Edgar Allan Poe - The Mask Of The Red Death (Video)
February 12, 2026
Behind iron gates, a prince and his thousand guests feast while plague devours the world outside. But when midnight strikes at the grandest masquerade of all, they discover that no fortress can bar the one guest who always finds a way in.
This video presents a complete reading of Edgar Allan Poe’s iconic gothic tale, “The Masque of the Red Death.” A devastating plague known as the Red Death sweeps across the land, and the privileged Prince Prospero responds by sealing himself and a thousand courtiers inside a fortified abbey. There, surrounded by luxury and entertainment, they attempt to wait out the catastrophe in blissful isolation.
The heart of the story unfolds across seven symbolically colored chambers, each more unsettling than the last, while an enormous ebony clock marks the passage of time with a sound that silences every reveler. When a masked figure appears at the prince’s extravagant ball, dressed as the Red Death itself, Prospero’s illusion of safety shatters in one of the most chilling finales in all of short fiction.
The reading captures Poe’s rich, atmospheric prose and the mounting dread that makes this story endure nearly two centuries after it was written.