Черният трон

by Roger Zelazny, Fred Saberhagen, Роджър Зелазни

„Черният трон“ е удивително съчетание между приключенско четиво в духа на Карл Май, история с привидения и мистичен роман.
Едгар Пери е разменил мястото си с друг мъж от съседен свят. Шайката на разбойниците Гудфелоу, Темпълтън и Грисуолд, която се стреми да заграби световните запаси от злато, му е скроила лош номер и сега той е по следите им, заедно със своя приятел от Дивия Запад Дърк Питърс и неговата грамадна маймуна Елисън. Те пристигат с кораб в Европа и наемат блестящия детектив Дюпен. Отговорът на загадката се крие в странния двойник на Пери. Неговото име е… Не, няма да повярвате кой е той!

Genres: Fantasy, Fiction, Science Fiction, Speculative Fiction, Horror, Science Fiction Fantasy, Collections

256 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 1990

About the author

Roger Joseph Zelazny was an American fantasy and science fiction writer known for his short stories and novels, best known for The Chronicles of Amber. He won the Nebula Award three times (out of 14 nominations) and the Hugo Award six times (also out of 14 nominations), including two Hugos for novels: the serialized novel ...And Call Me Conrad (1965), subsequently published under the title This Immortal (1966), and the novel Lord of Light (1967).

Reviews

[Craig · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a fun book, but it's nothing like any other Saberhagen or Zelazny novel. It's essentially Poe fanfic. You can almost see the authors grinning slyly as they tried to outdo each other on sliding in Poe references. I don't think readers who aren't fairly conversant with E.A.'s oeuvre would get much from it, and anyone searching for a standard novel's entertainment and diversion are out of luck, but if Poe's your guy this is for you.

[Michael McClung · Rating 1 out of 5]

I don't know if I can do this. It was painful to read; how much more painful will it be to write about? But my conscience tells me I must, lest someone else accidentally picks up this book under the impression that it might actually readable. Do not, I beg you! Learn from my mistake!

You would think that when Roger Zelazney and Fred Saberhagen get together to write a book it would be worth reading. I mean, these are two of the biggest names in science fiction and fantasy. Zelazney rose to immortality on his Amber series, and Saberhagen's Berserker series is one of the biggest sci-fi franchises on the shelf. Both have been critically acclaimed.

The premise of The Black Throne is... well, I guess that's where the trouble starts. The premise is rather muddled. It has to do with Edgar Allan Poe (a man whose writing I was raised on, which probably explains a lot) and multiple universes and a girl named Annie and her Kingdom by the sea and a fellow who is much like Poe, except his name is Edgar Perry and he's not mad or an alcoholic or much of a writer. He's like Poe's healthier, less exctiting alter ego. He's Poe if Poe was more like Kipling, except not so smart.

Poe, Perry and Annie meet in a kingdom by the sea throughout their childhood, apparently. And then something happens and Annie and Perry are thrown into Poe's world, and Poe is thrown into Perry's (our) world, where things are less magical. While Annie and Perry muddle through various adventures, Poe seems to keep some sort of connection to the two and writes of their adventures in garbled fashion. Thus Murders in the Rue Morgue, Mask of the Red Death, etc are born. It all sounds rather interesting, except it isn't.

Here is an excerpt, and it illustrates both what I mean by the muddled feel of the whole book and also what I mean when I say imitation has its limitations:

"Walking on that gray, warm morn through fogs which entombed his world in near-viscous whiteness, perfect as snow, quietening as cloak or shroud, the boy moved with a certain deliberation, wordless voice within his head, veiled forms swaying about him, avoiding cobble and branch in passage through the wood behind the school, oddity back of a place once known well, occuring mystery somehow situated to hold his soul chrysalis for a vital season, somehow special, personal, and marking a passage distinctive as scar or tattoo upon his life and forever."

Can someone please buy these guys a period? Or trade two for one for a comma? Look, I know what they're trying to do. But Only POE could get away with that sort of crap, because only POE could come up with the sort of macabre, fascinating idea that would make putting up with that sort of crap worth it. We read Poe despite the twisted run-on sentences, not because of them.

