Edgar Allan Poe's works have stood the test of time, weathering many a severe storm of criticism. In this corpus, Poe's short stories have created an enviable niche in the literary firmament in spite of much criticism. And what does not elude the readers but captures their attention is Poe's narrative strategy. This paper, analyzing Poe's "The Cask of Amontillado," reaffirms how his deft narration momentarily effaces the interpretative faculties of readers who merely tag along with the narration, lost in its intricacies. The process of interpretation begins only after the story ends on a bizarre note when the readers snap out of their reverie. While highlighting how Poe performs this mesmerizing act through several literary elements like irony, foreshadowing, grotesque humor and symbolism, this paper also reveals how the reader, in the process of reading, keeps role-playing all the possible characters, little realizing that he/she is a reader, endowed with the duty of not merely reading but also interpreting what has been played out by the author. The paper reiterates Poe's ingenuity in storytelling and showcases how reading "The Cask of Amontillado" is a unique experience, where there is an intense and involved reading, but there is no reader but only Poe and his story.

The text is a fetish object, and this fetish desires me. The text chooses me, by a whole disposition of invisible screens, selective baffles: vocabulary, references, readability, etc.; and, lost in the midst of a text (not behind it, like a deus ex machina) there is always the other, the author.

The Text is an autonomous object that creates itself, within a chosen premise and functions independently of its creator, marking a territory— a `site of bliss'—in the process. Readers have no choice but to engage with the text on its own terms. The text takes on different dimensions once it is crafted from its pre-textual phase and is seemingly delivered as a tangible form with meaning. Such a text has no aporias but forces itself upon its readers. Those who access this text are formally designated as readers but turn out to be passive listeners. Such a text is a rarity and its creator is a craftsperson who has truly earned his due.

Edgar Allan Poe's short story "The Cask of Amontillado" turns out to be such a text that functions like a predator seeking out its prey in its readers. The alluring text itself is the bait and an offering of pleasure is the first principle it works on. Readers have no alternative but to succumb to the temptation of a peep into the pleasures that are `unknown,' but are glimpsed at the reading of the first line.

The Cask of Amontillado, Montresor, Richard Miller, Interpretative Faculties, Tyrannies, Textual Hegemony, Psychological Horror, Linguistic Pleasure, Literary Firmament, Grotesque Humor, Catacombs, Mosaic Patterns.