Preview

The Masque Of The Red Death Symbolism

Satisfactory Essays
Open Document
Open Document
177 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
The Masque Of The Red Death Symbolism
In a short story, the masque of the red death by Edgar Allan Poe, discuss a terrible disease called red death has stricken in the country. Prince Prospero, who is the king of the country. He describes as a bad leader in the short story because he does not care about his people when the disease strike. King prosper shut his self in the castle with his favorite people. Mr. Poe uses seven different colored room to symbolic of procreation of life. There are seven different colored room, birth – blue, youth – purple, and adolescence – green, adulthood – orange, old age – white, imminent death – violent, death itself – black scarlet. The seventh represent that Prospero chasing the stranger. It is also the room which everyone avoids at the end of

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Powerful Essays

    Both influential writers in the time of early American literature, Nathaniel Hawthorne and Edgar Allen Poe explored the dark motives of the human psyche. In “The Minister’s Black Veil”, a short story by Hawthorne, the town’s minister, Mr. Hooper steps out into the street one day wearing a black veil that covers his face. His clergymen cannot bear to see him plainly profess his sins and instead separate themselves in an attempt to deny the truth that all people are flawed, but are eventually forced to accept it. In Poe’s short story, “The Masque of the Red Death”, Prince Prospero and his merrymakers lock themselves within a castellated abbey in an attempt to escape the horrible “Red Death” that ravages the lives of the…

    • 1398 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The exposition of masque of the Red Death starts with Prince Prospero at his masquerade ball. The rising action occurs with introduction of the guests and the walk through of the seven rooms of life's stages. The clock strikes and an secret guest appears causing the climax of the story. Prince Prospero chases the secret guest confronting him and meets his demise. The falling action occurs when the guests corner the secret guest and unmask him. The guests unmask the guest and realize there is nothing there. It is Red Death himself causing the resolution.…

    • 292 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Edgar allan Poe uses the seven rooms from east to west to explain the stages of life . "That at the eastern extremity was hung, for example, in blue....second was purple....the third was green...the fourth was orange...the fifth with white... the sixth violet...the seventh apartment was closely shrouded in black..." (448) The blue room represents the new born stage of life, purple is for your childhood, green represents growing up and gaining knwledge. These first three rooms are…

    • 159 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    “The Masque of the Red Death” story response Throughout “The Masque of the Red Death” by Edgar Allan Poe , he shares his ideals on the inevitability of death through the main character in the story, Prince Prospero. Prince Prospero embodies three of the deadly sins such as, pride, greed, and sloth. In the story Prince Prospero says “Who dares” -- he demanded hoarsely of the courtiers who stood near him -- “who dares insult us with this blasphemous mockery? Seize him and unmask him.”…

    • 301 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    In Poe’s “The Masque of the Red Death”, the color of the most eastern and most western chamber are significance to the message of the story. In Roppolo’s Literary Criticism, he explains, “To Blair, as to many others, there is ‘allegorical signification’ in the seven rooms, which, ‘progressing from east to west—from blue to black—connote the seven ages of man from the blue of the dawn of life to the black of its night.’” The message Poe presents is that no living thing can avoid its fate of death no matter how it tries to protect itself or escape it. The blue most eastern chamber represents the birth of dawn and the black velvet and red most western chamber depicts death and night, demonstrating that as Prince Prospero and the guest run through…

    • 178 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    In the “Masque Of Red Death” by Edgar Allen Poe, Poe uses imagery and symbolism to create an allegory that communicates to the reader the idea that nobody is able to escape death. In the story, Prince Prospero and his royal friends seclude themselves away from a plague called red death that is killing every poor soul it comes in contact with. As the royals entertain themselves with a masquerade, red death himself arrives at the party, finishing up of what's left of human civilization. Now the first thing that is found that creates imagery and symbolism is a line in the story that says,”While the chimes of the clock yet ran, it was observed that the giddiest grew pale”.(Poe pg.5) This shows a symbol of a black grandfather…

    • 276 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Death is a mystery event that happens to all of us and it is one those events that you can hide from no matter what you do. In the story “Masque of the Red Death” Edgar Allan Poe explains how Prince Prospero locks himself and others in his castle to hide from the plague. Even though the prince hides himself in his castle, he was not able to escape death. He even tried to fight it off ,but made it worse for himself. In the story Peo applies that you can not hide from death or fight it off.…

