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Analysis Of The Raven By Edgar Allan Poe

Decent Essays

Kinnedy Kriso
Audrey Holod
English 106-3107
30 October 2017
Edgar Allan Poe(m): Formalist Approach
In Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven”, the speaker grows mentally unstable over the loss of his love. Poe’s poem has many references to death and popular mythology through the speaker and raven. The speaker has lost his beloved Lenore which in turn drives him mad. The speaker and the raven begin a narration, both using cryptic language. The speaker’s grief manifests itself into a conversation with the raven. The poem “The Raven,” by Edgar Allan Poe creates powerful language and symbolic character placement to bring forward how powerful grief is. The speaker’s narration and Poe’s use of language and symbolism shows how this poem continues to be iconic literature. “The Raven,” highly symbolizes death and grief, which is expertly written by Poe; the importance of knowing these symbolic and language is an attempt to recognize the importance of death.
Poe uses trochaic octameter to write “The Raven,” which stresses syllables and pairs in eights. He manipulates the octameter and language, creating his own dark rhyme scheme. Using this type of rhyme scheme adds to the creative language, an example, “’ Tis some visitor,’ I muttered, ‘tapping at my chamber door-/ Only this, and nothing more’” (lines 5-6). Using this octameter adds to the haunting rhyme of “The Raven”. The poem attaches melody and simple rhyme scheme adding to the speaker’s grief. The rhyme scheme adds to the importance of language along with small references: Poe references an ancient Greek drug, “… Respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore! / Quaff, oh quaff this kind of nepenthe and forget this lost Lenore!” (lines 82-83). The reference to nepenthe in “The Raven,” is used by the speaker to forget his grief and Lenore, commonly used in ancient Greece as an anti-depressant. The use of language from Poe is always mysterious, but he uses little terms or phrases to intensify his stories. Nepenthe is an educational Easter egg to show the reader how devastated the speaker is over his grief, referencing to anti-depressants. Not only did Poe reference Greek mythology, he also uses the phrase: nights plutonian shore. Nights plutonian shore is a nod to roman

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