...Many authors use symbolism to heighten the meaning of their themes and ideas by connecting their symbols to commonly known sources or objects. For instance, within Edgar Allen Poe’s “Masque of the Red Death” symbolism is used heavily throughout this short story and are linked to some commonly known material. The “Masque of the Red Death” focuses on a chaotic theme of death and chaos. Poe uses symbolism to portray his theme through the seven chambers in the prince’s home and these rooms together are linked by colors and Biblical references. In “Masque of the Red Death”, Edgar Allen Poe uses symbolism to establish the chaotic theme represented through the seven chambers. First Poe had used symbolism within this short story to establish...
Words: 1202 - Pages: 5
...Death is going to reach everyone at some point. No matter what advantage a person has in life, they are still going to die. In “The Masque of the Red Death” by Edgar Allan Poe, a village is faced with a deadly plague. The main character, Prince Prospero, decides to gather 1,000 of his friends and family and lock them up in his castle as a way to avoid catching the plague. He then throws a masquerade ball that contains 7 color coded rooms, and the party takes a turn for the worse. Symbolism is used throughout “The Masque of the Red Death,” and it shows that death is inescapable. The first use of symbolism in “The Masque of the Red Death” is shown by the directions the seven rooms flow. On page one, Poe states, “But in the western or black...
Words: 891 - Pages: 4
...The Masque of the Red Death is a short story about a terrible disease known as the Red Death that has struck the kingdom. It has already killed half the kingdom which has made it incredibly fatal. The Prince Prospero, doesn’t seem to care one bit about the poor, dying subjects roaming through the kingdom. Instead, the Prince decides to let the kingdom take care of themselves while him and his favorite knights and ladies throw a never-ending party. After five or six months into his stay, Prince Prospero decides to have a huge masquerade ball. The ball takes place in a suite of seven rooms, each one designed as a different color (blue, green, purple, orange, white, violet, and black). After some time everybody stops dancing and end up falling asleep momentarily silent. Suddenly, some of the guest that were still dancing notice a guest they’ve never seen before, wearing an utterly scandalous costume. The guest decides to dress up as a corpse who died of the Red Death. He slowly starts stalking through the frightened crowd. Prince Prospero, takes notice to him he’s extremely...
Words: 1043 - Pages: 5
...In a story written by Edgar Allan Poe called “The Masque of the Red Death” we find that we can’t escape from all of our problems. The main characters name is Prince Prospero and he lives in a town that is being taken over by a disease called the Red Death. He doesn’t want to die from this disease and he doesn’t want his friends to die either, so he invites all of his friends into his castle and boards up all windows and doors so that no one could have access to the outside world. Little to their knowing this just insured their death. This story also uses many different examples of symbolism like how the masquerade ball represents how they are all hiding from the Red Death, how the clock at the end of all the rooms represents death, and how the the Red Death appeared in a person’s body but wasn’t really a person. One example of symbolism in “The Masque of the Red Death” is how the masquerade ball represents how all these people are hiding from the Red Death. This is symbolism because a masquerade ball is a party where everyone wears mask. The show that they wanted to hide from the Red Death because they didn’t want to die. The masks represent the castle in a way because they locked themselves in a castle to hide from the Red Death as well. Both the mask and the castle were...
Words: 578 - Pages: 3
...styles/elements. The authors of these short stories have many hidden meaning behind their words. “The Masque of the Red Death” by Edger Allan Poe, the “Lottery” by Shirley Jackson and, “Cast of Amontillado” by Edger Allen Poe have similar styles such as, using symbolism to enhance and foreshadow the reading. The author in Cast of Amontillado uses symbolism through the meaning of the title its self “ Cast of Amontillado” since Amontillado mean wine, and in the story the plot mainly happen based on the characters drinking wine, I thought the name symbolizes the results/effects in an irony way or drinking wine in this story. Since the character lures the other character...
Words: 710 - Pages: 3
...“The Masque of the Red Death” by Edgar Allan Poe is a dark story about a plague that put thousands of lives in danger. A Prince named Prospero brings one thousand friends into his castle and welds shut the doors to keep the red death out and lift the spirits of the people during the very scary time. In the end though, the red death itself comes into the castle and shows Prince Prospero that no one can escape the plague. The theme of this story is that no matter how rich or powerful a person is, no one can avoid death. This statement is proved in the text with symbols and (characterization)? In “Masque of the Red Death” the ebony clock is a symbol that shows that no one can avoid death. In the story, everyone is dancing and having a good...
