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The Red Death. It Should Come As No Surprise That The Farther Away You Are From Another Person, The Less

Poe creates an eerie tone in his description of a masquerade ball. The guests feel uneasy when a clock rings ominously, yet the event seems cheerful. A seventh room is decorated entirely in black and red, symbolic of death and blood. The guests avoid this room due to its ominous symbolism but ultimately die there after pursuing a mysterious figure, revealing it to be death itself. Clocks symbolize the inevitable approach of death, consuming the guests' joy and lives.

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49 views1 page

The Red Death. It Should Come As No Surprise That The Farther Away You Are From Another Person, The Less

Poe creates an eerie tone in his description of a masquerade ball. The guests feel uneasy when a clock rings ominously, yet the event seems cheerful. A seventh room is decorated entirely in black and red, symbolic of death and blood. The guests avoid this room due to its ominous symbolism but ultimately die there after pursuing a mysterious figure, revealing it to be death itself. Clocks symbolize the inevitable approach of death, consuming the guests' joy and lives.

Uploaded by

Ritz Bizmo
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Poe's language helps to create an eerie tone while maintaining a joyful yet dark mood.

Poe
initiates the passage by describing the masquerade ball as a luxurious event ("voluptuous scene"), which
helps to establish the setting. The guests at this event are described as having a brief moment of
uneasiness and slight fear when the clock rings out in a somewhat foreboding manner—"...monotonous
clang...even the giddiest grew pale..."—yet at the same time, Poe describes the event as wonderful and
cheery ("in spite of these things, it was a gay and magnificent revel") despite the unsettling environment.
These elements coincide to create the story's mood in which the guests feel a false sense of comfort that
the reader can seemingly anticipate will come to an end, as expected with the foreboding occurrences.
This eerie tone is further explored when Poe mentions that the prince possesses a seventh room for the
ball which is entirely decorated with black and red—which Poe describes a deep blood red. The color red
as it is used in this story is symbolic of blood—bleeding from pores is a symptom of the red death as
described in the story. Likewise, the color black is usually symbolic of death—this is most likely why the
guests in the story avoided using this foreboding room ("there were few of the company bold enough to
set foot within its precincts at all"). Ironically, the guests who avoided this room due to its association
with death all ended up dying shortly after they entered the room to pursue the mysterious figure. In that
same room, Poe describes there being a large clock (which is also black as expected). Clocks in literature
and artworks are usually symbolic of the passage of time—as time passes, so does death inevitably
approach. This serves the purpose of building the dark mood that eventually consumes the joy of the
guests at the ball—both metaphorically and literally.

Understanding the Importance of Poe's The Masque of the Red Death with Regards to Social Distancing
Guidelines

Social distancing is an important aspect of the safety precautions necessary for maintaining health
and avoiding sickness. Similarly, Poe explores the concept of social distancing in his story The Masque of
the Red Death. It should come as no surprise that the farther away you are from another person, the less
likely to are to catch a disease from them. In the story, we observe as Prince Prospero holds a masquerade
ball. At the same time, a deadly plague is being transmitted throughout the area where the prince lives.
Clearly, we can see that the prince is not following social distancing guidelines. At the end of the story,
the prince and every guest at the ball dies after interacting with a mysterious figure who is revealed to be
the red death itself. We can easily observe the parallels of this story to real-life—albeit to a lesser degree.
As the prince hold the party, a mysterious figure arrives. This individual can be representative of COVID-
19 itself. When the prince interacts with this individual, he ends up dying of the red death. This can be
likened to interacting with an infectious individual—then catching COVID-19 from them. Then, every
other individual at the party dies as well. This can be compared to a superspreader event, in which a large
amount of people catch an illness (COVID-19 in this case) from one person. The Masque of the Red
Death serves as a simple cautionary tale about the detrimental effects of disregarding social distancing
guidelines. While you may not die from catching COVID-19, it is important to maintain social distancing
to avoid an event similar to The Masque of the Red Death from occurring.

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