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Tempest
Sept 24, 2012 9:38:40 GMT -5
Post by Will on Sept 24, 2012 9:38:40 GMT -5
More Tempest lyrics-
Long and Wasted Years:
It's been such a long long time since we loved each other when our hearts were true one time, for one brief day, i was the man for you last night i heard you talkin in your sleep saying things you shouldn't say, oh baby you just may have to go to jail someday is there a place we can go, is there anybody we can see? maybe, it's the same for you as it is for me i ain't seen my family in twenty years that ain't easy to understand, they may be dead by now i lost track of em after they lost their land shake it up baby, twist and shout you know what it's all about what you doing out there in the sun anyway? don't you know, the sun can burn your brains right out my enemy crashed into the dust stopped dead in his tracks and he lost his lust he was run down hard and he broke apart he died in shame, he had an iron heart i wear dark glasses to cover my eyes there are secrets in em that i can't disguise come back baby if i hurt your feelings, i apologize two trains running side by side, forty miles wide down the eastern line you don't have to go, i just came to you because you're a friend of mine i think that when my back was turned, the whole world behind me burned it's been a while, since we walked down that long, long aisle we cried on a cold and frosty morn, we cried because our souls were torn so much for tears so much for these long and wasted years.
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Tempest
Sept 25, 2012 9:20:13 GMT -5
Post by beacon on Sept 25, 2012 9:20:13 GMT -5
According to Wikipedia " The cover art for Tempest incorporates a red tinted photograph of a statue located at the base of the Pallas-Athene Fountain in front of the Austrian Parliament Building in Vienna." The follwoing I have copied from here www.redicecreations.com/specialreports/2006/05may/spearshaker.htmlPallas Athena was the Goddess of Wisdom and was supposed to preside over the whole of the intellectual and moral side of human life.
She was depicted in Greek Art with a Helmet on her head. She held the Spear of Knowledge in her right hand, poised to strike at the Serpent of Ignorance writhing under her foot. The large Helmet denoted that she waged invisibly a silent war against Sloth and Ignorance. She was usually placed on the Greek Temples with a Golden Spear in her hand. When the morning rays of the sun glinted on the weapon, causing it apparently to tremble, the common people were in the habit of saying smilingly : "Athena is Shaking her Spear again." She was thus known as "the Spear Shaker" or the "Shaker of the Spear."
This was the Goddess to whom Francis Bacon plighted his troth when a youth.
The members of this Secret Literary Society which centered in Pallas Athena were known as The Knights of the Helmet. They had a ritual created by Francis Bacon and were initiated with an elaborate ceremonial. There was a vow, recitatives, perambulations. The Initiate was capped with the Helmet of Pallas to denote he was henceforth an "Invisible" in the fight for Human Advancement. A large Spear was placed in his hand indicative of a pen for he was to Shake the Spear of Knowledge at the Dragons of Ignorance. He thus became a "Spear-Shaker", and the head of the little band of "Spear-Shakers" was "Shake-Speare" himself, Athena's visible representative on earth.......Francis Bacon.
This little group of law students with a few outsiders like Gabriel Harvey, a Cambridge Professor, the one-time tutor of Francis in Prosody became the brains of the secret movements in the Elizabethan Era which led to the English Renaissance. The prime Fraternity became known ultimately as the Rosicrosse.
The actual statue depicted is The Moldau, however, given the connections already established on the album to Shakespeare - The Tempest, Don Quixote - and the legend that Francis Bacon was the author of Shakespeare, I think Pallas Athena is the real clue.
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Tempest
Sept 25, 2012 9:44:13 GMT -5
Post by beacon on Sept 25, 2012 9:44:13 GMT -5
Will, I have copied this over to this thread "Henry Lee is a well-known folk ballad (Young Hunting), but look at how the original Henry Lee relates to Queen Elizabeth I. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Lee_of_Ditchley...and it's yet another H and L..." This is a fascinating discovery. Sir Henry Lee is believed to have been the inspiration for the character Don Quixote which gives us a link to two Shakespeare plays prior to Roll On, John. The Lyrics to Tin Angel are also fascinating... It was late at night when the boss came home To a deserted mansion and a desolate throne Servant said: "Boss, the lady’s gone She left this morning just 'fore dawn."
