Theme Of Confinement In The Cask Of Amontillado

684 Words2 Pages

In “The Cask of Amontillado” by Edgar Allen Poe there are several themes, but the themes that stood out to me the most were freedom and confinement, and revenge. The incorporation of the themes make the readers, think more deeply about what makes them feel trapped, what makes them feel free, and personal faults. Edgar Allen Poe explores the themes of freedom and confinement and man’s desire for revenge through the use of dramatic irony, dialogue, and setting. The setting in the short story is greatly incorporated into theme; it has a special purpose, to suggest freedom or confinement of the characters. Most people go back and forth with feeling free and feeling trapped. The author makes us aware of these emotions through details …show more content…

This is suggesting that, as they travel farther away from the open world, they are also moving further away from that freedom. Fortunato is eventually trapped in a space, chained up and bricked inside a crypt with no air and no way out— the human emotion of entrapment. Unlike Fortunato, Montresor finds freedom at the end of the story by being alive. For one character to be free, another must die. The confinement in the crypts makes both the readers and the characters appreciate the freedom they …show more content…

Through the use of dramatic irony, the reader is reminded of the true intentions of the character. We know something that one or more of the characters do not. An example of such irony is when Montresor toasts to Fortunato’s “long life”, we the audience know that Fortunato might die. Another important passage depicting irony is when the two men discuss Montresor’s arms. "I forget your arms." "A huge human foot d'or, in a field azure; the foot crushes a serpent rampant whose fangs are imbedded in the heel." "And the motto?" "Nemo me impune lacessit" (Poe 168). The Montresor’s arms show an image of someone’s foot striding a ‘rampant serpent whose fangs were imbedded in the heel’. The motto ‘nemo me impune lacessit’ means ‘no one insults me with impunity’. Fortunato is unaware of all of this symbolism. He is unaware that everything symbolized in the Montresor’s arms is what’s going to happen to him. He is the foot that is going to be bitten by the Montresor’s fangs. Through the use of the theme revenge, Poe makes the reader think about his own faults and dooms with

Open Document