Comparing The Shawl And The Masque Of The Red Death
The Shawl written by Cynthia Ozick and Edgar Allen Poe 's The Masque of the Red Death are elaborate allegories that use symbolism and imagery to illustrate the image of death. In both these stories, death is inevitable, the end of a human life. However, in the first short story, The Shawl, Ozick shows us that death is inevitable and it is useless if you attempt to escape it. And in the second story, Poe symbolizes the immortality many of us believe we have, but not any of us really possess.
In Cynthia Ozick 's The Shawl the image of death is introduced in the opening paragraph, when the narrator graphically explains that Rosa 's breasts does not have enough milk to feed baby Magda - who sometimes screams because there is nothing for her to …show more content…
Each guest, including the Prince, stop when they here the chime of the ebony clock.
The ebony clock symbolizes death. The individuals, who have come to the party, believe that they have escaped the "The Red Death". The truth is that they have only prolonged their lives for a short period of time. Each time the clock chimes, everyone stops to listen. They do not know when their time will come, but they know its coming.
The reader is given graphic descriptions of the seven rooms from blue to black. One could interpret the rooms as being stages of a human life. The beginning of life is emphasized by the masked figure, never explicitly stated to be the actual Red Death but only a reveler in a costume of the Red Death, making his initial appearance in the easternmost room. This room is colored blue, a color most often associated with birth. The black room, which is the most prominent image in the short story, depicts the end of life, death. In the black room, the narrator describes the ebony clock which would allude to the fact that time has run out and death
In Cynthia Ozick 's The Shawl the image of death is introduced in the opening paragraph, when the narrator graphically explains that Rosa 's breasts does not have enough milk to feed baby Magda - who sometimes screams because there is nothing for her to …show more content…
Each guest, including the Prince, stop when they here the chime of the ebony clock.
The ebony clock symbolizes death. The individuals, who have come to the party, believe that they have escaped the "The Red Death". The truth is that they have only prolonged their lives for a short period of time. Each time the clock chimes, everyone stops to listen. They do not know when their time will come, but they know its coming.
The reader is given graphic descriptions of the seven rooms from blue to black. One could interpret the rooms as being stages of a human life. The beginning of life is emphasized by the masked figure, never explicitly stated to be the actual Red Death but only a reveler in a costume of the Red Death, making his initial appearance in the easternmost room. This room is colored blue, a color most often associated with birth. The black room, which is the most prominent image in the short story, depicts the end of life, death. In the black room, the narrator describes the ebony clock which would allude to the fact that time has run out and death