In Edgar Allan Poe’s “ The Masque of the Red Death” the main focus is not on just the party itself but what lies outside of Prince Prospero's abby, the black plague. This was a grave disease that tormented the people of Europe during the 14th Century. It originally came from a bacteria in rats that then would be transferred to humans in the form of a flea bite. Due to the disease being a bacteria once it was in ones system they could easily infect someone else through both the air and bodily fluids, such as sneezing. There are two main types of the plague were septicemic and pneumonic. The septicemic plague affected the infecteds bloodstream causing the blood to be unable to clot, therefore the ill would bleed to death. In the pneumonic form
…show more content…
One being when the narrator describes the hooded guest at the masquerade saying that he “out-Heroded Herod.”(Poe 3) Herod in this context comes from King Herod in the Bible when he kills all the boys under two years-old in order to kill the messiah,Jesus. The way that the hooded figure “out-Heroded Herod.” though was by not only killing all of the guests by the Red Death but unlike Herod the hooded guest kills his intended victim in the end while Herod did not. Poe pulls another allusion from the Bible being “like a thief in the night.” (Poe 4) This also is meant to describe the hooded figure not as a physical guest but as what he represents, the Red Death. The context in which this comes from the bible is in Thessalonians when describing Jesus’ second coming and the final judgment. This is the Red Death’s final judgment upon the guests and Prince Prospero because they thought they could out run the inevitable. Poe’s The Masque of the Red Death can teach the reader a lot about life but more about death. This short story shows that no matter the matter or amount of means a person has they cannot make themselves immortal. Prince Prospero tried to cheat death but death caught up to him. It is something that every person needs to realize is that no matter what time continues on like the ebony clock and that death can take each person “like a thief in the
One being when the narrator describes the hooded guest at the masquerade saying that he “out-Heroded Herod.”(Poe 3) Herod in this context comes from King Herod in the Bible when he kills all the boys under two years-old in order to kill the messiah,Jesus. The way that the hooded figure “out-Heroded Herod.” though was by not only killing all of the guests by the Red Death but unlike Herod the hooded guest kills his intended victim in the end while Herod did not. Poe pulls another allusion from the Bible being “like a thief in the night.” (Poe 4) This also is meant to describe the hooded figure not as a physical guest but as what he represents, the Red Death. The context in which this comes from the bible is in Thessalonians when describing Jesus’ second coming and the final judgment. This is the Red Death’s final judgment upon the guests and Prince Prospero because they thought they could out run the inevitable. Poe’s The Masque of the Red Death can teach the reader a lot about life but more about death. This short story shows that no matter the matter or amount of means a person has they cannot make themselves immortal. Prince Prospero tried to cheat death but death caught up to him. It is something that every person needs to realize is that no matter what time continues on like the ebony clock and that death can take each person “like a thief in the