I was going to go through all the terrible bits of the book, but I just don't have the strength. Here are the highlights:

1) When Poe's alter ego Perry writes poetry:

These recent days be bloody stuff
and also recent dreams.
I seem to hear a phthisic cough
by life's eternal streams.
Death lurks and laughs his ass off.
At least that's how it seems.

At first I thought this was meant to be a little light humor. Then I realized it wasn't. Then I gagged.

2) The 'Plot' (not to be confused with the premise): Annie is a powerful supernatural woman who has been manipulated by three 'mesmerists' to shift the Edgars around in their worlds so that she can build up some sort of a psychic charge and power an alchemical transformation of lead into gold. Huh? Well, a LOT of lead into a LOT of gold. Oh. Well, at least there's a lot of gold at stake. Perry trails after her and her kidnappers from Richmond through Paris, parts of Spain, the Antarctic and New York. And in the end, she doesn't even need his help to be rescued.

3) The south pole is actually a big drain in which all water drains through the center of the earth and gets spat up through the north pole. Sort of a constant flush. Perry's ship gets sucked in, but 'just by chance' they had rescued a Dutch balloonist sometime before. They ride the baloon to NORTH AMERICA with only one brief stop.

4) Perry digs a trench in the middle of the villain's fortress and hides it with a piece of tarp. Never mind that the room is actually a room, not a dirt-floored hovel, or that one of the many henchmen would have noticed him, or that the writers, who yet again badly damaged our willing suspension of disbelieve then don't even bother to use the offending trench in the plot. Just never mind.

5) The villain of the piece makes Perry the sole beneficiary of his last will and testament. Why? Nobody knows. Well he may have been Perry's father. But that's just speculation. "Perry. I am your father, Perry. Join me on the dark side of the force, where we kidnap young girls and make them turn lead into gold. C'mon, Perry, you know you want to.'

6) There is no black throne in the entirety of The Black Throne. There is however a black chair. A 'shiny black chair'. So that's okay, I guess. As long as it's shiny.

I'm tired now. Let me sleep. Maybe the pain will subside. It's not enough that I suffer from literary poisoning, but you people make me talk about it too? Go read the Black Throne for yourself, then!

No I don't mean it. It's only the pain.

[Иван Величков · Rating 5 out of 5]

Разкощна книга на тандема Зелазни-Саберхаген, писана в памет на Едгар Алан По.
Главният герой е самият По, който попада в алтернативен свят, където героите и ситуациите от неговите разкази и романи са действителността. Историята се преплита и с нашата вселена по времето на писателя и неговата биография. Вдна различна, среща със старите любими произведения на класика в жанра написана от други двама майстори в него.
Прочетох няколко ревюта тук и мога да кажа, че ако не сте фенове на Е.А.По и не сте запознати с творчеството му, няма да разберете и оцените тази книга. Обратното, тези които обичат По и Зелазни трябва да си я включат в задължителните за четене.
Трябва да отбележа и чудесния превод на Комата.

[Stuart · Rating 1 out of 5]

The concept is good, but unfortunately the book isn't. It initially promises to be something like a Tim Powers story, but never really achieves either the clever world-building of Powers, or much of anything else.

There's a bit of ingenuity in the way that the authors manage to pack in so many references to Poe stories, but unfortunately none of these develops into anything. The characters whose peculiar backgrounds are drawn from Poe never go beyond being plot devices, the scenes that allude to memorable ones in Poe stories have none of the atmosphere of the originals, and the whole thing is just a sequence of interesting ideas that are rapidly shuffled through without ever being thoroughly explored.

One last thing that I'll mention is the strange pacing - the authors seem in a hurry, but waste many pages on dream sequences that don't advance the plot and then seem to absolutely rush the last scenes. The story finally ends so abruptly that it's startling.

It's a fairly short book, and the shout-outs to Poe did keep me interested for most of it, but it was a disappointment in almost every way.

[Stephen Simpson · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is up there with A Dark Travelling as potentially the worst with Zelazny's name on it. The fact that this was a partnership doesn't help; this was a case of 1 +1 = -2. The plot was ... ambitious (and I won't spoil it other than to say it involves Edgar Allen Poe, sorta), but not executed well at all.

Skip it unless you're a die-hard.

[Ty · Rating 2 out of 5]

I am starting to wonder if reviewing fantasy paperbacks is even worth it. Just about every single one I have ever picked up has suffered from the same problems.

