Abstract
This paper contextualizes the role of literature during the current state of Covid-19 outbreak. As representation of plague has been a stable in literature across time and space, reading literature about pandemic offers important insights in dealing with the changing period. This study offers a reading of ‘The Marque of Red Death’, a short story written by Edgar Allan Poe which dramatizes the outbreak of titular plague. Poe’s narration contextualizes the horrifying aspects of plague and also criticizes the social inequality concerning the ability of different social classes to cope with pandemic. Hence, this depiction asserts that ecological problem is inseparable with social problem and racial inequality. This study is conducted under ecocritical framework which emphasizes the reorientation of human and non-human relationship through the imaginary literature. The findings suggest that the non-human entity in form of plague is depicted as a disruptive force that abolish the progress of human civilization. This dramatization explores humanity to ponder their position in the world as a reminder of their mortality. The analysis suggests that during the troubled era of Covid-19 outbreak, reading representation of plague in literature can provide an idea with how people across time and space cope with pandemic outbreak.
Highlights
A prolific author of his age, Edgar Allan Poe and his fictional works are contextualized
The premise of ecocriticism is the realization that scholars of the humanities can no longer ignore the current state of environmental problem, especially as humanities themselves are the ones to blame for the years of exploitation
Ecocriticism argues that environmental crisis cannot be separated with crisis of the imagination, which indicates a necessity for other forms of representing nature instead of the human-oriented paradigm
Summary
A prolific author of his age, Edgar Allan Poe and his fictional works are contextualized . Born at Boston on January 19th, 1980, Poe was an American author who was noteworthy for his works as editors and literary critics He wrote a substantial amount of literature, mainly focusing on short stories and poetry. One of his much-talked about poem, the Raven (1845) is noteworthy due to its use of the bird Raven to represent evil and death, which is employed as a symbolism for the narrator‘s grief of losing his beloved. The present study focuses on analyzing ―The Masque of the Red Death‖, a short story by Poe to underline representation of plague outbreak which is conducted through ecocritical perspective Poe positions his narration under the outbreak of the titular disease, and explore the inequality based on the social and class divide concerning the ability to cope with the disease. As the relationship highly favors the humans through anthropocentric point of view that designates non-human as commodity to be exploited, ecocriticism mediates the relationship between human and non-human though alternative point of view (Indriyanto, 2020, p. 3)
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