"You got something to tell me, tell it to me, man Come to the point as straight as you can" "Old Henry Lee, chief of the clan Came riding through the woods and took her by the hand"
The boss he lay back flat on his bed He cursed the heat and he clutched his head He pondered the future of his fate To wait another day would be far too late
"Go fetch me my coat and my tie And the cheapest labour that money can buy Saddle me up my buckskin mare If you see me go by, put up a prayer" (The Boss)
Well, they rode all night, and they rode all day Eastward, long down the broad highway His spirit was tired and his vision was bent His men deserted him and onward he went
He came to a place where the light was dull His forehead pounding in his skull Heavy heart was racked with pain Insomnia raging in his brain
Well, he threw down his helmet and his cross-handled sword He renounced his faith, he denied his lord Crawled on his belly, put his ear to the wall One way or another put an end to it all
He leaned down, cut the electric wire Stared into the flames and he snorted the fire Peered through the darkness, caught a glimpse of the two It was hard to tell for certain who was who
He lowered himself down on a golden chain His nerves were quaking in every vein His knuckles were bloody, he sucked in the air He ran his fingers through his greasy hair
They looked at each other and their glasses clinked One single unit, inseparably linked "Got a strange premonition there's a man close by" (Henry Lee) "Don’t worry about him, he wouldn't harm a fly" (The Wife)
From behind the curtain, the boss he crossed the floor He moved his feet and he bolted the door Shadows hiding the lines in his face With all the nobility of an ancient race
She turned, she was startled with a look of surprise With a hatred that could hit the skies "You're a reckless fool, I could see it in your eyes To come this way was by no means wise" (The Wife)
"Get up, stand up, you greedy-lipped wench And cover your face or suffer the consequence You are making my heart feel sick Put your clothes back on, double-quick" (The Boss)
"Silly boy, you think me a saint I’ll listen no more to your words of complaint You've given me nothing but the sweetest lies Now hold your tongue and feed your eyes" (The Wife)
"I’d have given you the stars and the planets, too But what good would these things do you? Bow the heart if not the knee Or never again this world you'll see" (The Boss)
"Oh, please let not your heart be cold This man is dearer to me than gold" (The Wife) "Oh, my dear, you must be blind He's a gutless ape with a worthless mind" (The Boss)
"You've had your way too long with me Now it's me who’ll determine how things shall be" (The Wife) "Try to escape," he cussed and cursed "You'll have to try to get past me first" (The Boss)
"Do not let your passion rule You think my heart the heart of a fool And you, sir, you can not deny You made a monkey of me, what and for why?" (The Boss)
"I'll have no more of this insulting chat The devil can have you, I'll see to that Look sharp or step aside Or in the cradle you'll wish you'd died" (Henry Lee)
The gun went boom and the shot rang clear First bullet grazed his ear Second ball went right straight in And he bent in the middle like a twisted pin
He crawled to the corner and he lowered his head He gripped the chair and he grabbed the bed It would take more than needle and thread Bleeding from the mouth, he's as good as dead
"You shot my husband down, you fiend" (The Wife) "Husband? What husband? What the hell do you mean? He was a man of strife, a man of sin I cut him down and threw him to the wind" (Henry Lee)
This she said with angry breath "You too shall meet the lord of death It was I who brought your soul to life" (The Wife) Then she raised her robe and she drew out a knife
His face was hard and caked with sweat His arms ached and his hands were wet "You're a murderous queen and a bloody wife If you don't mind, I'll have the knife" (Henry Lee)
"We're two of a kind and our blood runs hot But we're no way similar in body or thought All husbands are good men, as all wives know" (The Wife) Then she pierced him to the heart and his blood did flow
His knees went limp and he reached for the door His tomb was sealed, he slid to the floor He whispered in her ear: "This is all your fault My fighting days have come to a halt" (Henry Lee)
She touched his lips and kissed his cheek He tried to speak but his breath was weak "You died for me, now I'll die for you" (The Wife) She put the blade to her heart and she ran it through
All three lovers together in a heap Thrown into the grave, forever to sleep Funeral torches blazed away Through the towns and the villages all night and all day Dylan is definitely revealing something here!
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Tempest
Sept 25, 2012 11:53:52 GMT -5
Post by Will on Sept 25, 2012 11:53:52 GMT -5
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Tempest
Sept 25, 2012 19:20:49 GMT -5
Post by Ter on Sept 25, 2012 19:20:49 GMT -5
The Pallas-Athene fountain is used on the Tempest cover. So, why the red tinted photo of Moldua? The statue, used on the cover of Tempest, is one of four figures on the intermediate platform of the fountain bowl personifying the main rivers of Austria-Hungary: the Danube, the Inn, the Elbe, and the Moldau. The figure shown on the album cover represents the Moldau.
