Edgar Allen Poe, Not Stephen King

A group of people ignore a beloved woman’s dying wish and rush to take advantage of her death.

They hold an event to announce their corrupt plan...

...and then one by one they start falling ill.

Gotta admit, it’s all very Stephen King.

— The Hoarse Whisperer (@TheRealHoarse) October 3, 2020

Surely, I cannot be the only one who thinks that the entire scenario more closely resembles Edgar Allen Poe's Masque of the Red Death.

With his retinue at the center of an expanding Covid-19 outbreak, the parallels are striking.

Seriously:

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.