Does the evidence prove Montresor is sane or insane in "The Cask of Amontillado"?

Measured against some of the killers in contemporary America, Montesor follows the pattern of those who have posted manifestos before they slaughter their victims. Here is his:

I must not only punish, but punish with impunity.
A wrong is unredressed when retribution overtakes its redresser.
It is equally unredressed when the avenger fails to make himself as such to him who has done wrong.

Granted, he kills only one man, but his motives appear to be as delusional as some other deranged killers because throughout the narrative of "The Cask of Amontillado" there is no interchange between victim and murderer that would substantiate the hyperbolic claims of Montresor that he has endured "a thousand injuries."

Clearly, too, Montresor is obsessed with his method of murder and its process more than the murder of his victim itself. He delights in the arabesques of suggestion and false concern, understatement, pun (the trowel and jokingly calling himself a "mason"), innuendo, and repetition as he herds the drunken and deluded victim, Fortunato, farther and farther into the depths of the niter-ridden and bone-strewn caverns. Some critics even feel that Montresor's sadistic intents take a prurient turn, as in the last part of the narrative Montresor "seduces" Fortunato as he "fettered him" to the granite and asks him to pass his hand over the wall. In this last passage, one critic suggests that there may be double meanings to Montresor's use of such words as "ejaculated," "unsheathing my rapier," "erected the hairs upon my head" that occur in the final paragraphs.

Certainly, the behavior of Montresor is bizarre and the real horror of this tale lies in the mind of the killer himself who distorts and exaggerates and perverts all the action and verbal interchange. Furthermore, he seems disappointed when he has finished his acts of unsubstantiated reprisal; for, after he calls to Fortunato behind the wall and his victim does not respond, Montresor states, "My heart grew sick," then makes an excuse quickly.

The use of reverse psychology is rampant through the story and demonstrates how perverted and backwards all the relationships in the story have become [Enotes]

Insanity means that you are partially or fully incapable of rational thinking and reasoning. An insane person performs actions without considering the consequences or how it affects other people.

In "The Cask of Amontillado," we can argue that Montresor is insane because he schemes to kill Fortunato because Fortunato insulted him. We don't know the nature of this insult, but we can safely assume it was a rough insult if it leads Montresor to murder his so-called friend.

Still, the idea of killing somebody simply because they insulted you might be considered a sign of insanity. Montresor seemingly hasn't thought about any other response to Fortunato's behavior than killing him; if his mind immediately went to murder, than Montresor is thinking impulsively rather than rationally.

Montresor is fixated on taking his revenge, which is another sign that he is insane. Thinking about revenge in and of itself is not necessarily insane—everybody does that when somebody wrongs them. But sane people consider more peaceful options and think about the best way to proceed. Montresor only feels guilty after the deed is done, suggesting there is some sanity still left inside of him.

We know that Montresor is insane because he kills a man for no reason.

To be insane is to not have full use of your mental faculties.  In other words, a person thinks things that a sane person never would.  He or she may see or hear things that or not there, or imagine things.  This person will do things that a sane person would never do, like kill a person.

We can tell Montresor is insane because he decides to kill a man, Fortunato, because of a ridiculous reason.  He says that Fortunato has insulted him and has to die because of that.

THE THOUSAND INJURIES of Fortunato I had borne as I best could, but when he ventured upon insult I vowed revenge. You, who so well know the nature of my soul, will not suppose, however, that I gave utterance to a threat. At length I would be avenged …

Most people do not kill others because of an insult, especially a minor one, and certainly not with this much planning.  It is not normal, or sane.  Actually, killing another person is not a normal or sane thing to do in general.  Planning a meticulous murder and wanting to get away with it is a thing that some people do, and it is not something in and of itself that makes a person insane.  What makes Montresor insane is the fact that he found something minor as the motive and meticulously planned a murder from it.

We know that the “thousand injuries” were minor because first of all it is hyperbole (gross exaggeration) and second of all, if Fortunato had really done something to Montresor there is no way he would have gone into the catacombs with him!  If you have done real insult to someone and there is a chance he might be planning revenge, you don’t go underground with him.

Montresor asks Fortunato to look at a special cask of wine with him.

I said to him—“My dear Fortunato, you are luckily met. How remarkably well you are looking to-day. But I have received a pipe of what passes for Amontillado, and I have my doubts.”

Fortunato is surprised, especially since Montresor wants him to look at the wine “in the middle of the carnival,” but he goes along with it because of his pride. Montresor tells him he needs his opinion, and even says he might get another man’s opinion, and Fortunato is having none of that.

Montresor goes through with killing Fortunato and feels no remorse until he is dead.  This again shows that he is insane.  He is more concerned with getting away with the murder.

Is Montresor psychologically unstable in "The Cask of Amontillado"?

What is insanity? Couldn't it be maintained that anyone who commits a murder must be "psychologically unstable"? Montresor is certainly sane enough to be able to tell his whole story fifty years after the events took place. Could an insane man do that? Wouldn't there be some obvious lapses in his narrative during which it became apparent that he was not entirely stable psychologically? There certainly are plenty of such lapses in the protagonist's narrative in Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart."

