The Black Cat and The Cask of Amontillado
The Cask of Amontillado and “The Black Cat are among the many popular stories by Edgar Allan Poe famed globally for shaping not only the gothic fiction genre but also the short story genre as a whole. The two short stories depict too many similarities on the surface, yet they surprisingly have unsurpassed differences underneath. Poe explores the narrators’ love for inhumanity to fellow men especially when provoked. The obsession with alcohol and revenge as Poe depicts in the stories drives the characters to commit awful crimes and conceal them, yet they resurface much later due to the guilt that consumes the consciousness of the perpetrators deep inside. While the killing in The Cask of Amontillado is well planned and has a motive, the murder of the narrator’s wife in “The Black Cat” I spontaneous as he had only planned to kill the cat: ORDER YOUR PAPER NOW
The two stories are written in the first person point of view and employ symbolism to relay the intended message. In The cask of Amontillado Montresor retells how he took revenge on a fellow nobleman, Fortunato. The events in the story mainly take place during one cold dark evening (Poe 69). The acts of the characters are an exact replica of what could happen in such environments. In The Black Cat, the unnamed narrator who is the main character in the story tells a story of how he mistakenly killed his wife while trying to kill his pet cat named Pluto (Poe, The Black Cat 4). The black cat is a symbol of evilness and death and precisely represents what happens in the story. Both stories give an account of mysterious and horrific events. The characters kill and wall up their victims to conceal their evil acts. However, they feel guilty of their actions and end up revealing their evil deeds. The narrators in the two cases strive to convince the audience that they are insane and are only doing the right thing. The characters, themes and styles in the two stories by Poe hence depict a great sense of similarity: End of Preview: ORDER YOUR PAPER NOW