What Does The Light Symbolize In The Masque Of The Red Death

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In the story “The Masque of the Red Death” by Edgar Allen Poe he uses imagery and symbolism to make connections between the story and what you picture. When he uses imagery, you are getting a visual description and images to show two connection. Symbolism, is using different items to show specific meaning. This story has many connections that give away details, it uses clocks and different colors to show different symbols. In this story, it tells that their was an illness going around, but Prince Prospero and his friends who were all wealthy decided to run from the illness and move out to the countryside. It is stated that “The external world could take care of itself” (Poe 465) they believed that no sickness could possibly get to them. The illness caused many…show more content…
In the palace, the “windows were of stained glass whose color varied in accordance with the prevailing hue of the decorations of the chamber” (Poe 457). These colors represented different items, like black for death, purple for the rebirth of life, and white for some pure. In the story, their is many different times where the clock will strike symbolizing that there's not much time left. It is stated that “the hour was to be stricken, there came from the brazen lungs of the clock a sound which was clear and loud and deep and exceedingly musical” little did they know that it was showing them that their was not much time left. They did not know what was coming for them, they thought that they had run far enough out in the country for the illness to not harm them. While enjoying themselves at the masquerade party, they were going through different rooms with the different colors. While in the black room, the clock struck again, “gasped unutterable horror at finding the grave-cerements and corpselike mask, which they handled with so violent a rudeness, untenanted by any tangible form.” The death has come back to get them, the red mask has come to make them suffer for what they have
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