E X T E N S I O N RIVALRY AND REVENGE Much of the legend of Poe the half-crazy, drunken, drug-taker and womanizer, was created and exaggerated by two of his biggest literary rivals of the time: one was the American poet, critic and editor, Rufus Griswold, and the other was Thomas Dunn English, politician, writer and poet/playwright. The rivalry was sufficiently strong to stir up1 the desire for a form of revenge, and The Cask of Amontillado provided a perfect tool for this. English and Poe were Rufus Griswold originally friends, but in the 1840 s, Poe satirized some writers in a series of articles in The New York Literary ; English was included in one of these and reacted by publishing a letter in the Evening Mirror which basically accused Poe of forgery2. Poe successfully sued3 the newspaper for libel. English then published a novel 1844, in which there is a journalist who gets drunk five times a week and becomes famous for a poem The Black Crow (Poe s poem The Raven was very well-known), goes mad and is put into an asylum at the end of the book. After this parody, perhaps it was not surprising that Poe was moved to take revenge on him, and did so by creating this brilliant, far more readable perfect short story which makes obvious references to English s novel. In the novel there is a chapter set in an underground vault and the words For the love of God are used; it talks about a secret society, and the family motto has a snake. Needless to say, the two never became friends again and after reading Poe s evil fantasy of revenge, perhaps English was glad to keep out of his way. Griswold had a somewhat turbulent relationship with Poe. They 3. sued for libel: made a claim in court about something untrue said about him. 1. stir up: cause an unpleasant emotion or problem to begin. 2. forgery: illegal copies of writing, documents, paintings etc. 66