Essay on Symbolism in The Masque of the Red Death

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

The author, Edgar Allan Poe, using illusion or misdirection keeps the reader is suspense throughout this story called "The Masque of the Red Death". Symbolism such as the colored rooms, the impressive clock, the feeling of celebration being at a party all makes this story feel like a fairytale. Poe used this fairytale style and converts it into a nightmare in disguise.

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.

Edgar Allen Poe’s chilling short story Mask of the Red Death begins with people dropping like flies, as the king of the land decides to take his close friends with him to live in one of his palaces. leaving his subjects to survive on their own. A puzzling creature known as the Red Death has been terrorizing and killing off people one by one, and no one has a way to stop it. Through characterization of both Prospero and the Red Death, Poe foreshadows Prospero’s eventual death in the end of the story.

There is quite a lot of symbolism for the seventh room and how it portrays death. The seventh room symbolizes death because the room is, ‘...Closely shrouded in black velvet tapestries…’, and the room windows are also described as a blood color, and all of these descriptions are symbolizing death and because black is mostly related to death (374). Many of the guests stayed away from the room because of how extremely creepy it is. The black room is also the last room on the west side of the abbey symbolizing the way the sun sets; the ending of a day. The

In Poe’s short story, The Masque of the Red Death, he makes it pretty apparent that there is no possible way to escape death, no matter what rank you are. To get across this message he uses the ticking of a clock and the ring every hour to remind you death happens no matter what you do. He also adds in seven different rooms of varying colors blue, purple, green, orange, white, violet, and black/scarlet. These seven rooms may represent a whole unit of time, like the days of the week. Poe also says that the rooms go east to west like the sun’s course. Every color of the room can also represent life itself, blue represents birth, purple is youth, green is adolescence, orange is adulthood, old age is white, imminent death is violet, then finally death itself is black/scarlet.

For instance, the panes were scarlet, a deep blood colour. The "bloody" red room thus becomes a place of ending not only due to the westward location, but also because of its color. Poe describes the last, black room as the dreadful endpoint, the room the guests fear just as they fear death. The room is feared by the guests because it reminds them of death, which is why no one enters the room. The room is involved in all of the main scenes throughout the course ofthe story. For example, this is the room Prince Prospero and his guests die from the Red Death and also where the clock is located. The reader sees how important the rooms are throughout the story and its main contribution to the theme.

“The Masque of the Red Death,” a short story by Edgar Allan Poe, tells the story of Prince Prospero and his futile attempts to prevent death. During his masquerade party, the prince notices an unusual figure, dressed as the Red Death, and, enraged at the sight of it, Prospero tries to kill it. Poe uses the seventh room, the ebony clock, and the Red Death itself as symbols of death throughout his story.

the end of a day and darkness. Poe uses the element of darkness as a visual representation of

The seven rooms in the house also conveyed stages in life ending with death. These rooms were set up from east to west. This meaning that the sun comes up in the east and goes down in the west, and death comes in the darkness. "In this chamber only, the color of the windows failed to correspond with the decorations. The panes here were scarlet--a deep blood color." The guest's avoided this room because it was a sign of death.

“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.

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 the article, “Deliberate Chaos: Poe’s Use of Colors in ‘The Masque of the Red Death” by Eric H. du Plessis, he says “In each preceding apartment the panes of the gothic window match the prevailing color of the room, but in the last the color is altered to a deep red, since black windowpanes would not allow the light from the tripods to shine through the glass and illuminate the room” (43). There is no way to the leave the black room, conveying the idea that death cannot be

Poe used the rooms of the fortress as a symbol of the progression of a human life. The fortresses design contains seven distinctly different rooms. H.H. Bell, Jr., an expert on Edgar Allan Poe, has suggested that Poe seems to represent these rooms as an “allegorical representation of Prince Prospero’s life span” (Bell 241). The greatest piece of evidence for this is the order in which Poe arranged the rooms. The first room is positioned in the far eastern side of the mansion and the last room’s placement resides in the far western side. Just as the sun rises in the east and sets in the west each day, the arrangement of the rooms suggests the beginning and the end of life. Poe exemplifies this idea with the coloration of the last room. Black, a color connected with night and death, covers the walls in the last room. Also, the color of red seeps through the stained glass windows representing the bloodiness often incorporated with death, particularly the Red Death so feared at this party. Prospero’s guests avoid the last room out of fear, just as the living avoid reminders of death. Meanwhile, music and dancing

There is a terrible sickness spreading throughout their town. “No pestilence had ever been so fatal, or so hideous.” (Poe 78 ) In the story “The Masque of the Red Death” fear is the main theme. Prince Prospero invites a thousand of his friends to his castle. There are seven different colored rooms in the castle. The guests fill all the different