Symbolism In The Masque Of The Red Death

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Death and Prosperity: An Analysis of “The Masque of the Red Death” Have you ever had a near death experience? The masque of the red death written by Edgar Allen Poe is realistic fiction and has the main theme of. “One cannot escape death” when a town is affected by a disease and instead of helping his town the prince hides him self and his friends from the red death but he does not know that death is amongst them.
The first literary element that Poe uses to show theme “One cannot escape death” is symbolism. To start, the ebony clock symbolizes that the time to death is near and the time is running out for the people at the castle. The clock chimes while the masquerade party is going on and there is a stop to the masquerade party and everyone is stiff frozen. “There strikes the ebony clock …show more content…
First, person vs environment is shown by the prince leaves all the poor people out to die and only cares about him and his friends that why he kept him and his friends safe. “While the pestilence raged most furiously abroad that the Prince Prospero entertains his thousand friends at a masked ball” (Poe 1). This is connected to the theme “One cannot escape death” because Prince Prospero thinks he can escape death but in the end he would not. Additionally, Poe uses Person Vs Person is connected to the theme “One cannot escape death”. The prince is trying to escape death but death still ends up finding him and kills everyone at the party. The prince thought he was safe at the party but death shows up and kills everyone. Nothing that you think that can save you form death will not actually save you from death. Finally, Person vs Society is connected to the theme “one cannot escape from death”. By showing that the prince could have helped the people that were dying, but instead he decides to get away from everyone that is dying. But, it does not change the fact that he is going to
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