Masque Of The Red Death

Two weeks ago I was tramping off Mount Kilimanjaro. The Kili Initiative team were happy to be back in Marangu. I got on the internet and checked the news outlets. Italy was shut down 100% and the Pope wandered the streets of Rome blessing the faithful, but the virus resisted all measures.

I felt fine and I passed through JFK without a single person from TSA or the Border Control asking a question about my health.

I still feel fine and since my I have been endowed with a Neanderthal's belief in immortality, I wasn't worried about the virus' ravages, yet thousands died in China and Italy. This was not just the flu. Old people were dying by the score and last week Trump ordered the total shutdown of air traffic between the USA and Europe to prevent the spread of Covid 19.

Today bars and restaurants have been closed across the USA.

New York too.

After 8pm no more drinks will be served within the five bouroughs.

Prohibition.

Quarantine.

Same as in Edgar Allen Poe's MASQUE ON THE RED DEATH from 1842.

Prospero has sequestered a thousand nobles within his castle walls. The guests fete every night. Safe from the always fatal Red Death.

"The Red death had long been feeding on The country. no sickness had ever been so deadly — so great a killer — or so fearful to see. Blood was its mark — the redness and the horror of blood. There were sharp pains, and a sudden feel ing that the mind was rushing in circles inside the head. Then there was bleeding through the skin, though it was not cut or broken — and then, death! The bright red spots upon the body and especially upon the face of the sick man made other men turn away from him, afraid to try to help. And the sickness lasted, from the beginning to the end, no more than half an hour.

The Red Death was not Covid 19.

The Red Death was merciless.

"Now they knew that it was the Red Death itself that had come in the night. One by one the dancers fell, and each died as he fell. And the fires died. And the clock stopped. And darkness and decay and the Red Death ruled forever over all."

Covid 19 has yet to be so cruel, but it is easrly in the game.