The Role of Coloured Rooms in The Masque Of The Red Death
In the Masque of the red Death, Edgar Allen Poe tells his readers about the seven different rooms. Each room is said to have a different color with items to match. Also each colored room symbolizes a feeling. The feelings that portray each room are usually a dark emotion such as the red and black room with the exception of the blue room which signifies comfort or safety. The Masque of the red death explains throughout that death is coming close for them. Even if they try their hardest to try and avoid death, it will still catch up to them and the colors of the red room, black room, and blue room tells readers that.
In the story, the author tells his readers about a room filled with black all around. The black symbolizes death, so this basically states where the deaths of the people could possibly happen. Prince Prospero tries to save his closest friends and when he does so they all go to in the black room and in the book it states, “Then summoning the wild courage of despair, throng of the revelers at once threw themselves in the black apartment”. In the black room, a clock was said to be hung up in the room. The clock in the story could symbolize that the people in the room have run out of time and they are going to die soon. Poe writes about the clock to foreshadow the events, “And the revel went whirlingly on, until at length there commenced the sounding of midnight upon the clock”. Death soon shows up while Prince Prospero and his friends are trying to escape from the Red Death, but even as hard as they tried, it didn’t work out.
The first room mentioned in the story is the red room. The red room tells the readers about the bloody aspect of things that take place there. Poe starts off by stating “blood was its avatar and its seal-the redness and the horror of blood”. Similar to the black room, this room gives an idea of what might be happening. The Red death gets its name from the redness of the blood that bleeds out of the pores of people when they are dying. The description of red helps to paint a picture of the death Prince Prospero’s friends are going to face when the red death hits. The red also helps to explain how horrid the disease is in general. Poe explains the symptoms of the death by stating, “There were sharp pains, and sudden dizziness, and then profuse bleeding at the pores, with dissolution”. The reader can infer that this is a painful and gruesome death that people have to face if they get this disease.
Another room mentioned in the story is a blue room, where people can get a sense of safety there. The blue room can help the people remain calm and not worry about the disease that’s nearby. The blue room helps readers realize that this helps the people feel safe. Prince Prospero tries his best to make sure that his closest friends are as safe as they can be. He tries to take their mind of the problem going on and as stated in the book, “There were buffoons, there were improvisatori, there were ballet dancers, there were musicians, there was beauty, there was wine”. That sense of safety that the blue room gives the people, helps them not be stressed about the life threatening situation that’s happening to others. Even if they try their hardest to try and avoid death, it will still catch up to them and the colors of the red room, black room, and blue room tells the reader that. The death ended up catching up to them but Prince Prospero bought him and his friends a little more time than what they thought they had. The red death ended up affecting all of the characters in the story.
The three rooms that were talked about each impacted the characters in a different way or stage from their journey. The journey for them was trying to escape the Red Death with Prince Prospero leading them and helping them throughout. This didn’t end successfully for them the way they hoped, but they still tried their hardest.
