Comparing The Cask Of Amontillado And The Masque Of The Red Death

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 …show more content…
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