Symbolism In The Masque Of The Red Death

In Edgar Allan Poe’s poem “The Raven” and short story “The Masque of The Red Death” Poe illustrates a fear of death. Death has taken away the people he cares about most in his life. As an author of fear and death, Poe's own life was the inspiration for his spine tingling poems and stories. In his poem “The Raven” Virginia was the influence for Lenore, whose death the speaker is grieving. In Poe’s short story “The Masque of the Red Death,” the red death is a representation of tuberculosis which his wife as well as his mother, foster mother, and brother all obtained and die from.

Through using the deathly symbolism in this story skillfully, Poe allude to people to the part of life that people have to go through without the controled by people . First he described seven chambers ( seven rooms in the palace ), “In blue…….. falling in heavy folds upon a carpet of the same material and hue” ( Poe 43) . Seven room were represent to 7 part of life : the blue room, which is farthest to the east, represents birth.. The next room is purple, a combination of blue (birth) and red suggests the beginnings of growth. Green, the next color, suggests the young of life the age of spring , orange is the summer and autumn of life is the age of adult . White, the next color, suggests age with white hair, and bones the age of old . Violet is a shadowy color, the color represents people were near the death . And black is death. Otherwise, 7 rooms were set up East to West like the position of the Sun. That means that no matter who you are you

Each apartment in the abbey is a symbol that supports the theme. The apartments are in order, starting with blue, purple, green, orange, white, violet, and black. Starting with the blue apartment, blue symbolizes birth or the start of someone’s life. Next, the purple apartment represents growth in someone’s life through

“And Darkness and Decay and the Red Death held illimitable dominion over all.” This quote from Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Masque Of The Red Death”connects the fictional fate of Prince Prospero and his subjects to the . . Red Death to the many loved ones Poe’s life is very similar to those in thelost to tuberculosis in the late 1800s. Poe uses personification and allegories to show emphasize the presence of death that theand fear and presence of death is evident present in his work. Poe uses personification and gory phrases to show bring to the forefront the fear of death that possesses everyone clutches .

Imagine dancing through the colorful stages of life, birth, childhood, adolescence, adulthood, and such. However, as you progress through life, you can never shake a sense of foreboding lurking behind you. Suddenly, deep, dark, death devours you. Death, everyone faces it eventually. In the story, “The Masque of the Red Death”, by Edgar Allan Poe, the theme is, “You cannot avoid death.” Poe develops the theme by using many different symbols throughout the story.

But we will never know the real reason. It could be because of William Shakespeare’s “Seven Ages of Men”, or Christianity’s seven deadly sins. There are more speculations, but my personal perception would be one of these two. Although Poe was not very religious in his later years, he went to church a lot when he was a child which could have influenced his stories. The vivid colors used in each room would lead me to assume that the rooms actually represent the stages of life. On the most eastern side (where the sun rises) would be infant, then the colors in-between would be your years after infancy, then lastly on the furthest western side (where the sun sets) would be death since the room is black.

The fires in each of the suite rooms serve as a representation of death. Poe depicts

“The boundaries which divide Life from Death are best shadowly and vague. Who shall say where the one ends, and where the other begins?” (Poe). There is no such thing as having the ability to predict or tame the wrath of death, for all we can do is learn to accept it. In the story, “The Masque of the Red Death”, the main character, Prospero, shows through his arrogant actions that death will forever overpower the human instinct to stay alive. Poe uses symbolism to convey the battle between man and nature through the idea of the masquerade that serves as a fortress against the wrath of the disease, an excuse to disguise the true colors of man, and the honest truth that man will never become immortal.

Edgar Allan Poe is a famous well known writer known for his dark and gothic horror stories such as “The Tell-Tale Heart” and many others. The well-known author had a rough life which dealt with a lot of death, so most of his stories revolve around this idea. In “The Cask of Amontillado” and “The Masque of the Red Death” Poe uses similar themes or darkness to convey tone and conflict throughout the story. His writing style is dark and revolves around one main concept: death. Edgar Allan Poe uses diction and syntax, setting and conflict, and characterization in his writing style to develop his stories.

One of the most apparent symbols in the text are the bizarre colored rooms. The rooms represent the cycle of life, blue is birth, purple childhood, green adolescence, orange adulthood, white is the elderly years, violet is dying, and finally black is death. The rooms are arranged like the sun rise and set with the blue room all the way in the east and the black at the west end. Furthermore, the rooms have similar styles, all one color with the decor and windows matching said color. However, the black room is different with black velvet curtains, and the windows a blood red color. The light from the hall isn’t able to enter the room so a candelabra was placed behind each window so that it “projected its rays through the tinted glass… And produced so wild a look upon the countenances of those who entered” (2) The

In Prince Prospero’s castle, he had a hallway of seven rooms. The rooms went from one direction to another, starting in the east, changing by color as they went. Poe mentioned, “That at the eastern extremity was hung, for example, in blue- and vividly blue were its windows” (84). The symbol of the rooms one and seven represents new life and death. With this, Poe shows how the room started in the eastern extremity, just as the sun rises from the east, and is blue just as blue symbolizes life. Poe also writes, “The seventh apartment was closely shrouded in black velvet tapestries that hung down the walls” (84). In this quote, he shows how the last room was black, which symbolizes death. This last room was in the far western extremity. This shows that this was the last room, and everything must end there. Consequently, many people did not notice the two different colors in the room. The first color of that room was black, which was death. The other color was red which can symbolize blood. Also, the colors of these rooms showed how the death could not be kept out. Above all, these colors the stages of life. Therefore, the colors of the rooms showed what was

Death is an important theme in Edgar Allan Poe’s short stories, “The Pit and the Pendulum” and “The Masque of the Red Death”.

The placement of the rooms in the hall plays a symbolic role in the story. The seven different rooms are set in an intricate way, “There was a sharp turn at every twenty or thirty yards, and at each turn a novel effect.” Which means when you stand in the first room you are unable to see the last room. This symbolizes life, you can't see what happens in the future

While humans can possess dominance over several aspects of their worlds, mankind is simply vulnerable to their unyielding fate. In the allegory entitled “The Masque of the Red Death,” Edgar Allan Poe indirectly employs the concepts of life and death, along with their role in the course of human events. While the revelers make great attempts to obscure themselves from reality, the spectre of death is something unable to be hindered. Through the prominent use of symbolism, Poe communicates the uncompromising presence of death in one’s life, along with the futility of trying to escape from it.

As a gothic writer, Edgar Allan Poe created horror using gloom as his weapon. Hidden within the suspenseful story of “The Masque of Red Death” is an allegorical tale of how individuals deal with the fear of death as time passes. Frantic activities and pleasures (as represented by Prince Prospero and his guests) seek to wall out the threat of death. However, the story reminds the reader that death comes “like a thief in the night”(Poe 3), and even those who seek peace and safety shall not escape. Poe uses symbolism to illustrate that man cannot hide from his own mortality.