The Masque of the Red Death Edgar Allan Poe…is a short story of fear and pride amid the time of a raging disease leading to widespread death. More importantly, it is a study of humanity. Prince Prospero, an elite of an unspecified time period, invites others to socially distance with him in one of his abbeys.
Attempting to leave the rest of the population to their demise, he parties the night away with the other aristocrats in the belief that this sequestration will spare their lives. Unfortunately for him and others like him, the disease is undiscerning. It doesn’t care where you live or who you are. It simply spreads to its next victim, finding a host in every class within society.
So as you teach The Masque of the Red Death Edgar Allan Poe lessons, why not use 5 easy activities along the way?
Need help with Test Prep? Check out this FREE Pack of 3 Test Prep Activities to help students achieve success on standardized tests!
Why is The Masque of the Red Death Edgar Allan Poe relevant today?
I am blown away by the significance of this short story today! We live in a world riveted by fear of disease in 2020 and 2021, and so did the characters in “The Masque of the Red Death.” The wealthy hid themselves away from the world to party the time away only to succumb to the Red Death! One cannot escape death. We try to avoid it at all costs; however, it cannot be shaken or deterred.
More than in past years, our students will see this short story through different eyes. Prince Prospero is no longer just a foolish character in a story. The Red Death is no longer an imagined illness from the brilliant mind of Edgar Allan Poe. The place of safety is no longer “safe” from the ravages of the outside world.
We are Prince Prospero. We are the ones trying to hide from death. We are living in our homes in a mirage of safety. We are the ones wearing the masques!
It might be too real for some students, as they might have lost someone close to them. But this short story, The Masque of the Red Death Edgar Allan Poe wrote, has survived for the last 180 years for a reason. It reveals who we are and what we fear most!
Read more about teaching Love Poems by Edgar Allan Poe!
5 The Masque of the Red Death Edgar Allan Poe Activities
1. Character Analysis
Analyzing Prince Prospero, the other aristocrats, or DEATH is simple and effective! Check out this FREE My Traits Organizer Pack for help with teaching characterization while reading The Masque of the Red Death Edgar Allan Poe!
The Masque of the Red Death Edgar Allan Poe Step-By-Step Outline
1. Answer the question about the characterization of Prospero
2. Incorporate a piece of evidence; be sure to embed the quote
3-4. Examine how the evidence conveys a specific effect that connects to the characterization
5. Incorporate another piece of evidence; be sure to embed the quote
6-7. Examine how the evidence conveys a specific effect that connects to the characterization
8. Reiterate the traits of Prospero
2. One Sentence Summaries
One of the most important standards is teaching main idea. Why not incorporate this standard by helping your students create one sentence summaries for each chunk of the story?
Here is an example to help from The Masque of the Red Death Edgar Allan Poe Lesson Bundle!
Directions: Reread the short story “The Masque of the Red Death” by Edgar Allan Poe. For each CHUNK, underline at least 3 important details (phrases) and write a 1-Sentence Summary.
THE “Red Death” had long devastated the country. No pestilence had ever been so fatal, or so hideous. Blood was its Avatar and its seal—the redness and the horror of blood. There were sharp pains, and sudden dizziness, and then profuse bleeding at the pores, with dissolution. The scarlet stains upon the body and especially upon the face of the victim, were the pest ban which shut him out from the aid and from the sympathy of his fellow-men. And the whole seizure, progress and termination of the disease, were the incidents of half an hour.
CHUNK #1
The Red Death, a disease characterized by its quick, bloody nature, has ravaged the country for some time.
3. Imagery Impact
Students have fun when creativity is an option! Yes, they can always write a response in paragraph or essay form when analyzing The Masque of the Red Death Edgar Allan Poe; however, why not make analyzing this short story a bit more engaging by having students create a visual based on imagery?
For these activities, you may want to define “imagery.” See these activities for The Masque of the Red Death Edgar Allan Poe at my store on TPT!
4. Setting Visualization
Students can practice analyzing the setting in The Masque of the Red Death by identifying the textual evidence that describes the setting, which is a description of the time and place. The Seventh Room and the other colored rooms play a major role in the story and deeply affect Prince Prospero.
5. Test Prep Quiz
Students can work independently or in pairs to answer Reading Questions with their own ideas and/or take a test prep Quiz with questions and answers modeled after state standardized tests! When students are done, students can review their answers with a partner and come to a consensus and/or you can THINK ALOUD and model how to answer the questions.
Check out this example from the PRINT & TEACH QUIZ for The Masque of the Red Death Edgar Allan Poe available here>>>The Masque of the Red Death Digital Quiz
This question has 2 parts. Read The Masque of the Red Death Edgar Allan Poe!
Part A: What is the central idea of the short story?
A. Prince Prospero and his friends put on a masquerade to celebrate the Red Death.
B. Prince Prospero and his friends assemble everyone in the kingdom to flee the Red Death.
C. Prince Prospero and his friends gather to escape the Red Death and end up dying anyways.
D. Prince Prospero and his friends hold a ball to commemorate those who survived the Red Death.
Part B: Which 2 quotations support the answer to Part A?
- “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.”
- “In an assembly of phantasms such as I have painted, it may well be supposed that no ordinary appearance could have excited such sensation.”
- “In many palaces, however, such suites form a long and straight vista, while the folding doors slide back nearly to the walls on either hand, so that the view of the whole extent is scarcely impeded.”
- “But in the corridors that followed the suite, there stood, opposite to each window, a heavy tripod, bearing a brazier of fire that protected its rays through the tinted glass and so glaringly illumined the room.”
- “It was toward the close of the fifth or sixth month of his seclusion, and while the pestilence raged most furiously abroad, that the Prince Prospero entertained his thousand friends at a masked ball of the most unusual magnificence.”
- “When the eyes of Prince Prospero fell upon this spectral image (which with a slow and solemn movement, as if more fully to sustain its role, stalked to and fro among the waltzers) he was seen to be convulsed, in the first moment with a strong shudder either of terror or distaste; but, in the next, his brow reddened with rage.”
The Masque of the Red Death Edgar Allan Poe A Visionary
There are other short stories that we enjoy by Poe like The Tell-Tale Heart AND The Cask of Amontillado; however, no other story is more significant and connected to today than The Masque of the Red Death Edgar Allan Poe!
Want more help with lessons, activities, and quizzes for The Masque of the Red Death Edgar Allan Poe? Check out my store, Kristin Menke-Integrated ELA Test Prep!
