SHORT STORY SERIES - The Masque of the Red Death by Edgar Allan Poe

In the prefix of my last short story review, I was talking about Edgar Allan Poe and how he has set such high standards for me whenever I am reading a horror short story or something similar. I did not plan to read this particular story. I actually just selected this title from the list because it sounded interesting. When I saw the author I was already excited about what was to come. I don't need to start telling you guys about the author. You know what he is capable of, xd.

Edgar Allan Poe is a literary giant. He is credited with inventing the gothic genre. He also is one of the pioneers of the short story genre. Ah, I can go on and on, basically, one thing I did pick out from this was his brilliant description of a dark, macabre tale that truly exudes wisdom, while allowing readers to conjure up numerous derivatives from the body of literature. To put simply, he employs good old ambiguity while telling an intellectually and morally captivating story, and yet allowing for limitless interpretations. I am not going to lie, when I started reading it till almost the end, I just felt lost. He is just that brilliant. I was thinking, "it would all make sense in the end, just keep reading". And it sure as hell did. Albeit I needed other explanations to truly decrypt some things, I got the gist, haha. This is absolutely one of the best short stories I have read in a while. The number of literary devices he used in this story is endless. A powerful allegory. While there is an endless stream of takeaways from this story, mine is simply that death cannot be evaded. Make of that information what you will. I will rate it 4.2/5, and yes, I recommend.