Moldau (Vltava) Both the Czech name Vltava and the German name Moldau are believed to originate from the old Germanic words "wilt ahwa". ("wild water")
Vltava (Die Moldau) The best-known of the classical Czech composer Bedřich Smetana's set of six symphonic poems Má vlast ("My Motherland"), inspired by his Czech homeland, is called Vltava (Die Moldau) or (The Moldau), and is a musical depiction of the river's course.
Bedřich Smetana's 2nd symphonic poem "Vltava", also known by its German name "Die Moldau" (or The Moldau), was composed between 20 November and (8 December) 1874
D I E Moldau
Notice the first letters of three of the four rivers represented on the fountain.
(D)anube, (I)nn, (E)lbe, "Moldau" DIE Moldau THE Moldau The Wilt Ahwa ( The Wild Water ) Then the first letters of each river. DIEM is Latin for (DAY) So is Dylan's Tempest cover saying The Red Wild Water?
...just some thoughts.
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Tempest
Sept 26, 2012 5:31:19 GMT -5
Post by beacon on Sept 26, 2012 5:31:19 GMT -5
So, we can connect the cover to the letters D I E and the US release date was 9/11.
Without going into the obvious 9/11 symbolism of this release date this also reminds me of the mirrored message on the Sgt Pepper drum. 1 One IX he die.
Just some more thoughts...
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Tempest
Sept 26, 2012 8:20:36 GMT -5
Post by beacon on Sept 26, 2012 8:20:36 GMT -5
"Well, he threw down his helmet and his cross-handled sword"
I am sure the reference to the helmet is a nod to Bacon and his Knights of the Helmet.
I am also pretty sure that the cross-handled sword would hold some sort of masonic/templar significance. Why mention that is cross-handled otherwise?
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Tempest
Sept 27, 2012 15:46:03 GMT -5
Post by Will on Sept 27, 2012 15:46:03 GMT -5
Is it actually possible here that Dylan may have encoded his own solution (or riddle) to all of this with Tempest?
The image of that beaten kid with the rose in his mouth that the gang just walks over in Duquesne Whistle...
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Tempest
Sept 28, 2012 3:58:44 GMT -5
Post by beacon on Sept 28, 2012 3:58:44 GMT -5
Is it actually possible here that Dylan may have encoded his own solution (or riddle) to all of this with Tempest? The image of that beaten kid with the rose in his mouth that the gang just walks over in Duquesne Whistle... It is easy to fall into the trap of seeing symbolism that just isn't there, but I feel there may be an element of this riddle that harks back to the war of independence. Being a Brit I freely admit my knowledge of this subject is patchy at best, but wasn't Duquesne a fort fought over by the British and the French? Anyway the allegory I am proposing is that the boy with the rose symbolises the early settlers with their Tudor / Rosicrucian idealism as set out in Bacon's New Atlantis manifesto. The boy's brush with the law is excused because the police are controlled by the powers that be, i.e. the Rosicrucians, however, his real problems start when he knocks the guy off the pyramid shaped ladder. The guy who he knocks off symbolises a kind of Washington / colonist figure who represents a different kind of freemasonry - Scottish Rite, Jacobite - model. They then whisk the boy off, extract retribution and dump his body, which the locals ignore, because they represent the real power. Anyway, probably reading far too much into it, that's what happens when you spend to long on this!
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Tempest
Sept 28, 2012 6:18:36 GMT -5
Post by Will on Sept 28, 2012 6:18:36 GMT -5
Yeah that's what I keep thinking, I don't want to go off on a wild goose chase either, but as soon as I read the lyrics to this LP something hit me that this has an entirely hidden theme...and I still think so...
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Tempest
Oct 5, 2012 20:25:47 GMT -5
Post by Will on Oct 5, 2012 20:25:47 GMT -5
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary, Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore, While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping, As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door. "'Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my chamber door - Only this, and nothing more."
Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December, And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor. Eagerly I wished the morrow; - vainly I had sought to borrow From my books surcease of sorrow - sorrow for the lost Lenore - For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore - Nameless here for evermore.
And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain Thrilled me - filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before; So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating, "'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door - Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door; - This it is, and nothing more."
Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer, "Sir," said I, "or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore; But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping, And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door, That I scarce was sure I heard you"- here I opened wide the door; - Darkness there, and nothing more.
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing, Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortals ever dared to dream before; But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token, And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, "Lenore?" This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, "Lenore!" - Merely this, and nothing more.
Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning, Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before. "Surely," said I, "surely that is something at my window lattice: Let me see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore - Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore; - 'Tis the wind and nothing more."
Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter, In there stepped a stately raven of the saintly days of yore; Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he; But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door - Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door - Perched, and sat, and nothing more.
Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling, By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore. "Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou," I said, "art sure no craven, Ghastly grim and ancient raven wandering from the Nightly shore - Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!" Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly, Though its answer little meaning- little relevancy bore; For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being Ever yet was blest with seeing bird above his chamber door - Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber door, With such name as "Nevermore."
But the raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour. Nothing further then he uttered- not a feather then he fluttered - Till I scarcely more than muttered, "other friends have flown before - On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before." Then the bird said, "Nevermore."
Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken, "Doubtless," said I, "what it utters is its only stock and store, Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful Disaster Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore - Till the dirges of his Hope that melancholy burden bore Of 'Never - nevermore'."
But the Raven still beguiling all my fancy into smiling, Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird, and bust and door; Then upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore - What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt and ominous bird of yore Meant in croaking "Nevermore."
This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's core; This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamplight gloated o'er, But whose velvet violet lining with the lamplight gloating o'er, She shall press, ah, nevermore!
Then methought the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer Swung by Seraphim whose footfalls tinkled on the tufted floor. "Wretch," I cried, "thy God hath lent thee - by these angels he hath sent thee Respite - respite and nepenthe, from thy memories of Lenore: Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe and forget this lost Lenore!" Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil! - prophet still, if bird or devil! - Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore, Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted - On this home by horror haunted- tell me truly, I implore - Is there - is there balm in Gilead? - tell me - tell me, I implore!" Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil - prophet still, if bird or devil! By that Heaven that bends above us - by that God we both adore - Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn, It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore - Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore." Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
"Be that word our sign in parting, bird or fiend," I shrieked, upstarting - "Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore! Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken! Leave my loneliness unbroken!- quit the bust above my door! Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!" Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door; And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming, And the lamplight o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor; And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor Shall be lifted - nevermore!
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Tempest
Oct 6, 2012 19:02:32 GMT -5
Post by Will on Oct 6, 2012 19:02:32 GMT -5
THE "Red Death" had long devastated the country. No pestilence had ever been so fatal, or so hideous. Blood was its Avatar and its seal -- the redness and the horror of blood. There were sharp pains, and sudden dizziness, and then profuse bleeding at the pores, with dissolution. The scarlet stains upon the body and especially upon the face of the victim, were the pest ban which shut him out from the aid and from the sympathy of his fellow-men. And the whole seizure, progress and termination of the disease, were the incidents of half an hour.
But the Prince Prospero was happy and dauntless and sagacious. 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. This was an extensive and magnificent structure, the creation of the prince's own eccentric yet august taste. A strong and lofty wall girdled it in. This wall had gates of iron. The courtiers, having entered, brought furnaces and massy hammers and welded the bolts. They resolved to leave means neither of ingress or egress to the sudden impulses of despair or of frenzy from within. The abbey was amply provisioned. With such precautions the courtiers might bid defiance to contagion. The external world could take care of itself. In the meantime it was folly to grieve, or to think. The prince had provided all the appliances of pleasure. There were buffoons, there were improvisatori, there were ballet-dancers, there were musicians, there was Beauty, there was wine. All these and security were within. Without was the "Red Death."
It was toward the close of the fifth or sixth month of his seclusion, and while the pestilence raged most furiously abroad, that the Prince Prospero entertained his thousand friends at a masked ball of the most unusual magnificence.
It was a voluptuous scene, that masquerade. But first let me tell of the rooms in which it was held. There were seven -- an imperial suite. In many palaces, however, such suites form a long and straight vista, while the folding doors slide back nearly to the walls on either hand, so that the view of the whole extent is scarcely impeded. Here the case was very different; as might have been expected from the duke's love of the bizarre. The apartments were so irregularly disposed that the vision embraced but little more than one at a time. There was a sharp turn at every twenty or thirty yards, and at each turn a novel effect. To the right and left, in the middle of each wall, a tall and narrow Gothic window looked out upon a closed corridor which pursued the windings of the suite. These windows were of stained glass whose color varied in accordance with the prevailing hue of the decorations of the chamber into which it opened. That at the eastern extremity was hung, for example, in blue -- and vividly blue were its windows. The second chamber was purple in its ornaments and tapestries, and here the panes were purple. The third was green throughout, and so were the casements. The fourth was furnished and lighted with orange -- the fifth with white -- the sixth with violet. The seventh apartment was closely shrouded in black velvet tapestries that hung all over the ceiling and down the walls, falling in heavy folds upon a carpet of the same material and hue. But in this chamber only, the color of the windows failed to correspond with the decorations. The panes here were scarlet -- a deep blood color. Now in no one of the seven apartments was there any lamp or candelabrum, amid the profusion of golden ornaments that lay scattered to and fro or depended from the roof. There was no light of any kind emanating from lamp or candle within the suite of chambers. But in the corridors that followed the suite, there stood, opposite to each window, a heavy tripod, bearing a brazier of fire that protected its rays through the tinted glass and so glaringly illumined the room. And thus were produced a multitude of gaudy and fantastic appearances. But in the western or black chamber the effect of the fire-light that streamed upon the dark hangings through the blood-tinted panes, was ghastly in the extreme, and produced so wild a look upon the countenances of those who entered, that there were few of the company bold enough to set foot within its precincts at all.