A band of some sort, complete with a short ugly strong guy, a thin, sexy woman, an animal or two and a protagonist of some sort come together and discover whatever maguffin they need to retrieve. What follows is several hundred pages of barely (or not at all) connected vignettes that must contain violence and magic of some sort, each conveyed in a faux-flowery prose that drowns in its own self importance. Make sure at least one minor but lovable character dies, throw in a dash of deus ex machina, and the entire incoherent mess, thin plot and totally uninteresting characters come together in the final ten pages, and the maguffin is obtained.

And the reader is angry.

That fits this mess to a tee.

[Jon Norimann · Rating 2 out of 5]

One of Zelazny's worst books. Very slow moving and generally boring. Best to stay away.

[Sofija Kryž · Rating 3 out of 5]

When I began reading this book, I was not quite sure what to expect. The recommendation said it was good. The book I found did not have a summary on the back of its cover but cited a passage from the book instead. Something about a night, a storm on a sea shore, lightning lighting up a human figure. What intrigued me, was the exclamation of the character telling the story: „Allan!“ I cried, recognizing him as I drew near; and then I added, „Poe!“

And yet, despite the promised playfulness, I did struggle at times.

There are kind of two layers to this story. One being an adventure of a young gentleman (Perry) searching for his childhood friend – a bit of an object of adoration, a bit of of a muse. Poor girl was kidnapped by mysterious villains. It‘s not that Perry himself is safe, though – same villains threaten him too. All the rest – spoilers.

The other layer is essentially a tribute of two dedicated fanboys to Edgar Allan Poe. Zelazny and Saberhagen creatively play around with elements of Poe‘s works: details of his life, characters, images or passages from his stories or poems. All nicely weaved into the story. In fact, although not directly presented so, Poe and his works are the main character in this book.

This was essentially a gem. And yet I could not enjoy it to the full because I had never read any Poe in my life. And yet – he apparently left such an imprint on the Anglo-American literature that one does encounter either stories inspired by his works or satire using elements from his works, so some elements can be recognised anyway. I was able to identify the raven or Montresor. Although I did not recognise other elements, some of them were clearly flagged and easy to google out. Not to mention excerpts to Poe‘s poems or prose – they did help with the flavour. I do want to read some Poe now – seems that he was indeed one hell of a crazy mind (in the best possible sense).

Some scenes were really enjoyable even without knowing the context. I liked their highly poetic, visual descriptions, a bit of a gothic vibe. I enjoyed both the images (fog, mist, dense canopies, grim buildings or ruins, imagery of death or some mysterious otherwordly existence) and the language, especially imitation of Poe‘s poetry or prose or generic 19th century literary English (you know, those sentence structures that make it hardly possible to understand what one or another character wanted to say). It should be said that the authors did not play around like that all the time, but when they did, it was quite fun to read.

There are additional layers of playfulness. The book references another Zelazny‘s book that was probably not yet published when „The Black Throne“ came out – „A Night in Lonesome October“. So this book is kind of a prototype for it?

And yet... other bits were less enjoyable. I don‘t know what Saberhagen is like (I had never read him before), but Zelazny‘s concentrated way of telling the story did not quite work for me this time. The characters ended up definitely not a focus of the story. Like, the relationship between Perry and Annie was supposed to be the centre piece of the story and yet it was so unfulfilling. It was not well explained how that relationship came to be (well, it was mentioned as one detail among many others, but without accompanying emotional depth), so I was like „whatever, let‘s pretend they love one another or some such.“ As a muse, I found Annie bland. Perry too – he did sound much like a somewhat more benevolent version of Corwyn. Emerson, Peters and Ligeia were described somewhat more extensively but the authors did not overdo with them either. Who did shine a bit, was Monsieur Valdemar. Won‘t say why, but it‘s worth to read the book just for this character :D

Regarding the plot, well, I can‘t say I absolutely enjoyed it. There were some absolutely deus ex machina moments (air balloon, really?). There were scenes and developments that were not fully exploited (e.g. the ghost ship, whirlpool or the asylum). I had to keep making myself believe in Perry‘s motivation just so the plot ties up nicely instead of jumping from one Poe-esque situation to another. Obviously, the fact that I hadn‘t read any Poe before did not help – there may have been some specific reasons for the developments based on the associations with his works that I missed.

