The Masque of the Red Death
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This article is about the short story by Edgar Allan Poe. For the Dungeons & Dragons campaign setting, see Masque of the Red Death (Ravenloft).
"The Masque of the Red Death" is a short story written by Edgar Allan Poe and first published in 1842.
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[edit] Plot summary
The story takes place at the castellated abbey of the "happy, dauntless, and sagacious" Prince Prospero. Prospero and one thousand other nobles are taking refuge in the abbey to escape the Red Death, a terrible and gruesome plague that has been sweeping the land. The symptoms of the Red Death are gruesome to behold: the victim is swept by convulsive agony and sweats blood instead of water. It is said to kill within half an hour. One night, Prospero holds a masquerade ball to entertain his guests, but late into the night, he notices one figure in a grey robe resembling a funeral shroud, with a mask depicting a victim of the Red Death, which all at the ball have been desperate to escape. Gravely insulted, Prospero demands to know the identity of the mysterious guest. To the horror of all, the guest is revealed to be the personification of Red Death itself. Once this is revealed, all the guests suddenly contract and succumb to the disease.
Prince Prospero has summoned all of his friends, knights, and dames to his abbey. There are 7 rooms in this abbey: The blue room, the purple room, the green room, the orange room, the white room, the violet and the black room. There is a giant ebony clock that makes all the guests stop in their tracks when it rings. At midnight when the clock sounds 12 times, the music ceases and the waltzers stop. The Red Death (symbolizing Tuberculosis) appears. He is slow and solemn until the Prince chases him with a dagger. The Red Death kills him and his guests quickly.
[edit] Publication History
Poe first published this story in the May 1842 edition of Graham's Lady's and Gentleman's Magazine as "The Mask of the Red Death." A revised version was published in the July 19, 1845 edition of the Broadway Journal under the now-standard title "The Masque of the Red Death." The story has been published in The Gold Bug and Other Tales as well as in multiple literature books.
[edit] Analysis
There is no epigraph at the start of this story, unusual for a Poe tale. The theme of this story is how, eventually, death comes to all. High-rank and wealth does not stop the Red Death's "illimitable dominion over all" and even in perceived safety, death sneaks up unexpectedly, "like a thief in the night."
[edit] Imagery and Symbols
The book shows a lot of imagery through color schemes and it also uses the number seven which is used as a "sacred" number. The colors in the story start and end (in order) Blue, Purple, Green, Orange, White, Violet, and Black. As seen 7 colors for the seven rooms which start at east and end at the west. Another point is brought here sun rises in the east (life begins) it sets in the west (life ends) the colors show the same as it goes from blue, whose meaning is more akin to that of the beginning life, to white, which represents the middle part of life at its climax, and black, representing the end of life; death itself. The clock in the story symbolizes that time is running out for the people and every hour is a time to mourn. In the end of the story it shows that the clock stops ticking and the candles die out which in a way shows the end of the world almost like an apocalypse.
[edit] The "Red Death"
The nature of the disease actually depicted as the Red Death is uncertain. Poe describes it as having "sharp pains, and sudden dizziness, and then profuse bleeding at the pores" and death within half an hour. Some scholars feel that it is Poe's perception of tuberculosis (or consumption, as it was known then). Poe had already lost two of his female relatives to this disease. The onset of the disease was usually heralded by coughing up of blood. The infected person then went on to develop worsening blood loss as the disease progressed to fatality. However, unlike the "Red Death" which occurs within half an hour, tuberculosis usually took several years to kill its victims.
[edit] Adaptations
- The story inspired Russian filmmaker Vladimir R. Gardin's A Spectre Haunts Europe in 1921.
- The story was adapted in 1964 by Roger Corman into a film, The Masque of the Red Death starring Vincent Price. The film adapted parts of another Poe story, Hop-Frog, involving the court jester and his wife.
[edit] References
Stephen King's novel The Shining contains several allusions to the story.
