Edgar Allan Poe faced many hardships in his life, all of which heavily contributed to his writing style. Adversity plagued Poe around every corner, ranging from his wife dying from Tuberculosis to his father abandoning him when he was just a child. Poe’s misfortune inspired him to write seventy poems and sixty-six short stories throughout his writing career. Although there are many texts written by him, Poe’s works all revolve around a comparable mood, theme, topic, and setting. “The Fall of the House of Usher”, “The Cask of Amontillado”, and “The Masque of the Red Death” exemplify these similarities, reflecting how Poe thought as he dealt with his burdens. Mood is often common among Poe’s many works, nearly all of his stories and poems being grim and frightening. In the story, “The Masque of the Red Death”, Poe begins by immediately setting the mood: “The ‘Red Death’ had long devastated the country. No pestilence had ever been so fatal or so hideous.” Among Poe’s other stories, “The Cask of Amontillado” resembles the mood of “The Masque of the Red Death” when Poe writes, “A wrong is unredressed when retribution overtakes its redresser.” Continuing with the similarities, “The Fall of the House of Usher” also has an affinity with the other mentioned texts, Poe saying, “During the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day…” thus setting the tone of the ominous short story. All of the aforementioned quotes pertain to a feeling of horror, creating the sinister mood in the three writings by Poe. The created tone assists in conveying the theme of death across nearly all of Edgar Allan Poe’s works. Frequently in the writings of Poe, death occurs or is dealt with in some way, shape, or form. Within “The Masque of the Red Death”, at the end it is stated, “And one by one dropped the revelers in the blood-bedewed halls of the revel.” “The Cask of Amontillado” concludes with the demise of Fortunato, as shown in the text: “I thrust a torch through the remaining aperture and let it fall within. There came forth in return only a jingling of the bells.” Similarly, in “The Fall of the House of Usher”, Edgar Allan Poe describes, “…and in her violent and now final death-agonies, bore him to the floor a corpse, and a victim to the terrors he had anticipated.” In all three of the stories, Poe manages to maintain a common theme of death. The shared themes of the writings coincide with the topics they were penned about, also linking the works through Poe’s focus on isolation. The seclusion from others is found within many of Poe’s stories, with the topic becoming a pattern in his writing style.
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Obviously revealed at the beginning of “The Masque of the Red Death” with Prince Prospero abandoning his people, Poe discloses, “…and with these retired to the deep seclusion of one of his castellated abbeys.” A similar scene is given in “The Cask of Amontillado” when Poe explains how Montresor leads Fortunato into the catacombs by saying, “There were no attendants at home…stood together upon the damp ground of the catacombs of the Montresors.” In “The Fall of the House of Usher”, Poe repeatedly refers to the isolation of the Usher residence, beginning with the narrator describing the eerie setting, “…I had been passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country, and at length found myself, as the shades of the evening drew on, within view of the melancholy house of Usher.” The characters in each of the short stories are subject to isolation, connecting the writings through their similar topics. In addition to seclusion, the settings of the three texts have related elements that tie them together to an even greater extent. Edgar Allan Poe’s regular use of a bleak and depressing scene is what sets his works apart, although his style never varied, causing his tales to always seem similar. In “Masque of the Red Death”, Poe creates the dark setting by stating, “When his dominions were half depopulated, he summoned to his presence a thousand hale and light-hearted friends from among the knights and dames of his court, and with these retired to the deep seclusion of one
Obviously revealed at the beginning of “The Masque of the Red Death” with Prince Prospero abandoning his people, Poe discloses, “…and with these retired to the deep seclusion of one of his castellated abbeys.” A similar scene is given in “The Cask of Amontillado” when Poe explains how Montresor leads Fortunato into the catacombs by saying, “There were no attendants at home…stood together upon the damp ground of the catacombs of the Montresors.” In “The Fall of the House of Usher”, Poe repeatedly refers to the isolation of the Usher residence, beginning with the narrator describing the eerie setting, “…I had been passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country, and at length found myself, as the shades of the evening drew on, within view of the melancholy house of Usher.” The characters in each of the short stories are subject to isolation, connecting the writings through their similar topics. In addition to seclusion, the settings of the three texts have related elements that tie them together to an even greater extent. Edgar Allan Poe’s regular use of a bleak and depressing scene is what sets his works apart, although his style never varied, causing his tales to always seem similar. In “Masque of the Red Death”, Poe creates the dark setting by stating, “When his dominions were half depopulated, he summoned to his presence a thousand hale and light-hearted friends from among the knights and dames of his court, and with these retired to the deep seclusion of one