It was in this apartment, also, that there stood against the western wall, a gigantic clock of ebony. Its pendulum swung to and fro with a dull, heavy, monotonous clang; and when the minute-hand made the circuit of the face, and the hour was to be stricken, there came from the brazen lungs of the clock a sound which was clear and loud and deep and exceedingly musical, but of so peculiar a note and emphasis that, at each lapse of an hour, the musicians of the orchestra were constrained to pause, momentarily, in their performance, to hearken to the sound; and thus the waltzers perforce ceased their evolutions; and there was a brief disconcert of the whole gay company; and, while the chimes of the clock yet rang, it was observed that the giddiest grew pale, and the more aged and sedate passed their hands over their brows as if in confused reverie or meditation. But when the echoes had fully ceased, a light laughter at once pervaded the assembly; the musicians looked at each other and smiled as if at their own nervousness and folly, and made whispering vows, each to the other, that the next chiming of the clock should produce in them no similar emotion; and then, after the lapse of sixty minutes, (which embrace three thousand and six hundred seconds of the Time that flies,) there came yet another chiming of the clock, and then were the same disconcert and tremulousness and meditation as before.
But, in spite of these things, it was a gay and magnificent revel. The tastes of the duke were peculiar. He had a fine eye for colors and effects. He disregarded the decora of mere fashion. His plans were bold and fiery, and his conceptions glowed with barbaric lustre. There are some who would have thought him mad. His followers felt that he was not. It was necessary to hear and see and touch him to be sure that he was not.
He had directed, in great part, the moveable embellishments of the seven chambers, upon occasion of this great fete; and it was his own guiding taste which had given character to the masqueraders. Be sure they were grotesque. There were much glare and glitter and piquancy and phantasm -- much of what has been since seen in "Hernani." There were arabesque figures with unsuited limbs and appointments. There were delirious fancies such as the madman fashions. There was much of the beautiful, much of the wanton, much of the bizarre, something of the terrible, and not a little of that which might have excited disgust. To and fro in the seven chambers there stalked, in fact, a multitude of dreams. And these -- the dreams -- writhed in and about, taking hue from the rooms, and causing the wild music of the orchestra to seem as the echo of their steps. And, anon, there strikes the ebony clock which stands in the hall of the velvet. And then, for a moment, all is still, and all is silent save the voice of the clock. The dreams are stiff-frozen as they stand. But the echoes of the chime die away -- they have endured but an instant -- and a light, half-subdued laughter floats after them as they depart. And now again the music swells, and the dreams live, and writhe to and fro more merrily than ever, taking hue from the many-tinted windows through which stream the rays from the tripods. But to the chamber which lies most westwardly of the seven, there are now none of the maskers who venture; for the night is waning away; and there flows a ruddier light through the blood-colored panes; and the blackness of the sable drapery appals; and to him whose foot falls upon the sable carpet, there comes from the near clock of ebony a muffled peal more solemnly emphatic than any which reaches their ears who indulge in the more remote gaieties of the other apartments.
But these other apartments were densely crowded, and in them beat feverishly the heart of life. And the revel went whirlingly on, until at length there commenced the sounding of midnight upon the clock. And then the music ceased, as I have told; and the evolutions of the waltzers were quieted; and there was an uneasy cessation of all things as before. But now there were twelve strokes to be sounded by the bell of the clock; and thus it happened, perhaps, that more of thought crept, with more of time, into the meditations of the thoughtful among those who revelled. And thus, too, it happened, perhaps, that before the last echoes of the last chime had utterly sunk into silence, there were many individuals in the crowd who had found leisure to become aware of the presence of a masked figure which had arrested the attention of no single individual before. And the rumor of this new presence having spread itself whisperingly around, there arose at length from the whole company a buzz, or murmur, expressive of disapprobation and surprise -- then, finally, of terror, of horror, and of disgust.
