Prince Prospero The Red Death Analysis

Emotion and logic can affect people’s actions. Emotion such as fear though can be helpful to us in certain situations. Fear is a natural reaction, or instinct, that can help you survive. Feelings, like fear makes people more alert and cautious of your surroundings. But, if clouded by fear, it can make you over worried about things that you find scary. Focusing on one thing can also lead to obsession and paranoia over an object. In Edgar Allan Poe’s stories - “The Tell Tale Heart”, “The Pit and the Pendulum”, and “The Masque of Red Death” - all the main characters experience fear and all main characters are affected differently by fear. Poe uses symbolism, irony, and imagery in these stories to emphasize how fear distorts the narrator’s mind

In “Mask of the Red Death”, Edgar Allan Poe uses setting and symbolism to deliver the theme that no one escapes death. The story follows the naïve and pompous Prince Prospero, and his feeble attempt to escape dying from the Black Plague. As the plague spread through his kingdom, the prince called one thousand of his closest friends to reside within the safety of the castle in order to seclude themselves from the horror and death going on outside. During the last months of their seclusion, the prince decided to hold a masquerade ball in order to amuse his many guests living within the confines of the rather odd castle. The dance takes place in a variety of unusual apartments within the castle, spaced apart so the guests would only see one room at a time. The apartments flowed east to west, each decorated in a different color and theme while following a pattern of blue, purple, green, orange, white, violet and finally ending in black. During the ball, guests enjoyed a dreamlike atmosphere as they danced through the many colored apartments, each of them avoiding the final black room. This final dark patterned room contained a large ebony clock which chimed eerily every hour, causing the party goers to pause their merriment for a few moments of uneasy silence. As midnight drew near, a new guest arrived, sporting a costume more ghastly and morose than any other. The mask he wore resembled that of a plague victim, and his clothes resembled a funeral shroud. Prospero became angry

The seven rooms within The Castle could be interpreted in many ways and settings. One interpretation is that the seven rooms are used as an allegory for the seven deadly sins. Pride and vanity correlate with the color violet and is prevalent in the story because Prospero believes that his social status will keep him from death. Gluttony is represented by the color white and is portrayed as running rampant throughout the Castle as Prospero throws a lavish party with more than enough provisions and wine for his multitude of party guests. The sin of slothfulness is represented by the blue room because when Prospero ordered someone to seize the unidentified man Prospero expected them to do his job of protecting them from the red death. Since the orders were not followed Prospero himself had to try to seize the figure but it took several moments before he made his way to him. Another interpretation is that the rooms represent the journey through life. Assuming that the order that Poe lists the rooms is in order from east to west the most eastern room would be the blue room. The blue room represents the beginning of life and new

In Edgar Allen Poe’s short story, “ The Masque of the Red Death”, Poe tells of a plague that has long devastated the country. The short story revolves around one character in particular, the wealthy Prince Prospero, and how he decides to deal with the situation. This narrative work is an allegory, meaning it has two levels of meaning. It has both a literal meaning and a symbolic meaning. An allegory has the overall purpose to teach you a life lesson. The allegory in this short story can be revealed by the symbolic significance of Prince Prospero’s name, the seventh chamber of the abbey, and the ticking clock.

Lastly, the number 7 symbolizes all of the seven deadly sins Prince Prospero, the protagonist, has committed as the story progressed. The story revolves around a deadly plague called the “Red Death”, that makes people bleed from their eyes killing them within 30 minutes. After hearing this, the Prince decides to hide in his castle and throw a big party despite what’s occurring in the outside world. The castle contains seven rooms with distinct colors. The seven rooms can be associated with the seven deadly sins Prince Prospero is guilty of. Poe utilizes all of the sins which are Vanity/Pride, Greed, Sloth, Envy, Anger, Lust, and Gluttony to strengthen the story’s symbolism. For example, vanity is when you have strong beliefs on your abilities,

