Allegory

1. Objective: students will read “The Masque of the Red Death” in order to compare to other romantics and examine for allegory. • Warm-up: Define allegory (462) and copy the chart to fill out after you read.

2. Allegory

3. The Masque of the Red Death Edgar Allan Poe

4. Edgar Allan Poe1809-1849

5. His Family and Tragic Life • Born in Boston • The son of traveling actors • Lived a tragic and unhappy life

6. Tragic and Unhappy Life • Mother died of tuberculosis when Poe was one • Father deserted him at the age of two • Adopted by Mr. and Mrs. John Allan • Had constant disagreements with his step-father John Allan

7. . . . continued • Studied briefly at the University of Virginia • Drinking and gambling difficulties kept him from continuing at UVA University of Virginia, 1856

8. . . .continued • Received an appointment to West Point, but provoked his own dismissal • Caused a final separation between himself and step-father West Point Crest

9. . . .continued • In 1836 married his 14 year old cousin, Virginia • Last 12 years of life worked as journalist, editor, and creative writer Virginia Clemm

10. . . . continued • Lived in poverty stricken conditions most of his life • In 1846 wife died after a long illness Poe’s home during the 1840’s

11. Addiction • All evidence suggests that Poe was an alcoholic. • Poe also habitually used drugs such as morphine, opium, and laudanum to treat depression and other health conditions. • Poe had a weakened nervous system due to a brain lesion and a heart condition. • Laudanum, a highly addictive, opium based medicine, was commonly used to treat headaches and stomach pains in 1800’s.

12. . . . continued • Died in Baltimore after having been found in a drunken stupor • Died a poor man

13. Poe’s Work Known for: • Tales of mystery and terror stories • Introducing the modern detective story

14. Short Stories: The Tell-Tale Heart The Cask of Amontillado The Black Cat, The Pit and The Pendulum Poems: The Raven Annabel Lee To Helen Lenore Just a Few Titles

15. “The Masque of the Red Death”

16. The Setting: An abbey

17. The Setting is an abbey, or monastery, converted by the rich Prince Prospero into a private palace and banquet hall. The time is the Middle Ages

18. The Setting: An abbey

19. The Setting: An abbey

20. The Plague is usually associated with the worst contagion to hit Europe before the 20th century— the Black Death — which, in the mid-14th century, killed roughly one-third of the continent’s population.

21. Its spread: 1347-1351 The Plague

22. The Plague came from a bacterium now named Yersinia pestis that normally lived in the bloodstreams of fleas, which, in turn, lived on black rats.

23. The Plague When the rats died, the fleas had to find new homes — humans — and a new food supply —human blood. When fleas bit people, they passed along the bacteria — the same pestis that had killed the rats.

24. The Plague in human hosts (such as this modern victim) infected the lymph nodes, causing black swellings, called buboes. From this symptom came the disease’s common names: Black Death and Bubonic Plague.

25. The Plague Poe’s version of this illness — the “Red Death” — does not strictly correspond to bubonic plague. He combines it with tuberculosis, which killed several family members, and plays up the bloodiness of the disease. For dramatic effect, he also shortens the infection’s time span, from years (tuberculosis) or days (bubonic plague) to minutes (Red Death).

26. The Plague in the Middle Ages had no effective cure. Doctors tried to treat it by lancing the buboes.

27. , either way, killed millions, The Plague

28. The Plan Before the Red Death arrived, Prospero planned to be elsewhere — specifically, in his converted abbey, with all that extra room.

29. The Plan ”a thousand hale and light-hearted friends from among the knights and dames of his court.”

30. The Plan ... then the doors could be welded shut, and the abbey could become a fortress …

31. The Masquerade “There were much glare and glitter and piquancy and phantasm … So the guests prepared their costumes ...

