Edgar Allen Poe's Poem, The Raven
Edgar Allen Poe is a creative, brilliant minded man who writes extraordinary pieces. A common question is whether the Raven in the poem, The Raven, is real or of the imagination of the narrator. With crucial evidence of the fatigue, grief, referencing and symbolism, it shows the Raven, is mere of the imagination.
In the beginning, the narrator is fatigued while he sits in his chamber. Poe wrote, “While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping.” He wants the reader to understand the circumstances that the narrator is in. Sleepiness can cause hallucinations of the mind. The narrator heard a small noise, possibly in a dream, that he turned into a reality.
Thereafter, the narrator speaks of his love, Lenore. The tragedy of her death …show more content…
Isn’t a definition of madness doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results? “Other friends have flown before- on the morrow, he will leave.” Poe is telling the reader that the narrator has lost everyone else in his life. The narrator uses the word “flown” as a comparison to his old friends. His “friends” are his insanity but they keep leaving, but not the Raven, he will leave him “nevermore.”
Finally, on a symbolic level, the bird could be represented as the devil antagonizing the narrator. The narrator asks him if he is a messenger from the “Night's Plutonian shore.” Pluto is another name for Hades, god of the underworld. Thus showing that the narrator is thinking about nonsense. Besides that, ravens are typically known as evil birds and damned in the Bible.
To conclude, in Edgar Allen Poe’s poem, The Raven, the narrator creates the bird from his imagination. With the combination of fatigue, grief, the way he refers things, and the apparent symbolism of the Raven, it becomes quite clear that the Raven is solely of the imagination. Whether in grief or in joy, the mind flows crazy
In the beginning, the narrator is fatigued while he sits in his chamber. Poe wrote, “While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping.” He wants the reader to understand the circumstances that the narrator is in. Sleepiness can cause hallucinations of the mind. The narrator heard a small noise, possibly in a dream, that he turned into a reality.
Thereafter, the narrator speaks of his love, Lenore. The tragedy of her death …show more content…
Isn’t a definition of madness doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results? “Other friends have flown before- on the morrow, he will leave.” Poe is telling the reader that the narrator has lost everyone else in his life. The narrator uses the word “flown” as a comparison to his old friends. His “friends” are his insanity but they keep leaving, but not the Raven, he will leave him “nevermore.”
Finally, on a symbolic level, the bird could be represented as the devil antagonizing the narrator. The narrator asks him if he is a messenger from the “Night's Plutonian shore.” Pluto is another name for Hades, god of the underworld. Thus showing that the narrator is thinking about nonsense. Besides that, ravens are typically known as evil birds and damned in the Bible.
To conclude, in Edgar Allen Poe’s poem, The Raven, the narrator creates the bird from his imagination. With the combination of fatigue, grief, the way he refers things, and the apparent symbolism of the Raven, it becomes quite clear that the Raven is solely of the imagination. Whether in grief or in joy, the mind flows crazy