Part Of Magical Realism example essay topic

Analysis of 'The Mask of the Red Death " American author Edgar Allen Poe (1809-1849) wrote many poems and short stories back in the 1800's. Poe is said by some to have virtually created the detective story and perfected the psychological thrill. These works include 'The Raven,' 'The Murders in the Rue Morgue,' 'The Fall of Usher House,' and 'The Mask of the Red Death' (April 30, 1842). In the fantasy short story Poe uses certain magical elements that are not accepted by the reader as being real. Because these magical elements are not accepted by the reader as being real this story is an example of the Fantastic genre and not a part of Magical Realism, because in Magical Realism they unreal is accepted as real by both the reader and the characters in the story. In 'The Mask of the Red Death,' Edgar Allen Poe has the ability to evoke imagery and the reader through the 'extensive use of detail' (Faris 169).

By doing so, I believe that Poe achieves of the reader because we as human tend to use our imagination to help us see things that are there when they are described to us in great detail to us. By using this ability, it seems as though we are a part of the book and not just reading it. In the following passage, Poe describes the rooms that are in Prince Prospero's abbey: The eastern extremity was huge, for example, in blue- and vividly blue were its windows. The second chamber was purple in its ornaments and tapestries, and here the panes were purple. The third was green throughout, and so were the casements. The fourth was furnished and listen with orange- the fifth with white- the sixth with violet.

(483) After barely describing the fifth and the sixth chambers, he goes back on to describe the seventh chamber in a more vivid detail as being: Shrouded in black velvet tapestries that hung all over the ceiling and down the walls, falling in heavy folds upon a carpet of the same material and hue. But in this chamber the only, the color of the windows failed to correspond with the decorations. The panes here were scarlet- a deep blood color. (483) Also in 'The Mask of the Red Death,' Poe uses the technique of de-familiarization or 'radically emphasizing a common element of reality' (Simpkins 150) to tell his story. Poe achieves this effect by de-familiarizing the Red Death's ability to kill its victims at the masquerade. This is evident when: The revelers at once threw themselves into the black apartment, and, seizing the mummer, whose figure stood erect and motionless within the shadows of the ebony clock, gasped unutterable horror at finding the grave cerements and corpse-like mask which they handled with so a violet a rudeness, untenanted by any tangible form.

And now was acknowledged the presence of the Red Death. (487) He goes on later to say that: one by one dropped the revelers in the blood-bedewed halls of their revel, and died each in the despairing posture of his fall. (487) These passages also show that the characters and the narrator accepted this supernatural event as being real because the narrator makes the statement: Now was acknowledge the presence of the Red Death. (487) Even though 'The Mask of the Red Death,' contains some of the characteristics of Magical Realism, it still remains a part of the Fantastic because the 'supernatural is accepted eventually as supernatural' (Todo rov) by the reader and not as something natural. The Red Death is the element that I speak of, and since the Red Death is a disease that takes on the image of a human figure it is not accepted by the reader as being real because in reality disease can't do such a thing. As I have tried to illustrate in this essay, the Fantastic genre is very similar to Magical Realism in that it uses many of the same characteristics as Magical Realism.

Some of the characteristics of Magical Realism that Poe uses are de-familiarization, 'extensive use of detail' (Faris 169), and of the reader. However, because in Magical Realism they unreal is accepted as real by both the reader and the characters in the story, this story still remains an example of the Fantastic Literature and not a part of Magical Realism because unreal is not accepted by the reader as being real.