Wouldn't an insane man run a great risk of getting caught? Wouldn't people wonder about him--his speech, his behavior?

Some readers maintain that Montresor must be insane because he must be only imagining that Fortunato has "injured" him a thousand times. They believe that Montresor should have provided examples of those injuries. There is little other evidence of insanity--except for the extreme sadism of the revenge. But the chains that held Fortunato had evidently been fastened to the granite wall for centuries and must have been used for the same purpose. We those other executioners also insane?  

Here is an interesting statement by a prominent thinker who was famous as an anti-Freudian:

For nearly 20 years now I have maintained that there is no such thing as mental illness .... it is implicit in this view that there can also be no such thing as psychiatric diagnosis, prognosis, or treatment.

Thomas S. Szasz, M.D., The Myth of Psychotherapy, American Journal of Psychotherapy, 28 (Oct. 1974): 517-526.

It should be noted that Montresor is not narrating the story as it is taking place. Instead he is narrating his recollection of an event that occurred over fifty years before. He may have been psychologically unstable before and during the time he was committing the terrible murder; but after fifty years he seems to be quite sane and at peace with himself and the world. He does not seem to be troubled by feelings of guilt. Rather, he seems to be quite satisfied with his accomplishment. He had a big problem and he solved it to his satisfaction. He had to lure Fortunato underground without being observed by anyone on the streets. Even after Fortunato turned up missing, he had to pretend to be just as concerned as anyone else. Montresor may have been completely insane during the time he was planning the murder and while he was leading Fortunato to his doom, but he could be completely sane by the time he writes the confession which Poe publishes under the title of "The Cask of Amontillado." His narrative seems to reveal a terrible sort of sanity rather than insanity. An insane person, like the narrator of "The Tell-Tale Heart," would be very likely to make mistakes and give himself away.

True, #10. Part of the great horror of the story is the slow realization of just how nuts Montressor really is. The reader comes to this realization about the same time Fortunato sobers up and realizes it, also. It's been a long time since I read "The Tell-Tale Heart," but I think this same narrative technique was employed in that story, as well.

The other posts make good points. Poe certainly did not want the reader to assume that Montressor was mentally unstable or he would have spelled it out much more clearly. The uncertainty is just one of the reasons that makes the short story one of the greatest in American literature. Do I think Montressor was unstable? Absolutely, though he was certainly able to maintain enough mental stability to complete his well-planned murder.

Is a psychopath or a sociopath psychologically unstable? How about a narcissist? I think so, and Montresor qualifies as all three. These personalities all deviate from the norm in human behavior and are therefore not grounded in healthy behavior--ungrounded, unstable. I wouldn't confuse stable with functional. Montresor was functional, even highly functional in planning his horrendous revenge and carrying it out without a hitch, but Ted Bundy was very functional and highly effective as a serial murderer, and I doubt anyone would consider him to have been psychologically stable. It's true that Bundy's psychological self-control eventually disintegrated and Montresor's did not, but I wouldn't attribute that to any "stability" in him. It is, however, a great plot and structure device in shaping the story.

If Poe had wanted us all to think one way about Montressor, he would have told us more clearly that Montressor was crazy. As a master storyteller though, Poe wanted us to consider what might be in a man's nature that would make him carry a grudge to this extreme, and then relish the retelling of every grim detail so many years later.

I've met people like Montressor before--though certainly they do not go as far as he does.  They feel as if they've been wronged, they see imaginary insults when none are given, and they let those perceived insults eat at them until they finally somehow snap or burst out with some almost incomprehensible reasoning for their reactions.  I know.  It sounds crazy, but I think most of us who have lived a bit have, indeed, seen this. What they don't do is cross the line and decide to take such drastic action.  That, to me, is what separates "normal" people from Montressor. On one hand, he is deliberate and strategic and able to contain his hidden intentions until the last moment, a sure sign of sanity.  On the other hand, he lives proudly guilt-free with his actions for half a century, a sure sign of mental and emotional callousness, at least, and perhaps psychological illness.  That's why Poe is the master. 

I guess it depends on how you define psychologically unstable. I personally do think he is pretty whacko (the technical term) and he is definitely an example of a stylistic device that Poe uses very frequently - the unreliable narrator. What makes me suspect that his perception of Fortunato is wrong is what we are told in the first paragraph. If Fortunato had insulted Montresor so very badly, it is hardly likely that he would trust him enough to go with him, by himself, down into the Montresor Catacombs. This suggests to me that this "insult" was a figment of the overactive brain of Montresor. Combined with the way in which he gets his revenge this suggests that Montresor is one unstable cookie.

We have to distinguish between "unstable" psychology, in which the subject's mental state can change from time to time, and "pathological" psychology: in this case, a mental state in which Montresor feels driven to torture Fortunato.

It seems that Montresor is stable enough, since he is still here and by implication at liberty 50 years later.