Words: 529 - Pages: 3
...The Inevitability of the Red Death Edgar Allen Poe's “The Masque of the Red Death” is an extravagant allegory of the futility of trying to escape death. In the story, a prince named Prospero tries to avoid the Red Death through isolation and seclusion. He hides behind the impenetrable walls of his castle and turns his back on the rest of the world. But no walls can stop death because it is unavoidable and inevitable. Through the use of character, setting, point of view, and symbol, Poe reveals the theme that no one, regardless of status, wealth or power can stay the passing of time and the inevitable conclusion of life itself, death. Like many of Poe’s works, the number of characters in “Masque of the Red Death” is limited; however they all work to reveal the theme. Only three characters, Prince Prospero, the Thousand Friends and the Masked Figure are mentioned. The central figure of the story is Prince Prospero. The author describes him as “happy and dauntless and sagacious” (Poe, 386). His name is used to infer royalty, wealth and happiness, and suggests that the prince is untroubled by the plague and is confident of his survival and the survival of his one thousand friends. Prospero has been described by scholars as a “feelingless ruling prince” (Wheat, 51). This is due to his apparent lack of concern for the people of his land: “The external world could take care of itself” (Poe, 386). Prospero is a flat character as he remains confident in his survival up to...
Words: 1908 - Pages: 8
...fear can also be harmful. Fear can lead to paranoia, obsession, and never a really full, happy life. Poe uses symbolism, irony, and imagery to depict how fear distorts the narrators’ minds and the result in which happens due to it. Symbolism, an essential part in the “Tell-Tale heart” and the “Masque of Red Death” shows us the events that will soon unfold. For example, this key quote from the “Masque of Red Death” symbolizes the remaining time before death takes them. “At each lapse of an hour, the musicians of the orchestra were constrained to...
Words: 679 - Pages: 3
...short story, “The Masque of the Red Death” by describing the setting of the scene. “The prince had provided all the appliances of pleasure. There were buffoons, there were improvisatori, there were ballet-dancers, there were musicians, there was Beauty, there were wine. All these and security were within. Without was the “Red Death” (Poe 516). Poe is putting the reader in a fun mindset about the Prince’s Abbey but ends it with suspicion. Poe uses symbolism in the setting so the reader can understand the meaning of the story. The Castled Abbey is a secluded place. The prince lures the people in by throwing a masquerade ball. Once you are in there is no way out. “A strong and lofty wall girdled it in. This wall has gates of iron. The courtiers, having entered, brought furnaces and massy hammers and welded the bolts. They resolved to leave means neither ingress nor egress” (“Poe 516”). The abbey symbolizes the prince’s power. He has people thinking they’re keeping the “Red Death” outside but, in all reality they are trapped in. The abbey included seven rooms. The rooms were arranged from east to west. East is usually the direction associated with the “beginnings,” and birth, because the sunrises in the east; west (the direction of the sunset) is associated with the endings, and death. ( “Shmoop”). Each room was a different color. The first one was blue ending with the seventh room which was black. These colors symbolize the stages of life from birth to death. “The blue room...
Words: 577 - Pages: 3
...Edgar Allan Poe’s life represented his stories and poems. Poe faced several different tragedies and each tragedy affected his style of writing. Poe wrote many poems and stories. For example, he wrote, “The Masque of the Red Death,” “The Fall of the House of Usher,” “The Cask of Amontillado,” and the poem, “For Annie.” All of these were written by Poe, and each one represents death, and desolation. When Poe was two years old, his mother, Elizabeth Poe passed away. He was then adopted by a wealthy family, but Poe never received any money. He lived a poor life until he married his cousin Virginia. Then, Virginia died and Poe “collapsed from stress.” All of the deaths of his loved ones’ affected his writings, causing him to write with sorrow...
Words: 2073 - Pages: 9
...When we read the stories, ‘The Tell -Tale Heart” and “The Masque of Red Death” we see many examples of symbolism. In “The Tell - Tale Heart”, the biggest symbol is the old man’s eye. The old man’s eye didn’t just symbolize an ordinary eye, it has a deeper meaning. The old man’s eye symbolizes fear. The narrator says that the old man’s eye horrifies him. The narrator describes the old man’s eye, and says, “One of his eyes resembles that of a vulture - a pale blue eye, with film over it”(pg.523) . He compares the old man’s eye to the eye of a vulture to show the reader that the old man didn’t have an ordinary eye, he had a sinister eye. The eye also symbolizes fear, the narrator was fearful of the old man’s eye until the eye became an obsession to him. The obsession the narrator had led him to murder the old man. After he murdered the old man, he wasn’t okay, he had such a strong sense of guilt that he turned himself to the police, and he eventually ended up dying. In the story “The Masque of Red Death”, the biggest symbol is death. The prince takes one thousand...
