The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe Rhetorical Essay

The Raven is a narrative styled poem by popular poet Poe. It is a brilliant expression of loss and the musings of the narrator about his loss are simply enchanting. The simple musicality and a sense of the supernatural theme contained in the narration are engulfing.

The flow of the poem is vividly described step by step explaining in detail every single action of the narrator. The poem manages to show the untold devotion the narrator has to a love one who has already left him. The raven that visits him briefly makes his mind deviate from the mourning but he soon resumes his old sadness (Gerald 92).

A poem that deals with family relationships and explain the poem’s meaning

The poem is heavily based on the relationship between the narrator and Lenore with their affection being the subject of the whole poem. The narrator is presumably mourning the loss of Lenore and assumes that the raven was an angel sent to comfort him during his grief. The poem describes the sad state of the narrator and describes how the presence of the bird on his window brings him joy.

The narrator is just indoors almost napping but is awaken by a wrapping on his door that turns out to be just the wind. He most probably created the wrapping on his door by thinking, but then the raven tapping on his window turns out to be real (Gerald 88).

He is momentarily relieved of his mourning as he indulges the raven. He happens to think that the bird can talk and claims that the only answer the bird has given is the word nevermore.

This response does not go well with the narrator since he asks the bird more questions and when the raven replies nevermore to whether the narrator is going to reunite with Lenore in heaven the narrator is infuriated. The speaker is essential to the point of view from which the poem is written.

The poem has a sad tone which is the general atmosphere of sadness that characterizes the personal life journey of Poe. He faced a lot of challenges in his life and it seems he was accustomed to being sad. His father abandoned them when he was young and his relationship with his step father was a struggle.

He never managed to finish college because he was a drunk and used to gamble. Even life with his relatives did not work out for him.

This vicious cycle of sadness never left him and after the failure of his first two marriages he married Virginia. This marriage was first done in secret since she was his cousin and in addition thirteen years of age making her a minor. Furthermore, it expresses the unending devotion that the narrator has for a loved one they have lost.

It is also a mourning poem like a dirge that never ends. The mournful tone could also be as result of the narrator’s grief due to his mother’s Eliza Poe’s death (Gerald, 72).

Analyze a love and death poem relating it to both the cultural time in which it was written and the present.

The poem describes the narrator’s deep anguish after losing a loved one. This deep feeling of loss can only result from deeper feelings of love. The strong bond that the love causes is the reason as to why the narrator is so saddened by his loss. He keeps thinking that the person who left them is going to come back hence when he hears a knock he assumes that it is Lenore.

The way the knock on the door is described as gentle and his response in a sure manner shows his anticipation that Lenore will return to him. The arrival of the bird makes him excited that he will hear from Lenore. The narrator even seems happy for a moment when the bird is there (Robert 99).

The death of Lenore seems to have devastated the narrator because his current mental state is questionable. He thinks that the bird has been sent from the afterlife with a message from Lenore. He even believes that the bird can speak and when it responds unfavorably to his question he gets agitated.

Select one of Edgar Allan Poe’s and Emily Frost’s poems. Analyze it and explain why it is representative of their work

The poem is composed of eighteen stanzas each of which has five lines. It uses a lot of rhyme within and without the stanzas, for instance the more, evermore and nevermore. It also has a lot of alliteration in the lines one is rapping, tapping and napping.

There is an extensive use of repletion as the word nevermore has been repeated to end the stanzas. The main theme is death that describes loss and mourning and best represented by the sad tone maintained through out the poem (Gerald, 70).

The Raven was Poe’s first work that made him popular and the way he wrote it to satisfy both the classical readers and seasonal readers. This work made Poe a household name in American literature. The work encompasses Poe’s literary skills since he wrote both poems and narratives.

This is a poem that was written in narrative style but contains poem properties. The description is as a narrative but the literary work is done in stanzas and lines just like a poem. This poem shows Poe’s ability to combine his creative abilities to come up with a brilliant work of art (Robert 101).

Works Cited

Gerald, Kennedy. A Historical Guide to Edgar Allan Poe. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2001. Print.

Robert, Regan. Poe: A Collection of Critical Essays. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice- Hall, 2007. Print.