Examples Of Allegory In The Masque Of The Red Death

In the short story, The Masque of the Red Death, Edgar Allen Poe tells a dark tale of a prince and his masquerade of death. In the story the prince, Prince Prospero, holds a luxurious ball at his enclosed castle ending in the demise of him and the attendees. Though the prince is a powerful and wealthy noble that seems to be fortified from any danger, he cannot escape the inevitability of his death. Throughout The Masque of the Red Death, Edgar Allan Poe uses literary techniques such as symbolism, allegory, and alliteration to develop a theme of power, that death is more powerful than any human can be.

Poe demonstrates a very obvious use of symbolism to illustrate the theme of death’s power over the characters in the story. One of the many

symbols used in the story is the clock. The clock struck every hour silencing the musicians and company of the prince, striking fear into their hearts. The clock basically represents their lives. The death of the joyful masqueraders was matched with the death of the clock as it “went out with that of the last of the gay” (Poe). This gives us the impression that death has the power and control over the characters. Death got to choose the “time” in which it took their lives. Another symbol in the story is the black chamber. The room represents the fear of death that the people have. None of them dare to go into room because of their fear. In essence fear is power. If you are afraid of something, it has power over you, and that’s exactly what the symbolism in The Masque of The Read Death tells us about the characters in the story, that they fear death.
The Masque of the Read Death serves as an allegory to demonstrate the theme of the power of death.

A more specific category of symbolism, and one of the many things Poe is known for, an allegory is used to symbolize a deeper moral of the story, which in this story is the power and inevitability of death. What gives away that this short story is an allegory is the first paragraph that Poe writes about the “Red Death”. This fictitious disease represents something more realistic and important to Poe. It represents tuberculosis and how it took the life of several women in his life. With this story about this “Red Death”, writing it as allegory helps him express how death has had a powerful influence over his life. Another symbol he uses for allegory is the masked visitor as he represents just how powerful death really is. Poe personifies death by making death into one of the characters of the story. The masked figure, an unwanted being that somehow got past of the “security” of the prince’s palace, after being uncloaked by the attendants of the masquerade, was “untenanted by any tangible form… and now was acknowledged the presence of the Red Death” (Poe). This use of allegory gives us that deeper moral that death can be anywhere, in this case in the form of a human, which adds to its powerful

presence.
Though very subtle, Poe uses alliteration to strengthen this theme of power. At the first sight of the princes name it makes the prince seem as someone with a powerful stature. The alliteration in his name “Prince Prospero” really helps with this effect. Authors usually will use alliteration in a character’s name to make them seem more important. Heroes and villains will be given alliterative names to show that they have power behind their image. Poe does the same with illuminating Prince Prospero’s name using alliteration. Another example of alliteration that Poe uses to show power is when describing the masked visitor. He describes the scary image of the visitor’s attire which was immersed “in blood—and his broad brow… besprinkled with the scarlet horror” (Poe). Poe makes it seem as if he is really trying to make this sentence stand out. With the use of the hyphen, the use of alliteration really strengthens the sentence and makes it stick. Poe must have done this put an image in the reader’s head on how frightening this figure really was. This creates a great indicator of the power of fear that death held over the prince and his the rest of the revelers. Knowing that Poe has a background in poetry, the use of alliteration seems something purposely done and buffs the theme.