In Gaston Leroux's novel The Phantom of the Opera, Erik, the Phantom, dresses up as the Red Death with the inscription "Je suis la Mort rouge qui passe!" embroidered on his cloak in gold. The Red Death costume shows up in both the 1986 musical and 2004 film of the same name, though the stage production is somewhat more accurate regarding his appearance, as he bears a large feathered hat and lengthy cloak as described in the novel. Neither appearance, however, shows the inscription. The animated film also shows the Red Death scene. Erik dressed as the Red Death also appears on the cover of Sam Siciliano's "The Angel of the Opera."
The American metal band Crimson Glory included a tribute to the tale on their 1988 album "Transcendence" entitled "Masque of the Red Death".
The 1994 computer game Under a Killing Moon featured interludes where text slides containing lines of The Masque of the Red Death were narrated by James Earl Jones.
The 1995 computer game The Dark Eye featured an abstract slide-show segment accompanying a reading of "The Masque of the Red Death" performed by William S. Burroughs.
The 2001 animated/live action comedy Osmosis Jones features the Red Death, otherwise known as Thrax, as the main villain. He was voiced by Laurence Fishburne.
The 2002 Thrice album The Illusion of Safety features a song entitled "The Red Death," which is an interpretation of the story.
In the Terry Pratchett novel Maskerade, Death himself wears a Red Death costume at the climax of the story.
[edit] External links
- "The Masque of the Red Death" at EServer.org
- "The Masque of the Red Death" with annotated vocabulary at PoeStories.com
- Sabrina Laurent (July 2003). "Metaphor and Symbolism in The Masque of the Red Death", Bohème Magazine Online.
- Analyzing Poe's Work Biographically and Psychologically Illinois State University
| Edgar Allan Poe |
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| Poems |
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1820's |
| Tales |
| Metzengerstein (1832) • The Duc De L'Omelette (1832) • A Tale of Jerusalem (1832) • Loss of Breath (1832) • Bon-Bon (1832) • MS. Found in a Bottle (1833) • The Assignation (1834) • Berenice (1835) • Morella (1835) • Lionizing (1835) • Hans Phaall (1835) • King Pest (1835) • Shadow - A Parable (1835) • Four Beasts in One - The Homo-Cameleopard (1836) • The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket (1837) • Mystification (1837) • Silence - A Fable (1837) • Ligeia (1838) • How to Write a Blackwood Article (1838) • A Predicament (1838) • The Devil in the Belfry (1839) • The Man That Was Used Up (1839) • The Fall of the House of Usher (1839) • William Wilson (1839) • The Conversation of Eiros and Charmion (1839) • Why the Little Frenchman Wears His Hand in a Sling (1840) • The Business Man (1840) • The Man of the Crowd (1840) • The Murders in the Rue Morgue (1841) • A Descent into the Maelstrom (1841) • The Island of the Fay (1841) • The Colloquy of Monos and Una (1841) • Never Bet the Devil Your Head (1841) • Eleonora (1841) • Three Sundays in a Week (1841) • The Oval Portrait (1842) • The Masque of the Red Death (1842) • The Landscape Garden (1842) • The Mystery of Marie Roget (1842) • The Pit and the Pendulum (1842) • The Tell-Tale Heart (1843) • The Gold-Bug (1843) • The Black Cat (1843) • Diddling (1843) • Morning on the Wissahiccon (1844) • The Spectacles (1844) • A Tale of the Ragged Mountains (1844) • The Balloon-Hoax (1844) • The Premature Burial (1844) • Mesmeric Revelation (1844) • The Oblong Box (1844) • The Angel of the Odd (1844) • Thou Art the Man (1844) • The Literary Life of Thingum Bob, Esq. (1844) • The Purloined Letter (1845) • The Thousand-and-Second Tale of Scheherazade (1845) • Some Words with a Mummy (1845) • The Power of Words (1845) • The Imp of the Perverse (1845) • The System of Dr. Tar and Prof. Fether (1845) • The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar (1845) • The Sphinx (1846) • The Cask of Amontillado (1846) • The Domain of Arnheim (1847) • Mellonta Tauta (1849) • Hop-Frog (1849) • Von Kempelen and His Discovery (1849) • X-ing a Paragrab (1849) • Landor's Cottage (1849) |
