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Research Paper On The Masque Of The Red Death

765 Words4 Pages

The Unavoidable Realities of Life In society, most people try to avoid their issues or hardships in life. In “The Masque of the Red Death,” by Edgar Allen Poe, the characters learn that it is impossible to avoid the realities of life. This short story is about a time when a deadly disease spread throughout the country, killing many people. A prince, named Prince Prospero, decided to host a masquerade or party in his castle filled with high-class people and without the red death. Somewhere in this party, the red death entered the castle. In this castle, there are seven rooms of all colors. The last room was black, symbolizing the death of Prince Prospero as the disease had entered the seventh room killing Prince Prospero. To enhance the allegory of human life, in “The …show more content…

gates of iron” (Poe 1). The castle was large and beautiful, yet it could not prevent the people at the party from the Red Death. The castle also had extensive measures taken to be cautious, like a large iron gate. Even after all of this, the Red Death still found its way into the castle. The castle was not enough to escape the realities of life, including death. The castle, representing the cautious measures and the high class of the people, was not enough to escape the harsh realities of life. In Poe’s story, “The Masque of the Red Death,” he reveals the allegory of human life by describing the layout of the rooms. The rooms were, “Built running from east to west,” (Poe 2). This layout symbolizes human life, as the east symbolizes birth and the west symbolizes death. As the red death enters each of these rooms, it symbolizes aging and the timeline of human life. As the disease reaches the last room, it symbolizes the end of a lifetime. In the last room, Prince Prospero dies. This represents the end of his life as there is nowhere to go after the last room. Poe reveals the allegory of human life, and the theme of the inescapable realities of life, through the layout of the

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The Masque of the Red Death Analysis Edgar Allen Poe’s use of vivid words and phrases in “The Masque of the Red Death” allows the reader to visualize the events as they unfold in the short story. In addition to these images, the reader is engaged by the use of irony that is built upon throughout the story. Also, the personification of the disease, the “Red Death”, causes the reader to feel fear as the masked figure walks through the rooms. These literary devices generate feelings in the reader that have him or her experience the characters security and dread. Therefore, the language used in the piece, along with the irony and personification, allows the reader to fully enjoy it.

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It is clear that all of the symbols included in the story contribute to the allegory “The Masque of the Red Death”, which contains a lesson that applies to all people and teaches the reader to recognize other people’s problems, even if they do not affect the reader

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Poe is often known for his dark, sometimes twisted short stories and poems. “The Masque of the Red Death” is no exception. In this short story, Poe creates and eerie and ominous mood by using a wide variety of literary techniques including imagery, diction, and syntax. Poe’s use of imagery contributes to the dark and mysterious mood of the short story, “The Masque of the Red Death.” In the first paragraph, a sense of darkness is conveyed in the sentence, “There was no light of any kind emanating from lamp or candle within the suite of chambers.”

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Death is a diva, time is the performance, and the human life is the stage. Edgar Allen Poe wrote “ The Masque of the Red Death”, which captures the intertwining motives of Prince Prospero, time, and the Red Death. From the start, we learn that the Red Death is an illness that ends lives in a scarlet pool of blood. With this knowledge, Prince Prospero takes one-thousand confidants to an iron-gated abbey that is walled off and secluded from the Red Death. Five or six months later, the Prince decides to throw a masquerade in the image of his favored, unusual fashion.

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This message is shown when the phantom kills the prince in the red room. Throughout the story Poe shows examples of how he reveals his hidden message. Edgar Allan Poe gives symbols and hints revealing a clue about what the message could be. The evidence given was the castle and clock that were used as symbols as well as interesting objects that appear before the “Red Death” came to play.

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However, the Red Death comes to the party and kills everyone there, starting with the prince. To strengthen the allegory of the divide in social classes, Poe expresses even the rich can not escape death through his portrayal of the masquerade, room 7, and the castle. The first symbol used

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The authors’ use of strong imagery invokes strong emotions that give the audience a personal connection to the characters and events. In the “The Masque of the Red Death”, the theme is mortality. Poe shows how people are vulnerable to death, even after taking every possible precaution. Poe writes, “The mask ... was made so nearly to resemble the countenance of a stiffened corpse ... gone so far as to assume the type of the Red Death. His vesture was dabbled in blood - and his broad brow, with all the features of the face, was besprinkled with the scarlet horror” (6).

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In “The Masque of Red Death”, the author includes 7 rooms, one being black, which is where the Prince locks himself in: “There were seven-an imperial suite… The seventh apartment was closely shrouded in black velvet tapestries that hung all over the ceiling and down the walls…” (pg. 58). The seventh rooms shows how death is always there and always will be. The Prince fears that he’s going to be contaminated, so he does everything in his power to avoid death. The Prince creates an obsession over escaping death, what he doesn’t know is that death has always been there and always

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“As none of the guests, also described as “a multitude of dreams,” are given any specific character traits, they could be interpreted as mere “fantasms” of the Prince's imagination, or imaginary projections of the Prince's psyche”(Milne). Poe’s illustration of the guests projects the false image of humanity and society. Society is another world created by self deception and hypocrisy. The humans that create this community are false beings that try to belong into this world by conforming to society’s standards. Prospero’s society is a representation of his own character: full of ignorance, arrogance,

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In “The Masque of the Red Death”, Poe employs the characteristic of the isolated setting with the description of the chamber. Poe describes the character walking down the hall speaking about the characteristics of the chamber; “To the right and left, in the middle of each wall, a tall and narrow Gothic window looked out upon a closed corridor which pursued the windings of the suite. “(Poe, pg 2) With the corridor secured shut and Prince Prospero believes his guest and himself have safely locked away from death. Although the Prince feels safe behind the shut corridor, death does reach him that dreadful night. No matter the precaution the Prince took or how safe the corridor remains, nobody can escape the grasp of death.

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In “The Masque of the Red Death” Poe creates strong images of various decorative rooms which have been designed to go from east to west. This is no coincidence, as the rooms seem to imitate the course of the sun from daytime to nighttime, or even the course of human life- birth to death. The first room, coated in the colour blue, represents the freedom and tranquility felt by the guests in the castle. In contrast, the final room, coated in the colour black symbolises the fear and despair felt by the guests in relation to death and its inevitability.

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The overall allegory of these rooms symbolizes the individual stages of life a person goes through. The rooms were “so irregularly disposed that the vision embraced but little more than one at a time” (Poe 83). People live life not knowing what is behind the next door, leaving the inside unknown until one reaches that particular stage in their life. When “death” arrives at the prince's party, “he makes his way uninterruptedly, but with the same solemn and measured step which had distinguished him from the first,” (Poe 87) through every chamber. The details in life are unpredictable, but for the most part, everyone goes through the same general stages.

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Demi Pyle February 20, 2018 English 1302 Looking Closer at “The Masque of The Red Death” In the grim short story written by Edgar Allan Poe in 1842, “The Masque of the Red Death” tells the tale of a kingdom ravaged with disease and a prince’s journey to escape death. Poe hides underlying messages throughout the story, leaving the reader to interpret the true meaning of prosperity and death. Edgar Allan Poe uses symbolism and imagery in the form of an allegory to reveal to the reader that death is inescapable, no matter how wealthy you are.

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The story portrays a lot of anger, greed, and fear. Edgar Allan Poe used these forms of nature to show that although nobody is perfect, they most important thing is to do the right thing, be kind, and courageous no matter what. By using supernatural, gloom and horror, revenge, and a castle this was the perfect setting for the horror story it became, using this to show that it is some humans nature to be selfish, fearful, or powerful made readers understand the importance of the message Poe was trying to depict. Always doing the right

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