Death-Despair-Vengeance: a recipe for good drama"Burning my heart burned with pain, not even hell will make me fear again."Edgar Allan Poe, Tamerlane, part Death, desperation and revenge, these three words form an insidious triangle for any reader who dares to enter the mind of Edgar Allen Poe. In many of his works these expressions seem to constitute a recurring theme. Comparing the works "The Masque of the Red Death" and "The Cask of Amontillado", we will discuss these themes while analyzing the method behind Poe's madness. In much of Poe's work, the presence of revenge and death seem to precede each other. In both stories, if someone dies, revenge follows. If someone takes revenge, death seems to find that person. With the deaths of the commoners in "The Masque of the Red Death," vengeance seems to follow the prince who abandoned them. When Fortunato betrays Montresor in "The Cask of Amontillado", death follows shortly after. At the end of the stories the characters close the circle with destiny, be it luck or bad luck. In the story "The Barrel of Amontillado", Edgar Allen Poe tells the story of Montresor and Fortunato. This story has a much lighter feel, but right from the start there is some tension between Fortunato and Montresor. The story itself has a rushed tone and you are kept on edge with the suspense that something dark could happen at any moment. There are hints throughout the plot that give hints that there will be revenge in the near future. The sad tone of death hangs in the air as the two characters interact with each other. Montresor, even though he smiles in front of Fortunato, is planning in his head the death of his enemy. Fortuna mistreats Montresor and that's why he has such...... middle of paper......montillado", Edgar Allen Poe tells us two very different stories with a similar theme. Poe seems quite comfortable writing of death in different situations, and advises us that death and revenge most of the time do not go hand in hand. This seems to be his most common theme not only in these two pieces, but also in much of his work exception, and that it is a normal part of life. Poe seems to write more easily about death than about life, and approaches it with more skill and technique than most writers. Literature: The Cask of Amontillado.http://bau2. uibk.ac.at/sg/poe/works/cask_amo.html.Poe, Edgar Allen “The Masque of the Red Death: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry and Drama.”, 2005.