Words: 1375 - Pages: 6
...Lester Small LITR 220 24 February 2013 The Masque of the Red Death vs. The Cask of Amontillado “The Masque of the Red Death” and “The Cask of Amontillado” written by Edgar Allan Poe are somewhat different. The major themes of these stories differ significantly, as does the emphasis placed on each character which dealt more to The Cask of Amontillado” than to “The Masque of the Red Death” Regardless of this, the stories are similar in many ways. For instance, both belong to the literacy of the gothic genre, it shared a small theme, and the characters shared a lot of the same characteristics. Poe known as a great writer how was his overall literary style determined for these two short stories? The similarities of both tales belong to the gothic genre. This is true from large number of features presented in either one or both of the stories. The most prominent were the dreary, damp, and decaying catacombs of the “The Cask of Amontillado” and the dark themes such as death and insanity, which was a consistent presence in both stories, in the forms of madness of Montresor and Prince Prospero and death of Fortunato and Prince Prospero, along with his guest who took shelter from the Red Death in Prospero’s palace. Other features common to the gothic literature of the narratives were mysteries in the shape of the mysterious shrouded figure in “The Masques of the Red Death” and how Montresor would avenge himself against Fortunato in “The Mask of Amontillado” and the fact the setting...
Words: 1557 - Pages: 7
...The Masque Of Red Death Death is unavoidable. We will all die one day. Nothing can prevent that from happening. Many people are afraid of death because they don’t know what’s coming after death. Many people don't really believe in afterlife because they feel as if there's no God. In the short story,”The Masque of The Red Death,” Edgar Allen Poe uses symbolism to exude his message, that no one can prevent the inevitability of death. Poe uses the character Prince Prospero to symbolize the conceited belief of the rich. Poe states,” And the whole seizure, progress, and termination of the disease were the incidents of half an hour. But the Prince Prospero was happy and dauntless and sagacious. When his dominions were half depopulated…” What Poe means is while millions and millions of people died while the Prince was inside closed doors not caring about the civilian’s being killed by a disease outside.To put it another way, The Prince stayed inside like he was unkillable and he felt like nothing would happen to him and that the people outside were poor and not rich like him, He was showing no fear while other people died. A sharp line is drawn between a world of life and a world of death. Poe states,” All these and security were within. Without was the “Red Death”. What he means is the death was outside, and even though the people inside are supposedly protected by being inside they’re really trapped inside with death all around them. To put it another...
Words: 461 - Pages: 2
...Setting’s Influence on Mood and Tone The setting of “The Masque of the Red Death” gives an eerie feeling to the story. In the book, it mentions that the seven rooms all have “…windows…of stained glass whose color varied in accordance with the prevailing hue of the decorations in the chamber,” except for the last room, which is black with red windows. This builds suspense, as the reader can infer that there is something special about the room, especially because its windows are red, and that is the color of the “Red Death”. There is a sense of eerie unearthliness throughout the story because of this room as well; all the guests at the party are avoiding it. In conclusion, the setting lends a sense of expectation and bizarreness to the story. Character Analysis Prince Prospero is likely a stubborn person who is used to having his way. In the story, he is resisting accepting the reality of “The Red Death” by hiding away in his castle with his guests. In addition, he chases the uninvited guest with the intention of killing him. This shows that Prince Prospero is stubborn because he’s unwilling to allow things to vary from how he planned them. This can also be inferred because Prospero is the ruler of the...
Words: 678 - Pages: 3
...As a result to the red death, Prince Prospero gathered his healthy friend together in his abbey. By keeping them in here, he believed he could keep all of them and himself healthy and away from disease. However he did not take into consideration that some of his friends may have looked healthy but could still be carrying diseases. So in actuality his friends could have spread disease all throughout the abbey. Prince Prospero thought his abbey was protection the red death, however it was not that simple. That is why Edgar Allen Poe used the abbey as a symbol of protection from the diseases around the city. There were seven rooms mentioned in the story. On the east end of the abbey there was a blue room; Poe used that color to represent the calmness in one’s life. While on the west end of the abbey was a black room; Poe used that color to represent...
Words: 457 - Pages: 2