    • 531 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    The introduction of Poe's famous short story, "The Masque of the Red Death" illustrates the disease that is gruesomely killing it's victims. There was sudden dizziness, sharp pains, and then profuse bleeding from the pores, lasting about half an hour until killing it's victim. As The Red Death is rapidly spreading throughout the country, Prince Prospero is optimistic and derives a plan. He decides to lock the gates of his palace inviting only a thousand of his peers to be spared from the disease. After five months the Prince throws an elaborate masquerade ball, decorating each room in a certain color. The first chamber was vividly blue, the second was purple along with it's tapestry. The third was green and the fourth chamber was orange, the fifth was white and the sixth was violet. The seventh apartment was the most grotesque of all, decorated in black with velvet curtains. It is the only chamber that the window hue did not correspond with the walls, the window was a scarlet red symbolizing blood. "Death cannot be barred from the palace...it is in the blood, part and parcel of our humanity, not an external invader." (Kennedy 111-133.) At midnight an unknown guest appears, dressed as…

    • 1498 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Masque of the Red Death by Edgar Allan Poe is the story of Price Prospero’s attempt to quarantine himself and his courtiers from the deadly disease, the Red Death. One of the major themes in the short story is: No one can escape death, not even the rich and powerful. To convey this message, Poe used symbols to express the images of wealth, power, control, vanity, the stages of life, and the inevitability of death. Two of these symbols are explained below.…

    • 449 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The universal theme, no one can escape death, is displayed in “The Masque of the Red Death” by Edgar Allan Poe. In this story, Prince Prospero threw a masquerade to distract him from the pestilence that was The Red Death. His guests were worried about the plague getting to them and killing them all, and they tried forgetting about it. Eventually, The Red Death came and everyone, including the prince, was killed. This theme is not just found in this story, it appears in other places. The universal theme, no one can escape death, is found in “The Masque of the Red Death” as well as in The Fault in Our Stars by John Green and in the “Book of Psalms”.…

    • 787 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    “Its pendulum swung to and fro with a dull...when the minute-hand made the circuit of the face...the hour was to be stricken...the musicians of the orchestra were constrained to pause”(374). The clock is in the seventh room, once again representing death. Every time the clock strikes an hour, the musicians stop playing and all the guests stop celebrating as well. Each hour is to be struck upon as their nearness of death. As the clock struck midnight it represented the end of the day meaning the end of life. This corresponds to the theme of how death is inevitable. Edgar Allan Poe symbolizes or represents the passing of life which can represent…

    • 734 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Masque of the Red Death is a short story written by Edgar Allan Poe. A horrible disease…

    • 465 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In the story, Prince Prospero tries to isolate himself in his castle, with the iron doors welded shut and even entertainers and his court to accompany him. He does this to prevent the Red Death from infecting him, but, towards the end of the story, a masked figure, symbolizing the Red Death, reveals itself. As a result, Prince Prospero rages over how anyone could have gotten in, but it turns out that Death was there along and he eventually kills everyone. Poe states, “And now was acknowledged the presence of the Red Death. He had come like a thief in the night…..And Darkness and Decay and the Red Death help illimitable dominion over all”(pg.61). It is ironic how Prince Prospero did everything to keep the Red Death out of his castle, but Death was there all along. He was so fearful of Death that he actually thought that he could prevent it. But of course, when “the life of the ebony clock went out with that of the last gay”(61). The masked figure took the lives of all the people in Prince Prospero’s castle because people cannot escape death. Poe is trying to explain that Death will always be apart of a person’s destiny and it’s better just live life to the fullest, rather than letting the fear of Death take over one’s…

    • 1013 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Gothic Poe and Hawthorne

    • 1173 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Gothic literature was influence by gothic architecture. The story of “Masque of the Red Death,” Poe uses the castle to gives it a gothic style. Prince Prospero and his friends also welded the doors shut so no one could enter. The story is set in Prince Prospero castle, cut off from the world, which is struck by plague. Poe describes the placements of the windows, the rooms and the clock. The castle had seven rooms which represents the seven stages of life. Each of the room has a different color theme to it. Poe describes the color of each room, “The first room is blue, the second is purple, the third is green, fourth is orange, fifth is white, sixth is violet and the seventh is black with red drapes, and a clock in the center of the room that announces at the end of each hour.”…

    • 1173 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Better Essays

    The story symbolizes the inevitability of death, and brings to reality the quote “you can run, but you can’t hide”. The colors presented in “Masque of the Red Death” play a huge role in this symbolism. They create the mood of the story, they represent the stages of life, and they highlight the horror of the last night of happiness. Overall, Edgar Allan Poe carefully depicts the use of colors in his story, and they will forever be recognized as allegorical genius in this iconic tale of greediness, power, and fate. Symbolism can be found in places high and low. Be sure to look closely, and one can reveal a meaning of something they never would have thought…

    • 1565 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays