The Theme of Violence in Edgar Allan Poe’s The Cask of Amontillado and in Ömer Seyfettin’s Beyaz Lale (White Tulip)

Poe (1809-1849) in America and Seyfettin (1884-1920) in Ottoman Empire met the demand of beautiful stories in the new emerging market of newspapers and magazines in 19th century. They were great authors and versatile figures who produced magnificent works in various fields. Poe as a theorist, devised a frame for short story which is still governing the genre. Seyfettin has been the most published short story writer in Turkey. As a theorist, he contributed to the modernization of Turkish language. These two authors wrote impressive, striking, absorbing stories. Poe and Seyfettin implement violence as one of the main themes in their stories. Violence is so vividly described in some of their stories that one may inevitably feel pure terror, distilled fear. In this study the theme of violence in The Cask of Amontillado by Poe and Beyaz Lale (White Tulip) by Seyfettin is compared taking social and cultural background into consideration.