"The Red Death had long devastated the country." (pg 43) The Masque of the Red Death was about a prince who invited all his "friends" to his palace. There were many people dying outside from the Red Death.
The prince had a large party. There were 7 rooms the guests could go into. They were all elegantly decorated - all in a different color. The last room was decorated in black and had a dard red stained window. No one would go into the last room. It had a large clock in it that rang every hour and startled everyone.
The clock rang again and midnight and the Red Death showed up and killed the prince.
"When his dominions were half depopulated, he summoned to his presence a thousand hale and light-hearted friends from among the knights and dames of his court, and with these retired to the deep seclusion of one of his castellated abbeys." (pg 49) The prince was obviously selfish and uncaring. He wanted to give all the important people a big feast while the under-privileged suffered death. He was the prince so this shouldn't have been his approach at all.
I think he simply decided to such a thing because he was a spoiled and selfish man and that was what he was taught to be. He was punished though, by the Red Death, for such cruelty.
I think that the theme of The Masque of the Red Death is escaping death. The prince and everyone that joined his feast, for that matter, were avoiding the outside world in which everyone was dying. They were having a good elegant time while others were suffering.
The most sinful person, the prince, ended up getting what he deserved though, when he was killed by the Red Death - what he'd been avoiding in the first place.
I would say that the author is making a point that you can't escape death; it'll catch up to you sooner or later.
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