32. The Masquerade

33. Vocabulary • Define the vocabulary • Complete Vocabulary in Action (463)

34. Literary Term: Allusion • Reference to a famous historical or literary figure or event • Best sources are literature, history, Greek mythology, and the Bible • Serves to explain or clarify or enhance whatever subject

35. Literary Term: Gothic Elements • Supernatural horrors and an atmosphere of unknown terror pervades the action • High emotion, sentimentalism, but also pronounced anger, surprise, and especially terror • Use of words indicating fear, mystery: apparition, devil, ghost, haunted, terror, fright, fainting

36. Literary Term: Symbol • Something that is itself and yet also represents something else • Universal symbols embodying universally recognizable meanings • Invested symbols give symbolic meaning by the way an author uses them in a literary work • Symbols are very common in literature

37. Allegory: A Story Behind a Story • An allegory is a narrative that is really a double story. One story takes place on the surface. Under the surface the story’s characters and events represent abstract ideas or states of being, things like love or freedom, evil or goodness, hell or heaven. • To work, an allegory must operate on two levels. On the level of pure storytelling, an allegory must hold our attention. Its characters must seem believable and interesting enough for us to care about them. On the allegorical level the ideas in the story must be accessible to us. As you read, you should find that the allegorical level of the story gradually begins to strike you. See if you find that Poe’s story of arrogance and death hooks you on both levels.

38. The Masque of the Red Death: Background • Poe’s fictional Red Death is probably based on the Black Death, which swept fourteenth-century Europe and Asia, killing as many as two thirds of the population in some regions in less than twenty years. Poe calls the plague “the Red Death” because victims oozed blood from painful sores. In this story a fourteenth-century prince gives a costume party, or masque, to try to forget about the epidemic raging all around him.

39. The Black Death • This particular type of plague was the bubonic plague, which is caused by a bacteria that lived in rats and other rodents. Human beings were infected through bites from the fleas that lived on these rats. The symptoms associated with plague are bubos, which are painful swellings of the lymph nodes. These typically appear in the armpits, legs, neck, or groin. If left untreated, plague victims die within two to four days. Victims of this disease suffered swelling in the armpit and groin, as well as bleeding in the lungs. Victims also suffered a very high fever, delirium, and prostration.

40. Summary • Poe’s tale of an eccentric nobleman and the Red Death ravaging his land can be read both as a chilling ghost story and as an allegory representing human folly and the inevitability of death. (In other words, you cannot hide from death regardless how much money you have.)

41. Comprehension Check • Why does Prince Prospero close himself and his courtiers off in the abbey? • Why does the masked figure’s presence cause such a sensation? • What happens to the prince and the revellers?

42. Time for further thought • Complete questions 1-7

43. Summary • Prince Prospero invites a thousand lords and ladies to escape death by living luxuriously in his castle until the pestilence passes. • To entertain his guests Prospero hosts a masquerade party that takes place in seven halls, each a different color.

44. Summary • At the stroke of midnight, a tall figure in a blood-splattered burial costume appears. • Prospero demands that his friends seize the intruder, but everyone is frozen with fear as the stranger slowly walks through the rooms. • Finally, Prospero rushes after him into the black seventh room.

45. Summary • When the intruder turns, the host falls dead. • The revelers then grab the stranger but find the costume empty. • All soon die of the Red Death.

46. Comments • The allegorical meaning of the story is found in such details as • Prospero’s name (Prospero means prosperous) • Unfortunately, the Red Death attacks the rich and poor alike • The stranger’s appearance (Dressed like the Grim Reaper or Death) • The arrangement of the seven halls • The rooms of the palace, lined up in a series, allegorically represent the stages of life. • Their colors, particularly the black (death) and red (blood) of the westernmost room with its ebony clock marking the inevitable passage of time. “No matter how beautiful the castle, how luxuriant the clothing, or how rich the food, no mortal, not even a prince, can escape death. “ -Sparknotes.com

47. Symbols • Symbols are people, places, events, or things that stand for ideas larger than themselves.

49. Symbolism • What symbols do you see in this story?

50. The Seven Rooms • Blue- East, windows the same color • Purple- windows the same color • Green- windows the same color • Orange- windows the same color • White- windows the same color • Violet- windows the same color • Black- West, blood-red windows