The Cask of Amontillado

InHee Ho
Edgar Allan Poe/Dark Romanticism
March 22 2012

“The thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as I best could, but when he ventured upon insult, I vowed revenge.” Reading this very first sentence of The Cask of Amontillado, I sensed two things. First was the smell of revenge and tragic ending, which typically appears in Poe’s writing. Second was the meaning of the name ‘Fortunato’. As many literatures connotatively allude to a character’s fate, I vaguely expected this story to have a fortunate ending. But on the other hand, reflecting on the general ‘Poe’ stories, I anticipated the most unfortunate ending of Fortunato. Apparently, both of my expectations turned out to correspond well to the actual story. Just like Poe’s thousands of other pieces, this story had a tragic ending--Fortunato’s death. Instead of some anticipation after I finished reading, one question filled my mind. What drove Montraseur to revenge Fortunato?

The first thing that came to my mind was ‘pride’. Montraseur was discontented with Fortunato’s vanity. As vanity is known as one of the seven greatest sins, Montraseur’s behavior in this context may be seen as an act of punishment. For sure, vanity is something to look out. But reading the text in Montraseur’s perspective, I could find no meaning or punishment. All I could grasp was a causeless hatred toward Fortunato.

Then, what drove Montraseur to commit such a brutal act? Maybe a lack of reason that potentially lies under all human minds. Our emotions aren’t always driven by reason. We sometimes suddenly feel favor toward something. In the same manner, we may feel sudden loathing. The key is that these reasonless emotions are often applied directly to behavior. Montraseur failed (or refused) to moderate his creeping hatred that finally boomed out as a strong impulse to get rid of Fortunato. The story develops with Montraseur telling his own story fifty years later. Reminiscing , was Montraseur still feeling the emotions he had half a century ago? By winding up his story with ‘in pace requiescat’ at the end? This seems to be a confession, but the reason for his confession was unclear. Maybe these ‘reasonless’ emotions aren’t always to be blamed. Why do people try to put all their emotions in reason? Sometimes emotions are aroused without reason, and that is probably why we call them ‘emotion.’ The Cask of Amontillado may imply the effort to perceive emotion as solely emotion.

The last thing I thought of was Poe’s desire expressed in his writing. Poe was suspected to have syphilis. He was also suspected to have led poisoning. Whatever disease he had, Poe is widely known to have had some harsh mental impulse. His father, a strolling player, abandoned Poe when he was about a year old, and his mother died of tuberculosis. His uncle later adopted him. Poe attended Virginia University, but dropped out because his uncle discontinued financial support for him. After leaving the school, Poe was addicted to alcohol and gambling. He fell in love with his 13-year-old cousin, Virginia Glemm, but she died soon after from privation and tuberculosis. Poe’s life after Glemm’s death is a mystery, except that he was mentally unstable. Perhaps the story was a reflection of his flaming of desire.








{Comments}

Lee Hyejoon: You mentioned about the two impressions you got when you read the first paragraph and the second one was 'Fortunato's fortune' which you dismissed as you just guessing wrong. However, this might be some kind of an intentional irony because Fortunato turned out not only to be 'not fortunate', but to be 'unfortunate'. I thought this was something like '운수 좋은 날' so the author makes you expect something in the beginning which turns out to be entirely false. Maybe you can elaborate more on this part.


Chonghyun Ahn: I really enjoyed the part when you juxtaposed the concept of emtion and reason. However I had two issues of disconsent in your essay:
1. about 'reasonless being problematic'. I don't think Poe had intended to show how emotional and unreasonable is problematic. In the stories the leiller is not punished; he manages to get away with his crime for half a century. Instead, wouldn't it be more apt to say that Poe tried to show how emotions and madness is an acceptable thing? 
2. Also, I do not see the relationship between confession and your argument of emotions being problematic. So by confessing, did the murderer save himself from hatred? Was there a tint of regret in his confession? 
Anyway, I really liked your writing!! Thanks for sharing :)