Use Of Irony In The Masque Of The Red Death

In the harrowing and atmospheric short story The Masque of The Red Death Edgar A. Poe uses many literary techniques to create a chilling and dark story, creating deep and meaningful metaphors and using deep symbolism to create powerful imagery that grips the reader with every word. In the story a clear location and time frame is never given, however the important characters in the story are outlined from the very start. Prince Prospero is the ruler of a dying and plagued land, his country has fallen under the dreaded spell of the pestilence known as the Red Death and it has claimed the lives of half of his nations population. Fearing the plague would work its way close to him he shows his own true colors and selfishly gathers a thousand of

his closest compatriots and locks himself safely in isolation from the populace in his abbey. After throwing a seemingly never-ending party the guests and the Prince himself are reminded of the horror they are attempting to evade in the form of a mysterious guest wearing a mask resembles a bloodied corpse that had died of the Red Death. Furious at the appearance of this mysterious unknown guest breaking the peace of his party the Prince takes a weapon and attacks the veiled new guest. In The Masque of the Red Death Edgar A. Poe shows the inevitability of the mortality of man through the use of several literature devices including Allegory, Irony, and Symbolism. The use of these methods creates a lasting impact on the reader and more impactfully evokes the moralistic points of the story.
Poe masterfully uses detailed imagery in order to create a vivid image of several unique rooms held within the abbey. These rooms all uniquely use different themed color schemes to create a large metaphor for the phases of ones life. Poe begins the intimate description of these rooms with highlighting the hue of the light shown in the rooms “to the right and left in the middle of each wall, a tall and narrow gothic window… these windows were of stained glass whose color varied in accordance with the prevailing hue of the chamber.” (Poe ). Poe flawlessly articulates an immaculate level of detail in order to establish not only the setting but also uses his ability of mental painting to set the mood that should be felt appropriately by the hue of the room. These individual rooms create a overarching allegory of the different stages of life one experience’s through their lives, the first room being bright blue signaling the initiation of a new life in the world, the colors then change steadily until at the end you reach the sunset. Poe finishes his masterful use of metaphor with the final room he describes. He goes into even greater detail in bringing this room to a truly nightmarish reality in the readers mind. As this metaphor uses the rooms to describes the phases of life there is only one possible way he can end it, and that is with death. Poe brings the allegory to a close by describing the room that is meant to express the final phase of life, death. “shrouded in black velvet tapestries… falling in heavy folds upon the carpet of the same material and hue. Only in this chamber the color of the windows failed to correspond to the decorations. The panes were scarlet a deep red.” (Poe ). This is the most clear part of the metaphor and clears any doubt of the significance of the rooms to the moral of the story away. This room is a blood red color and has all heavy black decorations filling the room, not only this but it also contains a intimidating clock that makes everyone stop and contemplate their own mortality one time every hour. This room is meant to be the end, Poe creates the dread of the environment and the feeling of death through his vivid description, tying back once more to the stories theme of mortality. Poe is able to create a vivid metaphor for the mortality of man through how he communicates the color and arrangement of the unique rooms found in the abbey. Starting with a sunrise and going all the way through to the end of someone’s life ending in a room filled with darkness and despair, the final room creates unease and leaves a lasting impression of dread that reaches its climax at the end of the story.
Irony is used to play against the main character of the story Prince Prospero, the whole story from beginning to end speaks about the great pestilence that the country is going through in the form of the Red Death.

It is expected that the prince does his job to try and keep the nation together, however he does the opposite and uses his power to seal himself and his friends away from his dying people. This is the start of the irony that leads to the prince’s demise. Poe sets the tone for the irony of Prince Prospero’s rule at the beginning of the story stating “the prince was happy… when his dominions were half depopulated he summoned the presence of a thousand of his friends… and with them retreated to the deep seclusion of the castled abbey.” (Poe ). The Prince is shown to be a selfish ruler placing himself over his own people unlike he should. While his own people are suffering instead of doing the thing that is expected wherein he attempts to help his dying people, Poe uses irony to convey that Prospero is a coward by attempting to save himself. After half of his own people have died he decides the best action to take is to bring his closest peers with him and lock themselves away in order to try and survive the pestilence on their own. However as the Prince will soon learn no one may escape their own destiny, especially someone who has committed egregious wrong. The second use of irony comes much later in the story very near the end, when a unwelcome guest is discovered amidst the party goers. Finally this mysterious figure brings about the realization that the party was finally going to be coming to a close, and the first member out would be the Prince himself. After the party stops at the sight of this new and mysterious party goer, the Prince no longer is distracted and becomes angry at this figure who when spoken to says nothing in return. Furious, the prince takes rash action “He bore aloft a drawn dagger and had approached in rapid impetuosity, to

