Edgar Allen Poe's story is a first-person narrative delivered by Montresor, a murderer relating the details of his crime 50 years after the event. He hates a rival named Fortunato, alluding to a grave insult, but never reveals what that insult was. From the beginning, the reader knows what's in store for the ironically named Fortunato, whose fate is anything but lucky. Montresor lures Fortunato from a cheerful carnival setting into an oppressive cellar, claiming that he needs Fortunato's expert opinion on a rare Amontillado vintage. Fortunado has every expectation of enjoying the refined sherry during the story, missing every clue that Montressor gives to his intentions, until he's shackled deep within the cellar and entombed alive.
"Oedipus Rex" was written by Sophocles and first performed in Greece around 428 B.C. Sophocles uses dramatic irony by making his characters the pawns of prophecy. The audience knows Oedipus and his parents are doomed their horrific, preordained fates despite taking frantic measures to thwart them. When Jocasta gives birth to Oedipus, her husband Laius learns that his son is destined to murder him, and attempts to have Oedipus killed. Oedipus survives to be raised by foster parents, but learns that he's doomed to kill his father and marry his mother. He flees his step-parents in attempt to avert disaster, believing he's their biological son, but if he'd stayed put, he would have escaped his tragic fate. Oedipus later unwittingly kills Laius during a chance encounter and marries Jocasta without knowing she's Laius' widow. Ultimately, Oedipus and Jocasta learn the awful truth, which drives Jocasta to suicide and Oedipus to madness.
"Romeo and Juliet" displays Shakespeare's fondness for using dramatic irony. His star-crossed lovers come from the warring Montague and Capulet families respectively. The couple is secretly married by Friar Laurence, who intends to use the marriage to bring the families together. After Juliet's cousin Tybalt challenges Romeo to a dual, Romeo refuses because he can't bring himself to harm his new kinsman. Romeo's cousin Mercutio dies when he battles in Romeo's place and Romeo kills Tybalt in retaliation, ironically shattering Laurence's hopes. Shakespeare builds the play's climax on dramatic irony, having Juliet drink a potion that puts her into a coma to escape an arranged marriage. Romeo doesn't know about the plan and believes that Juliet's dead when he finds her. He kills himself in grief and Juliet takes her own life when she wakes and discovers Romeo's corpse.