So, all in all, this was one of those books that I really wanted to enjoy more than I did. Had I read Poe, I am sure I would have enjoyed it more.

[Daryl · Rating 3 out of 5]

My reading of the Zelazny canon has led me to this, his second collaboration with Fred Saberhagen. As I mentioned in my review of their co-authored Coils, I'm not familiar with Saberhagen's writing, so it's hard to judge what contributions came from which writer. Let me start by saying this is a great example of not judging a book by its cover. The cover of the Baen paperback I've got (and I believe this is the original, first printing) shows a robed and hooded figure with a necklace made of large medallions seated on an ornately carved throne - nothing similar to any of this happens in the book. This is a strange novel; most of the characters are named for characters either from Edgar Allan Poe stories, or from real people in Poe's life. Once I realized what was happening, I did some research into Poe, which helped to make sense of things here. Edgar Perry (the name Poe used when enlisting in the army) is a man from our earth, who has a doppelganger named Edgar Poe on another world. The two often encounter one another in a mystical land called the Kingdom by the Sea, called their by a young girl named Annie (Annabel Lee?). Eventually, the two switch places/worlds and the novel follows the adventures of Edgar Perry as he searches for Annie. Along the way, he gets embroiled with characters and situations that form the basis for such Poe tales as "The Pit and the Pendulum," "Masque of the Red Death," "The Cask of Amontillado," "Murders in the Rue Morgue" and others. Apparently, Poe has some connection with Perry and channels his adventures into fiction here on our earth. Or something. The book is very uneven, with occasional jumps in narrative time, and often situations and scenes are created simply for the Poe connection, and don't go anywhere or get resolved at all. Characters are introduced and then disappear. And the ending is a bit of a let-down (somewhat anti-climatic). All that being said, I did enjoy the book while reading it for the most part - once I realized not to expect too much, I guess. It's a Poe pastiche, often in the writing style, as well as events portrayed, but there are some moments when fine writing and interesting bits shine through (courtesy more of Zelazny, I'm guessing). Sadly, this is a bit of a low point in the Zelazny canon.

[Joel · Rating 3 out of 5]

The premise: a psychic girl named Annie forms a dreamlike connection with two boys from different worlds; Edgar Allen Perry and Edgar Allen Poe. As adults, the two Edgar Allens unintentionally switch worlds with each other; Perry travels the world trying to save Annie from villains and having adventures (which inspire Poe’s famous writings) while Poe starts going mad, increasingly convinced that he’s imagining all of it.

I found the book a lot of fun, actually; but I can’t easily recommend it, especially to people who haven’t read much Poe. The authors are fairly ingenious about slipping in references to Poe’s writings and stitching them together into an entirely new configuration; trouble is, none of it makes a single bit of sense. The later parts of the book- starting when Perry and his associates try to sail to London- feel especially forced and lazily plotted.

[Shane Noble · Rating 2 out of 5]

It wasn't terrible, but it wasn't great. Big disappointment, really. We have three characters, the unrivalled Edgar Allan Poe; Edgar Perry, an Edgar Allan Poe from another dimension who doesn't suffer all of the mental health struggles his counterpart does; and Annie, the beautiful woman who lives in a kingdom by the sea (*coughAnnabelLeecough*). Annie has psychic/magical powers and forms a bond with both Edgars who both love her. In a strange twist, the Edgars switch universes and Edgar Perry and Annie go on adventures around the world. Because of the psychic connection, Poe uses these adventures as seeds for his work.

The premise is potentially interesting, but the delivery was flat. It was just hard to care about these characters. As a huge fan of Edgar Allan Poe, this book was a big let down.

[Richard Clay · Rating 3 out of 5]

Apart from Coils, his previous collaboration with Zelazny, I've not read any Fred Saberhagen. I have, by contrast, read almost all of Roger Zelazny so it's in that context I read this book.

It's not first-rate Zelazny: the picaresque plot moves unevenly and some of the surreal dream sequences are a bit impenetrable. But the references to Edgar Allan Poe are sometimes touching and the scenery is sometimes breathtaking. In particular, assuming Zelazny rather than Saberhagen came up with the description of the polar whirlpool, we can add it to the already huge pile of great RZ locations. And Zelazny was the Salvador Dali of prose: the best there's ever been at creating fantasy landscapes - not even Tolkien can touch him.