Edgar Allen Poe, completely transformed the horror genre with his tales reflecting the psychological depth and insight of the the human conditon not previously seen (Poe Museum, no date). Despite his alignment with the horror genre, he was initially taken in by the romantic ideals of consumption. This is portrayed in one of his early short stories, ‘Metzengerstein’, from 1832, where despite the majority of the story following many gothic conventions, the protaganist’s mother dies of consumption. The narrrator of the story asserts that ‘…it is a path I have prayed to follow…I would wish all I love to perish of that gentle disease’ when referring to the mother’s impending death. The narrator’s desperation to die from consumption is implied through the use of the verb ‘prayed’. This verb has connotations of wishing or hoping strongly for a particular outcome (Oxford Dictionaries, 2017): despite the horrific and drawn out process of the disease that we now understand in the 21st Century, this character still desires it thus reflecting the general insensitivty towards the disease. Although influenced early in his career by the romanticized stance on consumption, he changed his portrayal of the disease completely in his short story ‘The Masque of the Red Death’, published in 1842. Very little had advanced in the medical understanding of consumption, but between Poe writing the aforementioned text and ‘The Masque of the Red Death’, his own wife had contracted the disease

In "Masque of the Red Death", there are several differently colored rooms, which at first glance are simply several disparate pigments. After looking at the story as a whole, it is clear that these specific room colors each mean something other than itself. Spoken in "Masque of the Red Death" about two of the seven rooms is, "That at the eastern extremity was hung, for example, in blue...The seventh apartment was closely shrouded in black..." (Masque 5). The author, between discussing these opposing rooms, mentions the other rooms and their colors, also. Each of these rooms symbolizes the seven stages of life. The blue room represents birth and new life, as it is at the east where the sun rises beginning each new day. Meanwhile, the black room is the farthest west where the sun sets, ending the day. This black room embodies death, which is uncoincidentally where everyone dies in "Masque of the Red

They also represent the seven deadly sins which are Pride, Envy, Gluttony, Lust, Anger, Greed, and Sloth. The blue room represents birth. The purple room represents growth. The green room represents youth. The orange room represents strength and maturity.

At the beginning of the story, Edgar Allan Poe describes the disease and it’s horrid symptoms. He also explains how all the common people are dying from it, and the prince is doing nothing about it. However, the prince is allowing all the wealthy to live in his castle with him, and he decides to throw a ball only for the wealthy, too. At this ball, everyone is having a grand ole time until a mysterious marauder shows up. Edgar Allan Poe states in the text, “The mask which concealed the visage was made so nearly to resemble the countenance of a stiffened corpse” (3). In that statement, it is saying that this thing looks dead, but it has a face, which is a quality a disease cannot have. Another human quality Red Death is given is the ability to move. In the text it states, “ … he passed within a yard of the prince’s person… but with the same solemn and measured step” (Poe, 4). However, at the very end, they figured out that this figure was not a person but an unnatural force. Therefore, mysticism is used to help exemplify that this is a Romanticism

The story that tells the most never entertains, but more so teaches. The author of the story The Masque of the Red Death was by Edgar Allen Poe, the main characters of the story was Prince Prospero and the Red Death. The “Red Death” made itself known throughout the country as one by one the peasants of the country soon fell ill. The peasants experienced sharp pains and dizziness and within half an hour, the peasants were deceased. But Prince Prospero thought he could escape this unfortunate fate, so he gathered many people whom he deemed socially acceptable, and he shut the gates of the palace, shunning the rest of the infected population. He threw parties and entertained his guests with enough food and anything they could possibly need. In the palace, were seven rooms, all in which the parties took place in. The rooms moved from east to west, starting the with the first room which was blue, and ending with a black room. There was an unusual clock amongst them, every time it rang, it did not go unnoticed. The guests would stop, the music would stop, everything would stop. Then everything went back to it original atmosphere, fine and safe. But not you cannot run away from your problems, especially death, sooner or later death will find you. “The Red Death” found its way to the Prince and the rest of his guest, and soon they disappeared along with the rest of the infected people. The short story is not only expressing story about a young man who throws a party selfishly for only his friends and him, but it also underlies a symbolic meaning, with a lesson, you cannot escape death no matter how hard you try, it does not matter if you are rich or you are poor.

