EXPLAIN WHAT THE EVENTS IN THE STORY SUGGEST ABOUT THE CONFLICT BETWEEN THE DREAM WORLD AND THE TEMPORAL WORLD, OR BETWEEN THE ILLUSION AND REALITY.....USE QUOTES TO BACK UP THOUGHTS.... ESSAY ONE PAGE WITH THESIS STATEMENT ......PLEASE HELP ME, ANYBODY!!!!!!

-- Anonymous, January 29, 2002

Answers

Prospero walls up his guests and entertains them in chambers of symbolic luxury and isolation. But in the last chamber reality bridges to the world of time outside where death rampages. It is black with a clock and a window of red. Prospero's attitude is arrogant denial and his illusions are buttressed by actual walls. Hubris, defying time and death. As in "Dream within a Dream" willing does not make it so and time vanquishes both dreams and actual events. "The Conqueror Worm" pageant in a symbolic story. The artist bases his materials from dreams and real life but cannot breach this world except in the aspiration.

Poe expresses the artistic defiance in recognition of these limits perhaps because of what life taught him. The Red Death is itself an artistic intrusion in costume, leading the fake world into the last chamber, chased by an enraged Prospero and conquers Prospero in home ground with brutal and silent definity. Only the clock makes a final note as the last guest dies. It is not too hard to find quotes. The story is the statement without any speeches by Prospero.

-- Anonymous, January 31, 2002