In an assembly of phantasms such as I have painted, it may well be supposed that no ordinary appearance could have excited such sensation. In truth the masquerade license of the night was nearly unlimited; but the figure in question had out-Heroded Herod, and gone beyond the bounds of even the prince's indefinite decorum. There are chords in the hearts of the most reckless which cannot be touched without emotion. Even with the utterly lost, to whom life and death are equally jests, there are matters of which no jest can be made. The whole company, indeed, seemed now deeply to feel that in the costume and bearing of the stranger neither wit nor propriety existed. The figure was tall and gaunt, and shrouded from head to foot in the habiliments of the grave. The mask which concealed the visage was made so nearly to resemble the countenance of a stiffened corpse that the closest scrutiny must have had difficulty in detecting the cheat. And yet all this might have been endured, if not approved, by the mad revellers around. But the mummer had gone so far as to assume the type of the Red Death. His vesture was dabbled in blood -- and his broad brow, with all the features of the face, was besprinkled with the scarlet horror.
When the eyes of Prince Prospero fell upon this spectral image (which with a slow and solemn movement, as if more fully to sustain its role, stalked to and fro among the waltzers) he was seen to be convulsed, in the first moment with a strong shudder either of terror or distaste; but, in the next, his brow reddened with rage.
"Who dares?" he demanded hoarsely of the courtiers who stood near him -- "who dares insult us with this blasphemous mockery? Seize him and unmask him -- that we may know whom we have to hang at sunrise, from the battlements!"
It was in the eastern or blue chamber in which stood the Prince Prospero as he uttered these words. They rang throughout the seven rooms loudly and clearly -- for the prince was a bold and robust man, and the music had become hushed at the waving of his hand.
It was in the blue room where stood the prince, with a group of pale courtiers by his side. At first, as he spoke, there was a slight rushing movement of this group in the direction of the intruder, who at the moment was also near at hand, and now, with deliberate and stately step, made closer approach to the speaker. But from a certain nameless awe with which the mad assumptions of the mummer had inspired the whole party, there were found none who put forth hand to seize him; so that, unimpeded, he passed within a yard of the prince's person; and, while the vast assembly, as if with one impulse, shrank from the centres of the rooms to the walls, he made his way uninterruptedly, but with the same solemn and measured step which had distinguished him from the first, through the blue chamber to the purple -- through the purple to the green -- through the green to the orange -- through this again to the white -- and even thence to the violet, ere a decided movement had been made to arrest him. It was then, however, that the Prince Prospero, maddening with rage and the shame of his own momentary cowardice, rushed hurriedly through the six chambers, while none followed him on account of a deadly terror that had seized upon all. He bore aloft a drawn dagger, and had approached, in rapid impetuosity, to within three or four feet of the retreating figure, when the latter, having attained the extremity of the velvet apartment, turned suddenly and confronted his pursuer. There was a sharp cry -- and the dagger dropped gleaming upon the sable carpet, upon which, instantly afterwards, fell prostrate in death the Prince Prospero. Then, summoning the wild courage of despair, a throng of the revellers at once threw themselves into the black apartment, and, seizing the mummer, whose tall figure stood erect and motionless within the shadow of the ebony clock, gasped in unutterable horror at finding the grave-cerements and corpse-like mask which they handled with so violent a rudeness, untenanted by any tangible form.
And now was acknowledged the presence of the Red Death. He had come like a thief in the night. And one by one dropped the revellers in the blood-bedewed halls of their revel, and died each in the despairing posture of his fall. And the life of the ebony clock went out with that of the last of the gay. And the flames of the tripods expired. And Darkness and Decay and the Red Death held illimitable dominion over all.
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Post by Will on Oct 8, 2012 6:18:35 GMT -5
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Tempest
Oct 8, 2012 16:27:16 GMT -5
Post by Ter on Oct 8, 2012 16:27:16 GMT -5
Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door - Perched, and sat, and nothing more. On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door; I see how the Dylan, Tempest, and Pallas Athena connects, but wasn't Poe referring to Pallas the Titan god? www.theoi.com/Titan/TitanPallas.html
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Tempest
Oct 8, 2012 16:48:49 GMT -5
Post by Ter on Oct 8, 2012 16:48:49 GMT -5
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