within three or four feet of the retreating figure… when the latter turned suddenly and confronted his pursuer. There was a sharp cry and the dagger dropped gleaming upon the carpet, upon which, instantly afterward fell prostrate in death the Prince Prospero. “ (Poe ). The Prince finally falls to the very thing he not only attempted to escape but the thing he attempted to keep out of his Abbey. After all of his futile effort the Red Death sook him out in particular in a masterful bit of irony from Poe. Prospero may have had a chance to live had he not been a coward and did his best to protect the surviving people of his land and himself from the plague, however in isolating himself from the Red Death it brought the pestilence straight to him. Not even the powerful Prince was able to escape his fate and mortality, and ultimately he was the one who had brought his death upon himself. Poe creates a powerful irony that plays a crucial role though the story in establishing many of the moralistic pillars of the short story. Prince Prospero attempts to escape the blight claiming the innocent lives of his own people, this selfish desire to live above even his own people comes around by the end of the story when the Red Death seeks him and his peers out especially. Showing not only the mortality of man but the inevitability of ones own fate.
Symbolism is most effectively used near the end of the story to create a vivid dreadful image of what the Prince and partygoers were going to face. The new and mysterious figure that has been discovered in the crowd is given painstaking detail in the text, to set the feeling of impending doom that Poe labored so intensively to create. The party is finally brought back to reality when a mysterious figure shows up and reminds everyone of their worst fear and the very issue they attempted to ignore “The figure was tall and gaunt, and shrouded from head to foot in the habiliments of the grave, the mask… was so made so nearly to reassemble the courtenance of a stiffened corpse” (Poe ). The new mysterious party goer stands as the living embodiment of the Red Death itself. The figure resembles a corpse of someone who has fallen victim to the plague, this startling visage brings sense of great dread to all of the other guests. Its as if the guests knew they were simply living on borrowed time and the appearance of the figure heralds their impending doom. Not only this but for the guests it is even more terrifying as this is much more personal than the pestilence that had wrought so much death before, as it had come for them personally as their cowardice had painted a target on their backs. Time is up for the Prince and the party and this realization brings their fantasy world back down to the groveling depths of the country gripped by a unstoppable force of death. After the realization of who this figure is strikes the guests, they may no longer act ignorant. They must accept the reality that they had attempted in vein to escape so desperately was now upon them, and in fact they brought it down on themselves by trying to flee in an act of stunning cowardice. The person who will attempt to face this uninvited is the Prince himself, and the events that follow set the precedent for the other ignorant and cowardly guests. After a confrontation between the Prince against the Red Death itself leaves him deceased at the hands of Death itself the members of the party finally realize their reality “and now was acknowledged the presence of the Red Death. He had come like a thief in the night.” (Poe ). The whole party was thrown by the Prince in order to try and escape the reality and fate that was set in stone for himself and his guests. They choose to be cowards and attempt to ignore the issue in the hope that it would simply go away if they did not show their impending death any attention. However this worked against them as this then made the group a more prominent target for Death itself. In order to bring their fate full circle without anymore petty interference the embodiment of Death shows to the party and personally brings their fate to each and everyone of them, starting with the Prince. They had brought upon themselves the wrath of Death itself and not even the cowardly Prince could stop the passing of time and nearing of his own fate. Poe uses symbolism in the most chilling context possible in the story, no matter how many futile efforts the Prince and guests attempted their was no escaping their fate. Not just the Red Death but the embodiment of Death itself is revealed to the party members and takes what was his, their lives.