Varying Attitudes Toward Death in the Masque of the Red Death Essay

Varying Attitudes Toward Death in the mask of the exit Death Since the day of my birth, my death began its walk. It is walking toward me, without hurrying. Edgar Allen Poe provides us symbolically with the response of man to the pursuance of death that Jean Cocteau described before, in his Gothic short story, The Masque of the Red Death. Prince Prospero symbolizes the optimist who wants to avoid death. The Masqueraders represent the pessimist-the carefree who correspondk to forget about death. The Masked Red Death is the ultimate credit and enlightenment of deaths power over all-the realist view. Poes work symbolically demonstrates the attitudes of man with Prince Prospero, the Masqueraders, and the Masked Red Death. Prince Prospero symbolizes the optimist who is defiant and furious. Prospero believes that death can be evaded if not escaped entirely. Prospero seeks to protect himself from the red death, a disease that has ravaged his kingdom. He does this by ta king a thousand of his friends, with whom he retires to the deep concealment of one of his castellated abbeys (Poe 176). However he does more than try to circumvent or hide from deaths powers. Prospero has his courtiers replete hammers and furnaces to weld the bolts shut so to entrust no ingress or egress, effectively he barricades himself taking doctrine the physical barriers of man can somehow defeat the non-corporeal entity. While the canker rages outside the princes secure shelter, Prospero arranges that a masquerade or ball take place. He and his revelers take part in jovial and pleasant activities during a time when hundreds are suffering. Whats more is that he has his party be waltzers (Poe 177). much(prenominal) a dance involves t... ...to death in the masqueraders one can see the third gear attitude toward death, one of sagacity and acceptance because the ignorance that shrouded their eyes has been removed. With understanding which comes when one becom es closer to death one may adopt the third attitude which Bhagavad Gita has, Death is as sure for that which is born, as birth is for that which is dead. indeed grieve not for what is inevitable. Sources Consulted Cassuto, Leonard. The Coy Reaper Unmasque-ing the Red Death. studhorse con Fiction, 25(1988) 317-320. Poe, Edgar Allan. Tales of Mystery and Imagination Norwalk Heritage P.,1969. 317-322. Starret, Vincent. Tales of Mystery and Imagination. Norwalk Heritage P., 1969. Intro. Wheat, Patricia H. The Masque of Indifference in The Masque of Red Death. Stud Short Fiction, 19(1982), 51-56.