[Steven]

What I'm finding when I read Zelazny collaborations is that they never seem to live up to Zelazy on his own. This book is so... ambitious. But reading it was, for me, a muddled experience, with no real payoff for the time spent. It's a plot that would allow for rich, clever associations... a kind of multiverse Edgar Allan Poe piece. But nothing develops, and whatever literary allusions are there didn't strike me as all that compelling or interesting. Dear lord, I love Zelazy as an author, but something is terribly muted here.

[Mike S · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a good story, it would have been better if it had been all Zelazny, but it was worth reading. It was much more slow-paced and plodding than a Zelazny story would be, it was pretty easy to see Zelazny's contributions, he is brilliant and complex and fast-paced and exciting. I wish he could have lived longer and written more, he's one of my top favorite sci-fi authors.

[Drs · Rating 4 out of 5]

A childhood favorite, that I've read multiple times, including as an adult. It's definitely quirky in both prose and plot, which I would attribute to Zelazny being whimsical as well as channeling Poe, and it doesn't answer all your questions or resolve all the threads, but it's still fun to read.

[MegaWhoppingCosmicBookwyrm · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don’t know if it was my dislike of the writing style, my slight ignorance of Poe’s work (I’ve read some, but this book made me feel as though only hardcore Poe fans could really “get it”), or a mixture of both, but I didn’t really like this one.

[Brent Moffitt · Rating 2 out of 5]

Pointless. Only interesting aspect was the style of writing. Kept thinking the book would start to make sense, but it never did.

[Blind_guardian · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some interesting sequences and a lot of lore about Edgar Allen Poe, but a fairly forgettable pulp-style tale.

[Hawk · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really like this book, glad I didn't listen to many of the reviews

[Tim Baruffi · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was weird even for Zelazny. The ending was not fulfilling at all. Glad I finished it, but won't be coming back to it

[Cecilia Rodriguez · Rating 3 out of 5]

The story is complex, with the concept of alternate universes.
It reminded me of an old episode of The Twilight Zone.

[Alazzar · Rating 3 out of 5]

I probably would have given this 3.5 stars (and rounded it up to 4), but after reading a few Goodreads reviews I sort of came to agree with them on some matters. (Particularly about the ending being sorta lackluster.)

On the one hand, I loved seeing all the Poe references because I like Poe. On the other hand, there were times during which I felt like we were straight-up reenacting a Poe story without any real change; this made the book, unfortunately, a little predictable. (And it sorta made it feel like work, at times, because I knew where things were going and it was just a matter of wading through the text to get there.)

However, I also liked how certain of Poe's stories were linked together, when I otherwise never would have considered them taking place in the same time or location. So, that was neat.

Also, some of the allusions are less obvious (there's a line or two from "Ulalume" and "The Raven" sprinkled in there, though there's no particular attention drawn to them), which makes them very fun and pleasing to spot.

Overall, I'd say this is one of Zelazny's better collaborations (coming in just behind his other Saberhagen collaboration, Coils ), though that's not necessarily saying much because his collaborations were generally considered to be much worse than his solo efforts. It's definitely better than If at Faust You Don't Succeed , and everything ever written is better than Flare . I may have even liked this book more than Deus Irae , though I gave Deus Irae four stars, which is surely the only time my rating system has ever been inconsistent. Ever.

Surely.

[Joel Flank · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Black Throne by Roger Zelazny and Fred Saberhagen is a quirky book by two of science fiction's masters. The story is based around the question, "What if all of Edgar Allen Poe's stories and poems were based on fact?" In this case, the book features a Poe that is from an Earth that has elements such as trained orangutans, mesmerism, magic, alchemy, pits and pendulums, masques of the red death, and more. Unfortunately for Poe, he is switched with his real world Earth analog, a soldier named Edgar Perry. This puts Poe into our Earth, but linked to Perry and able to see all of Perry's adventures, which 'coincidentally' all mimic Poe's most famous stories, and suggest that Poe was actually basing them on actual events.

