The Cask of Amontilado

As this is a horror story, the setting is also adequate. Everything begins in the evening during the carnival season. But the location quickly changes from the places where the festival took place into the damp, dark and portentous catacombs of the Montresors.

In order to start the interpretation, we ought to learn more about the two main characters, Fortunato and Montresor. The first one seems to be a very careless man, without any serious problems. He differs so much from Montresor, who is actually the narrator of story as well as the main character. He pledged revenge upon Fortunato for an insult. He is quite sneaky, cunning and what is of great importance here, inexorable. There is also one more character in the text, Luchesi (or Luchresi in some versions) but he is not that important. He does not actually appear, but is merely mentione

I must say, that after reading it, I was a little disappointed, because it was a bit too short for my taste. Then again as every single Poe’s story it will for a long time remain in my memory, and in my heart, as a warning to be wary of gifts from other people.

Let us now try to concentrate on the reasons, why Montresor decided to kill Fortunato; this is not as complicated as it could be. At the very beginning, we are told, that for a long time now Fortunato has been inflicting blows to Montresor: “The thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as I best could”. But when he insulted Montresor this was it: “But when he ventured upon insult, I vowed revenge”, the already thin line was broken.

The origin of the names is also interesting. Luchesi and Fortunato are obviously Italian. Luchesi could be derived out of the word “lucrative”, and Fortunato out of “fortunate”. The third name, Montresor, is French.

Irony seems to be one of Poe’s favourite means of expression, and he didn’t let his readers down in “The Cask of Amontillado” as well.

Some topics in this essay:
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