A Literary Reading of Edgar Allan Poe's "The Cask of Amontillado" Using Traditional Approach

Edgar Allan Poe was born in Boston on January 19, 1809. His parents were David and Elizabeth Poe. Edgar's mother, Elizabeth, died when he was just 2 years old and after the death of his mother, he was adopted. His foster father was a successful merchant, so Edgar was able to go to good schools. When he was 6 years old, he went to England to study. He went to the University of Virginia when he was 17 years old. While in his university days, his father only gave him about a third of what he really needed. He did well in Latin and French but eventually, he started to be a drunkard and became in debt so he had to quit school. When he was 18, he went to Boston to serve in the US Army. He didn't stay long in the army and eventually, he was dismissed. He tried his luck on being a writer and submitted stories for some magazines. He became part of the Southern Literary Messenger, Graham's Magazine, The Stylus (it failed) and The Broadway Journal. He wrote his first volume of "Tales of Grotesque and Arabesque" that was published in 1839. After a year of becoming the editor of The Broadway Journal, he ran out of money and lost his job again. His family moved into a small cottage. Edgar's wife's health was slowly fading away until she died in 1847. Poe collapsed from stress after the loss of his wife. In June 1849, Poe went to Philadelphia and visited his friend, John Sartain. On October 3 he was found at Gunner's Hall and he was taken to the hospital. He was unconscious and had no knowledge of what happened to him. Edgar Allan Poe died in the hospital on October 7, 1849. The cause of his death is a mystery because no one really knows what happened to him on the last days of his life. Some say that he died from alcoholism, some say that he was mugged and others even hypothesized that he died from rabies. No one really knows.

"The Cask of Amontillado" is a short story written by Edgar Allan Poe in 1846. This short story, like his other works, is full of mysteries.

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