The Masque of the Red Death Decay and the Red Death held dominion over all". Directly influenced by the first Gothic novel, Horace Walpole's "The Castle of Otranto", in "The Masque of the Red Death" Poe adopts many conventions of traditional Gothic fiction, including the castle setting. The multiple single-toned rooms may be representative of the human mind, showing different personality types. The imagery of blood and time throughout also indicates corporeality. The plague may, in fact, represent typical attributes of human life and mortality, which would imply the entire story is an allegory about man's futile attempts to stave off death (a commonly accepted interpretation).
Masque of the Red Death and Other Tales are included, each in its own 32-page booklet, called "Red Tide", "Red Jack", and "Red Death" respectively. "Masque of the Red Death and other Tales" is an "Advanced Dungeons & Dragons" game supplement for the Ravenloft setting, published by TSR, Inc. as a boxed set containing one 128-page book, three 32-page books, one three-panel referee screen, one 21" X 32" map sheet, one 21" X 32" poster. Design was by William W. Connors with D.J. Heinrich, Colin McComb, and Shane Hensley; editing was by Anne Brown, Jonatha Ariadne Caspian, and Richard Pike-Brown. Illustrations were by Stephen Fabian and Ned Dameron,