The Pit and the Pendulum and you find an appeal to the nerves by tawdry physical affrightments." The Pit and the Pendulum "The Pit and the Pendulum" is a short story written by Edgar Allan Poe and first published in 1842 in the literary annual "The Gift: A Christmas and New Year's Present for 1843". The story is about the torments endured by a prisoner of the Spanish Inquisition, though Poe skews historical facts. The narrator of the story describes his experience of being tortured. The story is especially effective at inspiring fear in the reader because of its heavy focus on the senses, such
Black Legend of the Spanish Inquisition of centuries of rivalry between both powers. Those Spanish intellectuals who wished to advance and earn recognition in the court had to adopt said views in order to earn respect. On the other extreme, the protection for the absolutist Bourbons of the church generated a growing identification of the church, the old regime, monarchic absolutism and the king. Eventually, antimonarchic intellectuals and Spaniards resenting the new rule started identifying with the alleged cruelties of the medieval church and the Inquisition as reflections of their own perceived oppression under the Bourbons. The Black Legend of the Inquisition, already created and packed