Final answer:
The dark atmosphere in 'The Masque of the Red Death' reflects a literary theme of dark mood and fatalism following the Black Death era, a theme which is also present in 'The Fall of the House of Usher.' This mood contributes to the narrative's overall sense of inevitable decay and death, mirroring the cultural trauma from which such themes often arise.
Step-by-step explanation:
The mood of 'The Masque of the Red Death' plays a critical role in shaping the story's thematic content. The pervasive dark and gloomy atmosphere exemplifies a common theme in literature following the Black Death era, where there was a cultural shift in representations of sorrow, decay, and death.
This motif is similarly expressed in Edgar Allan Poe's 'The Fall of the House of Usher', where the sobering environment creates a relentless, oppressive feeling. Here, the physical reflections, such as the reflection of the house in the tarn, symbolically mirror the internal feelings of the characters, suggesting a world where despair is unavoidable and death inevitable. The gloom serves as a significant mood setter amplifying the hopelessness and fatalism inherent in Poe’s writings, resonating with the idea that humanity is doomed to succumb to mortality, despite efforts to avoid it.
Poe's attention to the environment, the detailed descriptions of the setting, and the use of mirror imagery in 'The Fall of the House of Usher' contribute to the narrative’s gloomy tone. This theme is not isolated to Poe’s works but is prevalent in the literary and artistic expressions following widespread disease and death, like in the case of the Black Death. Such expressions often feature macabre elements to remind the audience of the ever-present nature of death, in which macabre representations of death showcase the cultural trauma and collective fear of the plague, linking back to the original theme suggested by the dark mood in 'The Masque of the Red Death.' These themes aim to provoke reflections on life, death, and the human condition.