The Masque of the Red Death: Prospero’s Journey through Life
The short story, “The Masque of the Red Death” was written by Edgar Allan Poe. In this story there are seven rooms each room a different color: blue, purple, green, orange, white, violet, and black. The rooms went from east to west. They all had a sharp turn so that only one room could be seen at a time. The blue room was first out of all the rooms. Blue symbolizes birth, innocence, happiness. Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Masque of the Red Death” is a way to symbolize the stages of life!
Prince Prospero runs through all of the rooms chasing after the masked intruder with a dagger. As he crosses the floor of each of the rooms, the prince gets closer and closer to his death. Blue is thought to represent a baby and innocence, which would also be thought of as birth. Because birth is symbolized with the color blue, Poe put it first to show the beginning. Blue also can represent the sky and the sky could be thought of as spring. Spring represents new life and happiness. So when running through the rooms Prospero started innocent as a baby, but got closer to death as he got closer to the black, final room. The rooms represent the stages of life, starting as a baby and ending with death, just like what happened with Prospero. Poe’s use of symbolism makes the story more mystifying and interesting.
The color blue relates to my life in a few ways. The obvious reason is everyone was a baby some time in their life. The one I will talk about is the day my cousin Jenna was born. It was six years ago on June 13th. My Aunt Ida was pregnant and was expecting a baby girl. My family and I were spending the night at their house because they live in Davidsonville. My family was about to leave when Aunt Ida had to go to the hospital. My family ended up staying another night so my Uncle Ed could go to the hospital while we stayed with Kaitlyn, Julia, and Kyle. All of us went to the hospital the next day and saw Jenna. She did have something wrong with her though. She has to this day a disease called Sturge-Weber and has a Port-wine stain on half of her face. She was so innocent looking. That is how my life relates to the symbolism of blue. The color blue is a very important one because there cannot be an ending till there is a beginning. When Prospero started he was innocent, just like a baby, and in the end he died just like someone dying at the end of their life. The whole thing is just like life. The Masque of the Red Death is just a way to explain the cycle of life and time.
