Fortunato tries to pretend that he is the subject of a joke and that people will be waiting for him (including the Lady Fortunato). He screams for help, but Montresor mocks his cries, knowing nobody can hear them. At first, Fortunato, who sobers up faster than Montresor anticipated, shakes the chains, trying to escape. Montresor reveals brick and mortar, previously hidden among the bones nearby, and walls up the niche using his trowel, entombing his friend alive. Montresor declares that, since Fortunato will not go back, Montresor must "positively leave" him there. Fortunato, drunk and unsuspecting, does not resist as Montresor quickly chains him to the wall. When they come to a niche, Montresor tells his victim that the Amontillado is within. When Montresor appears not to recognize the gesture, Fortunato asks, "You are not of the masons?" Montresor says he is, and when Fortunato, disbelieving, requests a sign, Montresor displays a trowel he had been hiding. During their walk, Montresor mentions his family coat of arms: a golden foot in a blue background crushing a snake whose fangs are embedded in the foot's heel, with the motto Nemo me impune lacessit ("No one provokes me with impunity").Īt one point, Fortunato makes an elaborate, grotesque gesture with an upraised wine bottle. Montresor warns Fortunato, who has a bad cough, of the dampness, and suggests they go back, but Fortunato insists on continuing, claiming that he "shall not die of a cough". Montresor offers wine (first Médoc, then De Grave) to Fortunato in order to keep him inebriated. Fortunato goes with Montresor to the wine cellars of the latter's palazzo, where they wander in the catacombs. Montresor knows Fortunato will not be able to resist demonstrating his discerning palate for wine and will insist that he taste the Amontillado rather than Luchesi who, as he claims, "cannot tell Amontillado from Sherry". He proposes obtaining confirmation of the pipe's contents by inviting a fellow wine aficionado, Luchesi, for a private tasting. Montresor lures Fortunato into a private wine-tasting excursion by telling him he has obtained a pipe (about 130 gallons, or 492 litres) of what he believes to be a rare vintage of Amontillado. Angry over numerous injuries and some unspecified insult, Montresor plots to murder his "friend" during Carnival, while the man is drunk, dizzy, and wearing a jester's motley. The story's narrator, Montresor, tells an unspecified person, who knows him very well, of the day he took his revenge on Fortunato (Italian for "the fortunate one"), a fellow nobleman. The story has been frequently adapted in multiple forms since its original publication.įortunato and Montresor drink in the catacombs. Poe may have been inspired to write the story by his own real-life desire for revenge against contemporary literary rivals. Further, Fortunato is depicted as an expert on wine, which Montresor exploits in his plot, but he does not display the type of respect towards alcohol expected of such experts. However, Poe also leaves clues that Montresor has lost his family's prior status and blames Fortunato. Scholars have noted that Montresor's reasons for revenge are unclear and that he may simply be insane. At the end of the story, Montresor reveals that 50 years have passed since he took revenge and Fortunato's body has not been disturbed. For unknown reasons, Montresor seeks revenge upon Fortunato and is actually luring him into a trap, entombing him alive within the catacombs. Fortunato follows him into the Montresor family vaults, which also serve as catacombs. Montresor invites Fortunato to sample amontillado that he has just purchased without proving its authenticity. As in " The Black Cat" and " The Tell-Tale Heart", Poe conveys the story from the murderer's perspective. Like several of Poe's stories, and in keeping with the 19th-century fascination with the subject, the narrative follows a person being buried alive – in this case, by immurement. The story, set in an unnamed Italian city at carnival time, is about a man taking fatal revenge on a friend who, he believes, has insulted him. " The Cask of Amontillado" (sometimes spelled " The Casque of Amontillado" ) is a short story by the American writer Edgar Allan Poe, first published in the November 1846 issue of Godey's Lady's Book. Illustration of "The Cask of Amontillado" by Harry Clarke, 1919
0 kommentar(er)
