SOURCE: "The Supreme Madness: Revenge and the Bells in The Cask of Amontillado'," in The University of Mississippi Studies in English, Vol. V, 1987, pp. 51-7.

In the following essay, Stewart draws parallels between Poe's narrative and the stagecraft of Elizabethan revenge tragedy, highlighting his use of sound effects.

Even the most nonchalant reader admits that Edgar Allan Poe was more than a little interested in madness; he may be less aware, however, that Poe also dabbled in the dramatic arts. Poe's mix of madness and drama, specifically the substance of revenge tragedy in "The Cask of Amontillado," offers yet another example of his wideranging mind and creative propensities. I perceive in Poe's tale a parallel to Elizabethan revenge tragedy.¹ Pointing out that Woodberry calls "Cask" "a tale of Italian revenge," Mabbott states that such feeling embodies "an implacable demand for retribution," which Poe accounts for in the beginning...