Edgar Allan Poe’s works have thoroughly impacted American literature and European story writing approaches as well. Namely, Poe is one of the fathers of the short story genre, after Maupassant. However, the exquisite language, meaningful composition, and ambiguous images differentiate his works from Maupassant’s stories. The purpose of his style, ornate and yet concise, of the grotesque characters, the growing tension in the narrative is “the greatest possible effect on his readers” (Levine et al. 601). In his essays and novels, Poe attempted to issue various philosophical questions and mental phenomena (Levine et al. 607). The most important of the motifs featured by the author is the fate of ill-minded people, vicious, profligate, and arrogant. As such, his “William Wilson. A Tale” is a story about a wicked narrator’ twin man who seems to display consciousness. “The Masque of the Red Death” represents an elite group participating in excessive revels during a plague. Both works are unique in their representation of perverse human inclinations and consequences of virtueless actions; word choices and composition support the ambience of souls’ decay and the author’s judgment.
First of all, “William Wilson. A Tale” is replete with lexis that reveals the self-condemnation of a narrator. The reciter of the story comments on his past full of misfortunes and wrongdoings, describing it as “unspeakable misery” and “unpardonable crime” (Poe, “William Wilson. A Tale” 642). Although the narrator recounts his actions as errorful, he is insincere in his reproaches to himself, since right after the words about the mishaps, he blames society for his own depravity. Precisely, he calls himself “the slave of circumstances beyond human control” (Poe, “William Wilson. A Tale” 642). The change to the madness of the storyteller leads to the unpredictable result: he killed the man who had copied his lifestyle and had given guidance on how to prevent a shameful deed. The rich internal world of the character, his refined language with metaphors like “oasis of fatality amid a wilderness of error,” contrast with the poor qualities he exhibits towards other people and his soul health (Poe, “William Wilson. A Tale” 642). Thus, the author uses literary devices and language effects to create a double-natured personality that would enable multilayered work.
As compared with the mentioned work, “The Masque of the Red Death” differs in its frequently used words, which has significance. The initial tone of the story is pompous, majestic, and delighted. The feast organized by Prince Prospero is called “magnificent,” “a voluptuous scene,” a colorful “masquerade” (Poe, “The Masque of the Red Death” 662). Ample details are given for the description of the architectural exquisiteness of the castle, which was designed according to Prince’s “conceptions glowed with barbaric lustre” (Poe, “The Masque of the Red Death” 662). The picturesque festival is interrupted only by the looming image of the Red Death, a plague, “the figure in question had out-Heroded Herod” (Poe, “The Masque of the Red Death” 665). A simile features how pestilence reaches the reveling throng: “he had come like a thief in the night” (Poe, “The Masque of the Red Death” 666). With grotesque description, Poe shows the highly contrasting picture of excessive carnival and dramatic consequence that awaits the arrogant people and arrives unexpectedly. Therefore, the writer used the ingenious, pretentious style for a more meaningful composition with opposing beginning and end in this short story.
The role of the narrator in both stories is different but of equal significance to the didactic purpose of the works. In “William Wilson. A Tale, ” the author provides the reader with a more personal narrative type with a first-person account of the events. Such a style allows introducing the chain of thoughts of the main character, a synoptic view on the occurring matters. This perspective is intentionally distorted since it presents the slow decay of the hero into delusion, in consequence of which he kills himself. William Wilson, the narrator, seems an intelligent person; the allusions to world history testify of his great well-educatedness: he mentions Elah-Gabalus in his reflections (Poe, “William Wilson. A Tale” 642). At first, a reader may value the narrator’s mind and sympathize with him in his issue with the copycat. However, the character’s deeds are virtually vicious in contrast to his rational worldview and beauteous language. Thereby, Poe strikes his readers with ambiguous William and his speech only to disillusion them by his wickedness.
On the other hand, the detached manner of narration in “The Masque of the Red Death” is considerably effective but has a different purpose. The author seems to be not present in the text, utterly unrelated to the events and people of his description. The readers are given only graphic details of the revel and not the motivation of its participants on why they have left their country in such an irresponsible fashion. Hence, the text is accessible to interpretation, although it is almost apparent what a sense hides behind the scenery. The festival is an escapist phantasmagory, demonstrating the inability of its individuals to receive blame for their immorality and slothfulness in the time of crisis. The Red Death presents an anxious burden of consequences that finally punish those trying to escape them. Consequently, it could be said that Poe appeals to the same method of the unclear judgment of the sinners with the aid of contrast between colorful spectacle and corrupt behavior of the characters.
The doom that has always awaited the wrongdoers is best shown in the passage displaying the appearance of the Red Death. Poe writes in his “The Masque of the Red Death”:
And now was acknowledged the presence of the Red Death. He had come like a thief in the night. And one by one dropped the revellers in the blood-bedewed halls of their revel, and died each in the despairing posture of his fall. And the life of the ebony clock went out with that of the last of the gay. And the flames of the tripods expired. And Darkness and Decay and the Red Death held illimitable dominion over all (666).
The very structure of the passage is attempted to act like religious texts since it is similar to biblical formulations with constant repetitions of “and.” The language is highly imaginative; various epithets are used. Herefore, the literary beauty and strength are combined with philosophical meaning and didactic intent.
In conclusion, Edgar Allan Poe depicts the individuals with deceased minds that try to ignore reality with outcomes of their wrongdoings. Either the intellectual outcast delves into his evil mind and loses himself, or deranged revelers who lock themselves in the castle, all are not the victims of fate but the violent miscreants. The author heats his stories with numerous metaphors, similes, and allusions to the mass culture phenomena of his time. Hence, the works of Poe are essential not only because of their literary beauty but for the immense depository of sense contained within them.
Works Cited
Levine, Robert S., et al., editors. “Edgar Allan Poe.” The Norton Anthology of American Literature, 9th ed., RedShelf ed., vol. 1B, New York, NY, W. W. Norton & Company, 2017, pp. 604–08.
Poe, Edgar A. “The Masque of the Red Death.” The Norton Anthology of American Literature, edited by Robert S. Levine et al., 9th ed., RedShelf ed., vol. 1B, New York, NY, W. W. Norton & Company, 2017, pp. 662–66.
—. “William Wilson. A Tale.” The Norton Anthology of American Literature, edited by Robert S. Levine et al., 9th ed., RedShelf ed., vol. 1B, New York, NY, W. W. Norton & Company, 2017, pp. 642–55.