It has ravaged the country and few have survived. The main character, Prince Prospero, and hundreds of other wealthy citizens flee to a giant castle and lock themselves inside in an attempt to escape the Red Death. One night, Prince Prospero decides to lift everyone’s spirits by throwing a masquerade ball. He holds the party in a string of seven rooms, each decorated in a different color and arranged in a way as so no more than one room is visible at a time, and a loud chime of a clock is heard throughout the party. Prince Prospero and his guests thought they cheated death by hiding from it, but on the night of the masquerade, death finds his way into the castle, FINISH

Poe’s use of symbolism is very evident throughout the story of “The Masque of the Red Death”. Much has been made about the meaning of the rooms that fill Prince Prospero’s lavish getaway. One such critique, Brett Zimmerman writes, “It is difficult to believe that a symbolist such as Poe would refuse to assign significance to the hues in a tale otherwise loaded with symbolic and allegorical suggestiveness” (Zimmerman 60). Many agree that the seven rooms represent the seven stages of human existence. The first, blue, signifying the beginnings of life. Keeping in mind Poe’s Neo-Platonism and Transcendentalism stance, the significance of blue is taken a step further. Not only does blue symbolize the beginning of life, but the idea of immortality is apparent when considering these ideas. “Perhaps ‘The Masque of the Red Death’ then, is not quite the bleak existential vision we have long thought it to be”, expounds Zimmerman (Zimmerman 70). Poe’s use of each color is significant to the seven stages

Not to mention, his abbey is deeply secluded Prince Prospero and his followers have welded the doors shut, so no one can enter or leave. The main action of the story takes place in an intricated suite of seven colors where a masquerade ball is held. Much of the remainder of the story describes the arabesque and grotesque figures who inhabit the rooms (May 2609). Although, the story only has three character's through the Red Death, Prince Prospero, and the thousand friends. The Character's  seem less like real people than fancies created by a mad Prince Prospero (May 2609). The central conflict is Prince Prospero's attempt to evade and defeat death. In act of raising a dagger to kill the stranger, he falls instantly forward in death himself (May 2609). When the revelers seize the figure they found it had no tangible form at all (May 2609). With this discovery all the courtiers fall down in death one by one (May

In Poe’s “Masque of the Red Death” a plague (the Red Death) was ravaging the country and taking many victims to their ends. Prince Prospero was a very wealthy prince who decided that he was going to avoid the plague, so he gathered his knights and friends and walled them all up inside his palace before the plague could claim any of them. While the plague continued to rage on outside the walls, the Prince and his guests enjoyed a lavish masquerade party. The masquerade was held in seven rooms, each very different from one another and arranged so that one could only see one room at a time. The rooms were each shrouded in their own color; the last of the rooms was dark and black, and in it there was a clock that would ring each hour.

In the late 1340s the world faced a serious disease known as the Black Plague, that had killed several people. The plague was so severe the even people part of the upper and lower class was scared, including Prince Prospero. The story is bright with a dramatize representation with its colored rooms and secret revelers. Poe’s use of imagery is almost dizzying. The colored rooms delivered a coded message about the stages of life and everyone's reaction represented how man handle situations that are thrown towards us. A clock sat over which room reminded the guests of death’s final approach. The story also tries to punish Prospero’s arrogant belief that he can use his wealth to fight away the tragic stage of life. Although he possesses the wealth to assist those in need, he also attempted to use it in a way of self-defense. Throughout the short story "The Masque of the Red Death", Poe uses a variety of colors in the rooms to convey a coded message to the audience to express how fearful man is towards death.