Perry first has to make sense of the strange Earth he find himself in, and then chase after his (and Poe's) lost love, Annie, whom they both met in childhood dreams that the three of them shared. This quest take Perry from the shores of America, to France, Spain, and the high seas, and back again. While his encounters and adventures are all based on Poe stories, Zelazny and Saberhagen weave them together into a single tale that doesn't feel like a mish mash of separate stories at all. This novel concept, combined with the unique setting of a 19th century where all of the pseudo-science believed to be real at the time is in fact real, makes for a memorable fantasy adventure that strays far away from swords and sorcery and high fantasy tropes.

[Daniel · Rating 3 out of 5]

I admit that I struggled some with this book at the beginning, but I believe that this is because Zelazny tends to start a story right in the middle, forcing the reader to catch up to him.

I am not at all familiar with Fred Saberhagen, so I'm not sure what his influences are with this book.

Once I was caught up with the story, this was the type of read that is difficult to put down. I always wanted to read 'just one more chapter.'

Although the book managed to hold my interest through to the end, the last quarter or so seemed to get bogged down. I actually wondered if perhaps the authors traded off chapters and each wanted to add his own mark to the tale, although they both lacked necessity in telling the tale.

Some chapters spanned a few minutes ... the action being 'real time' and some chapters took place over several months. The inconsistency was always jarring.

I liked it well enough... reading Zelazny is like luscious, literary fruit ...but it failed to tell the story cohesively for me.

[Elliot Fleming · Rating 1 out of 5]

I hated reading this. I'm a fan of Saberhagen's Berserker stories and Dracula series, but I gave up on the Swords series. I loved Zelazny's early writing and the Corwin half of the Amber books, and thought the Merlin stories disappointing. So this is two inconstant geniuses writing a pastiche of a third inconstant genius, Edgar Allan Poe. It serves no one well, especially the reader. Others have commented on the story, the characters, and the writing, roundly berating all. This reads as though the collaboration had fallen apart before a final edit, and the publisher wanted to salvage something from the mess. The cover of the paperback edition has less than a paragraph from the story continued on the first page. No critical praise, no mention of the author's awards. A miserable mess. The more I think about this book as I try to evaluate it, the lower sinks my opinion of it. I started with 3 stars, because it was written by Saberhagen and Zelazny.

[Martin · Rating 1 out of 5]

What a mess. Much of the book takes place in dreamlike settings because characters are moving back and forth between 3 or 4 planes of existence. Much of the action is propelled without an engine, it just sort of happens, characters just know things, when its convenient they magically communicate across miles and dimensions, sometimes as vague feelings and sometimes as full conversations. Some steampunks will probably like it anyhow, as it has inexplicable steampunk elements.

The Zelazny co-authored books I've read have not been very good. He was so very good flying solo. I wonder if any of his friends told him, "stop diluting your talent with co-authors" while he was alive.

Also, terrible book jack design. Who leaves a back jacket completely blank? The marketing manager should have been fired.

[Pete · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is better than I expected given some of the reviews that I have read. Both authors have written much better books on their own. The novel has an intriguing idea--the works of Edgar Allen Poe are based on actual events on an alternate Earth. Thus, the novel has episodes based on The Pit and the Pendulum, Masque of the Red Death and The Cask of Amontillado, and characters named for M. Valdemar and Ligeia. This works quite well in spots. However, I think the novel is a bit of a pot-boiler, and the authors simply did not have time to hone their ideas and prose. Still, I'm glad that I read it because Zelazny is one of my favorite authors, and I admire Saberhagen's Berserker series.

[Morgan Lewis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reasonably good science-fantasy book (dealing with psychic powers and parallel worlds) interspersed with a lot of Edgar Allen Poe references. (Poe even features as a character in the novel and is the thematic inspiration). Entertaining, and has a lot of hallmarks of both Zelazny's and Saberhagen's styles.

[Kathy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Roger Zelazny writing about Edgar Allan Poe? These are two of my favorite authors, so I figured what the heck? I appreciate the unique approach of suggesting that Poe based his stories on actual events in some kind of alternate universe. And it almost works, but not quite. At least not for me.

[William · Rating 3 out of 5]

A rather bizarre novel featuring Edgar Allan Poe, a goldbug, a raven, Dr. Tarr and Professor Fether, a pit and a pendulum, a cask of amontillado, etc.