Stone Mattress: A Literary Analysis

Humans are continuously evolving with their surroundings, leaving the past behind. However, certain aspects of the past can cause mental pain to the extent that humans need to eliminate the thought of being defeated or taken advantage of using inhumane measures. The Cask of Amontillado written by Edgar Allen doe and Stone Mattress written by Margaret Atwood are two short stories based around the violent acts due to the distress caused previously in life. This distress affects one’s emotion, disturbing their moral and ethical thinking when resolving the issue. ‘Revenge’ is the natural human extinct when it comes to mending an unhinged past, and in order to take revenge, the idea of false ‘trust’ is applied to make the revenge as insufferable …show more content…
In The Cask of Amontillado, we see this trust being built in order to lure the perpetrator. The victim complements and offers the perpetrator exclusive wine to create a foundation of trust. In the Stone Mattress, there is a similar proposition, where Verna appears as a confident and sophisticated woman that caters for all types of men. “Wealthy Men recovering from life threatening episodes had recognised the worth of attractive women with deft hand.” As shown, women of her stature are desirable, which made Bob eager to make a move. She flirts around with him whilst reminiscing on the fact that she was humiliated, giving her no reason to look back. Both texts show the manipulation of trust in order for the victims of distress to take their revenge. Trust is a personal topic, and since the perpetrators have taken advantage of this trust, the victims believe that it is fair to do the same. In the eyes of the victim, gaining their trust and using it against them is a way of showing the perpetrator what they endured in the past. The way the victims use trust and lies in order to formulate and plan the revenge shows how savage the victims have become whilst going through emotional distress. The fact that the victims use such an emotionless approach for their revenge, makes it seem that they have forgotten what it is to be human. Since the perpetrators used this trust against them in the past, it is made to seem that the …show more content…
The idea of obtaining trust through the uses of lies, show that humans are violent, and that we will take the most drastic measures in order to hurt someone in the most sufferable way. These texts are successful in depicting how immoral we become when we are hurt, and that what we think and do is beyond our control when we reach mental