing about a vow of revenge for the insult of Fortunado.Planningly,in the feast time for Dionysos,Montresor takes Fortunado to his underground cellar by saying he'll take him at where the famous wine Amontillado is present.They have conversation including foreshadowings,ironies and puns.Drunk Fortunado gets aware of his tragic occasion only when he's walled up by Montresor among Montresor's family catacombs.With this horrible scene and murder style,we see how grim the mankind can be when they feel offended psychologically.
In the story,we're not able to find any specific sign proving Montresor's being insane.However,from the symbols,narrating style and the bitter end,it's not hard to label the protagonist as a mad
We have a mad protagonist named Montresor and a drunk antagonist named Fortunado,which means luck-adverse to his bitter end.Montresor begins his story by mentioning to an unknown person/thing about a vow of revenge for the insult of Fortunado.Planningly,in the feast time for Dionysos,Montresor takes Fortunado to his underground cellar by saying he'll take him at where the famous wine Amontillado is present.They have conversation including foreshadowings,ironies and puns.Drunk Fortunado gets aware of his tragic occasion only when he's walled up by Montresor among Montresor's family catacombs.With this horrible scene and murder style,we see how grim the mankind can be when they feel offended psychologically.
In the story,we're not able to find any specific sign proving Montresor's being insane.However,from the symbols,narrating style and the bitter end,it's not hard to label the protagonist as a mad
References: ¹ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_cask_of_amontillado - Baraban, Elena V. "The Motive for Murder in 'The Cask of Amontillado ' by Edgar Allan Poe." collected in Rocky Mountain E-Review of Language and Literature. Volume 58, Number 2. Fall 2004. ² http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obsession_%28Spiritism%29 ³ http://www.afl.org.tr/mezun/e_bulten/2005/temmuz/leventmete.htm