But it's apparent that he is subject to bizarre thinking, in which he becomes obsessed by anger at what he perceives are "the thousand insults of Fortunato".  He also seems to have what used to be called psychopathic or sociopathic personality disorder, where he lacks empathy and any sense that another person has some right not to be harmed.  He seems to regard Fortunato not as a "real" person, but rather as an annoying bug that he can punish and destroy.

Montresor is obviously able to think well enough to plan his ambush well in advance, and protect himself from retribution.

He also needs to preserve his superiority over Fortunato:  Montresor's family "was great and numerous", and their arms showed a foot crushing a snake; the motto means essentially "nobody disses me".  But Fortunato's name signifies "lucky", and I guess that the thousand insults were occasions when Fortunato outshone Montresor.

Montresor's bizarre thinking magnifies Fortunato's successes into mortal insults, and he convinces himself that he has to eradicate Fortunato from the Earth.

After the tomb is walled up Montresor feels sick at heart, but he is able to dismiss his human reaction to the death as something trivial induced by the dampness of the catacombs.

However, I was left with the impression he had not subsequently killed anybody else; possibly he could not accept his actions, and never dared to repeat them.

As is characteristic of his narrators, Poe's Montresor is clearly an unreliable narrator.  His emotional declaration in the first sentence indicates a tunneling of vision: 

The thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as I best could; but when he ventured upon insult, I vowed revenge. 

Following this declaration, Poe addresses the readers as though they should understand his statement:

You, who so well know the nature of my soul, will not suppose, however, that I gave utterance to a threat. 

Then, Poe's "explanation" of his plan of revenge and its rationale displays a personality that is obsessed with redressing what he feels are wrongs against him:

 At length, I would be avenged; this was a point definitively settle--but the very definitiveness with which it was resolved precluded the idea of risk.  A wrong is unredressed when retribution overtakes its redresser.  It is equally unredressed when the avenger fails to make himself felt as such to him who has done the wrong.

Clearly, there seems to be a certain degree of psychological instability to a narrator who perceives whatever insults or injuries someone has done to him as "the thousand"; and, his addressing the "you, who know me so well" does not seem be normal in any way.  That he has survived for fifty years after his murderous act does not necessarily exhibit mental stability.  After all, many an insane person lives a full life without detection of his/her condition.

Is Montresor in Poe's "The Cask of Amontillado" insane? Give two reasons.

The narrator of Poe's story "The Tell-Tale Heart" is obviously insane, but that should not give anyone cause to think Montresor is also insane. In fact, it might be possible to strengthen the case that Montresor is sane by asserting that Poe would not be likely to write two murder stories in which he used the same kind of narrator. It should be noted that the narrator of "The Tell-Tale Heart" gives himself away and confesses, whereas Montresor keeps his secret for at least fifty years.

There is no reason to claim that Montresor is insane except for one  element in his disclosure. He says that Fortunato has injured him "a thousand times," and yet he does not give a single example of an injury he has suffered. Some readers have concluded that Montresor has not suffered any injuries and therefore must be delusional. If he had not suffered any injuries, it would be easy for him to deceive and entrap Fortunato, because the poor man would have no reason to suspect any ulterior motive when Montresor lures him to his death. If Montresor has not been injured, then he is insane. But Poe could not have left the question of his sanity or insanity to hinge on a few words in the opening sentence of his story: "The thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as best I could, etc." If Poe wanted the reader to believe Montresor is insane, his creator would have given further evidence throughout the story. And if there is a plausible explanation for the "thousand injuries," that should refute the claim that Montresor is insane. To repeat: If Montresor really suffered a great many injuries from Fortunato, then he is sane.

It was a stroke of Poe's great literary genius that he began his story as if he were addressing a long-time friend in confidence. This eliminated the need for a great deal of exposition. For example, he doesn't have to explain where he lives, or who Fortunato was, or how long he had known him, or what their relationship was--or even what injuries he has suffered.

A clue to the "thousand injuries" can be found in the third paragraph of the story.

Few Italians have the true virtuoso spirit. For the most part their enthusiasm is adopted to suit the time and opportunity to practice imposture upon the British and Austiran millionaires. In painting and gemmary, Fortunato, like his countrymen, was a quack, but in the matter of old wines he was sincere. In this respect I did not differ from him materially; I was skilful in the Italian vintages myself, and bought largely whenever I could.

Now this says clearly that both men are experts who deal in one-of-a-kind items such as oil paintings, statues, antiques, and gourmet wines. Fortunato, as we learn, is rich and Montresor is hard up. Fortunato would have had countless opportunities to beat Montresor in business deals, both because he had more money and because, being Italian, he had more connections.

When Montresor tells Fortunato about his purchase of a cask of Amontillado, he knows his friendly enemy will see an opportunity to profit. They do not "buy largely" unless they are planning to sell. Fortunato goes with Montresor because he imagines a whole shipload of Amontillado newly arrived which he can buy up at a bargain price. Once again Fortunato would be beating his friend out of a deal, adding to the thousand injuries he had already committed. But this time Montresor--who is not so crazy--is one step ahead of him.

This would be a queer "revenge story" if there was nothing to revenge.