Review: Poe still haunts college students
Rating: 2 out of 5
Date: 09 22, 2013
So they tell college students "This is a great classic. You must read this."  Call me a bourgeois illiterate if you must but, like the people who couldn't see the emperor's new clothes, I just don't get it. Perhaps the story is supposed to make you do some deep thinking and questioning. Here are my questions:1. Why is Montresors waiting 50 years to tell the story?2. What was the insult and what was his grudge against his good friend Fortunato? Why didn't he just tell him about it and "hug-it-out"?3. Did Montresors always carry a trowel in his pocket?4. Why did Poe have Fortunato wear a jester's costume for carnival?  Did he just like the contrast of the catacombs and the tinkle-y little bells?5. Who mixed the mortar for the bricks and why hadn't it set up by the time they got to the scene of the crime?6. What is so poignant about a coat of arms which says (pardon the para-phrasing ) "don't tread on me"?7.Was Poe stoned out of his gourd when he wrote this?If I wanted to make up my own conclusions and read between the lines I would write my own book. Sorry oh great and mighty Poe. Don't quit your day job.