poes cask of amontillado

UNIVERSIDADE FEDERAL DO PARANÁCuritiba, 8 de outubro de
1996Curso: Letras - Inglês / NoturnoDisciplina: Literatura Norte
Americana IAluno: Anderson José Nogueira TASK: To write a
summary theme of Poe's "The Cask Of Amontillado" One of the
main themes of Edgar Allan Poe's The Cask Of Amontillado is revenge.
In this summary theme I intend to demonstrate how dramatic irony is
used all along the short story as a way of reminding us the true intentions
of the character who vowed revenge. Firstly I will make a brief
summary of the short story: the story is supposed to happen more than a
hundred years ago ( it was first published in 1846 ) during Italian Carnival
festivities. The main character, a man called Montressor, feels terribly
ofended, even insulted by a friend named Fortunato, and firmly decides to
take this friend's life. In order to achieve his aim, Montressor elaborates a
plan which consists basicaly of two steps: first, to take Fortunato to the
catacombs of the Montressors, and second, to arrest Fortunato down
there forever. Irony first appears in Fortunato's name, once we are
made aware, in the second paragraph, that he is going to be killed, but it (
the irony ) continues present during all the short story as something to call
our attention to what is really happening. In the second
paragraph Montressor states that in spite of his decision of killing
Fortunato, he continued smiling in his face ( Fortunato's ), but he adds:
" and he did not perceive that my smile now was at the thought of his
immolation." So, when they meet each other they behaved as always, but
now Montressor's smile had another meaning for himself.
Certain evening, " during the supreme madness of carnival season ",
Montressor meets his "friend" Fortunato and Montressor is very kind,
even affectionate towards him. He greets Fortunato "My dear Fortunato,
you are luckly met " . The reader that knows Montressor's real intentions
notices here that this greeting has another meaning, different from what it
would mean if we did not know about Montressor's plan.Once we are
aware of Montressor's intentions, we perceive that the real meaning of

the sentence could be something like MY ODIOUS ENEMY
FORTUNATO, IT IS BAD LUCK FOR YOU HAVING MET ME, for
instance. Here, the irony dresses itself with a bitter taste of sadist
disguised angry. However, there are passages in which is
impossible to assure that Montressor was using irony in his speech. For
example, in the passage that Fortunato says- "Enough ( ), the cough is a
mere nothing; it will not kill me. I shall not die of a cough." and Montressor
replies- "True-true, ", we can not be sure that Montressor said that
because he knew Fortunato was going to die by a different cause.
Perhaps Montressor said that without thinking that he himself would be
the cause of Fortunato's death, or at least the agent to cause it.
Another very interesting passage in which there is explicit or
implicit irony is when the two men talk about Montressors' arms. In this
case the irony has meaning by itself. It is not a sentence said dubiously,
but an object that has its own unique meaning. The Montressors' arms
consisted of a image of someone's foot treading a rampant serpent
whose fangs were imbedded in the heel. And the motto was Nemo me
impune lacessit that means no one insults me with impunity. Fortunato
does not know that everything symbolized in Montressors' arms is going
to happen to him. He is the "foot" that is going to be bit by the revengeful
"Montressor's fangs". It is another reminding of what is the real
Montressor's purpose in taking Fortunato to the catacombs. All
these examples demontrate how Edgar Allan Poe uses dramatic irony in
his short story to call the readers' attention to the double meaning of
words, and for extension, as one of Poe's favourite motifs, the duplicity of
human nature.