In Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven” and “The Fall of House of Usher,” Poe wrote constantly of the motifs of the heart, as well as that of madness and insanity. These two works feature elements of lost love and the pain one can feel as a result of a traumatic loss. In the powerful poem “The Raven,” the story tells of a distraught lover; the reader follows the man’s decent into a world of madness. As he displays the loss of his love, Lenore, as the story continues he goes through a world of pain, he sits in a room shut off from the world he once knew, feeling lonely and heartless. As we follow the narrator’s fast decent into madness and loneliness, he keeps mentioning how heartless he realizes now that his lover is gone.
Poetry Explication of “The Raven” by Edgar Allen Poe “The Raven” is a poem written about a man who is grieving about his lost lover. He has great difficulty with dealing with her death and the object in the poem that is used continually to remind him of the lack of her presence is that of the raven. Starting with the first stanza, there is indication of in climate weather and it also tells us that the setting is at night. There is an air of uncertainness and a definite dark side to the poem with the uncovering of some great tragedy that has befallen the narrator and he also has a fear of something coming to disturb him at rest. We find more out about what this tragedy that befell him is and we discover that the supposed date of this unfortunate happening occurred in the month of December.
“The Raven” focuses more on symbolism and tone to provide the reader with a glimpse into the mindset of a man stricken with the memories of a lost love. On the contrary, “The Things They Carried” uses epiphanies and imagery to let the reader experience the guilt that Lieutenant Cross experiences after the loss of his comrade. The conflict in “The Things We Carried” is resolved when Lieutenant Cross decides to forego his feelings for Martha and atone for his mistakes by leading the rest of the platoon to the best of his ability. On the other hand, “The Raven” holds no clear resolution for the reader. The story ends with the main character sinking more deeply into his own despair.
Just after he learns of the blind man’s impending visit, the narrator states, “I wasn’t enthusiastic about his visit. He was no one I knew. And his being blind bothered me” (20). These thoughts carry on through the story as the narrator begins to give the background details on his wife’s relationship with the blind man. When the narrator describes a poem his wife wrote about an experience she had when the blind man touched her face, he says, “I can remember I didn’t think much of the poem” (20).
Flies, as most people know, are an annoyance. They feast on dead flesh, which is what the speaker will soon be. The presence of the fly is a harsh reminder of the fate of the dead (“I Heard a Fly Buzz—When I Died—”139). Romanticism is defined as emotional and written works include emotional intensity. In this poem, Emily Dickinson creates just that in lines five and six, “The Eyes around—had wrung them dry— / And Breaths were gathering firm” (Dickinson 5-6).
Edgar Allen Poe wrote The Raven because his wife, Virginia, was dying of tuberculosis. To me I think the poem is about self torture and about being consumed by the past. The raven symbolizes the protagonist’s subconscious, trying to send him a message that pain and misery in which he has deluded himself into will never go away. It isn’t until nearly at the end of the poem that the
The Raven would have to be Poe’s greatest and most well known poem. With two of his fiancés dying of tuberculosis, this poem resembles the pain and insane-type qualities of the main character that he shared with Poe. The main character is mourning the loss of his beloved Lenore, resembling Poe’s loss of his three fiancés. The raven constantly mutters “nevermore” meaning that the narrator will never see his beloved Lenore, sending him into a depressing tailspin. Poe experienced a similar pain, using alcoholism to escape from all his pain and torment.
“The Raven” expresses Poe’s grief at the loss of Virginia Clemm portrayed as Lenore. He was distraught and tried “to borrow / From… books surcease of sorrow… for the lost Lenore” (lines 9-10). Poe could not get over the death of
“Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before.” (Edgar Allan Poe: The Raven) Another common topic in his writing was the theme of revenge. A recurring topic in his literature is the alcoholism. He wrote about that because in real life he was an alcoholic and drunk for a lot of his life. The event
Possibly the most significant use of personification instituted in "The Raven" comes from the communication between a raven and the speaker. He, the speaker, is mourning the loss of his love, Lenore. The raven, black in color, signifying death and grief, serves as a never-ending remembrance of the loss of his love Lenore. Throughout the raven's presence, the speaker is asking where Lenore is and if he will see her again. Again and again, the bird replies monotonously, "Nevermore".