“Annabel Lee” was Edgar Allen Poe's final finished poem, penned in 1849. In a scant 41 lines Poe manages to incorporate his principal themes of Beauty and sadness as the foundation of the poem, as it's about the death of a beautiful woman and the grief his narrator feels for her passing. This grief drives the narrator to near madness, as he refuses to leave her side even after she's entombed. The journey Poe takes readers on in Annabel Lee is to realize his two primary objectives in writing it: the illumination of eternal love, and a demonstration of complete devotion. The first lines of the poem set the tone: “It was many and many a year ago /In a kingdom by the sea...”(102). The first line is very close to “Once upon a time”, and evokes a mythical feeling, a transportation to the unknown. The second is the destination, which sets up a feeling of colossal space, both in the depth of the ocean and in distance. I remember visiting the ocean as a child, the sea wind cool on my face, and the magnificent majesty of the immense sea. I believe this
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These events occur in stanzas 3 and 4, and are the setup for his second primary objective in stanza 5. Neither angels nor demons “Can ever dissever my soul from the soul/Of the beautiful Annabel Lee” (103). The narrator decides that he's going to spend eternity by her side, never leaving. My take on this is that it becomes a suicide, because if the narrator never leaves he'll surely die. Not so far-fetched. Many examples of this kind of devotion can be found. When my grandfather Roe died, my grandmother pined so badly for him she passed within two weeks. There was a picture of him on the mantle and she would sit and stare at it for hours, weeping. She never left his side figuratively, and I'm sure if she'd had the chance she would have preferred to sit alongside him in a
These events occur in stanzas 3 and 4, and are the setup for his second primary objective in stanza 5. Neither angels nor demons “Can ever dissever my soul from the soul/Of the beautiful Annabel Lee” (103). The narrator decides that he's going to spend eternity by her side, never leaving. My take on this is that it becomes a suicide, because if the narrator never leaves he'll surely die. Not so far-fetched. Many examples of this kind of devotion can be found. When my grandfather Roe died, my grandmother pined so badly for him she passed within two weeks. There was a picture of him on the mantle and she would sit and stare at it for hours, weeping. She never left his side figuratively, and I'm sure if she'd had the chance she would have preferred to sit alongside him in a