Edward Rybak
Professor Bessenbacher
English M01B
15 April 2015
The Dichotomy of Death
In “The Raven,” by Edger Allen Poe, the speaker is driven to madness as a result of essentially lamenting over the death of his beloved Lenore. This theme of meditating on death also runs through out John Keats “Ode to a Nightingale.” Although the central theme of these two poems is in essence based upon the same subject, the perspectives taken by the two authors are so immensely different that they demand an entirely different reaction from the reader.
Both poems make use of symbolism to great effect. The use of birds in order symbolize concepts that are crucial to human existence is clear in both pieces. In the Raven Poe uses the imagery of the Raven to …show more content…
This was a common practice of writers throughout the Romantic era. For example, in “Ode to a Nightingale,” Keats makes reference to “Lethe” (Keats 4). A mythological river in the Greek underworld (Hades) and when souls would drink from the river Lethe it would cause them to lose their memory. Keats mentions Greek mythology in the fourth Stanza of his poem, “Not charioted by Bacchus and his pards” (Bacchus). Bacchus is the God of wine and the grape harvest he was worshiped widely from 1500-1100 B.C.E. What Keats is saying here is that he will not be with the nightingale through drinking. He goes on to say “But on the viewless wings of Poesy,” meaning he will be with the Nightingale through his poetry (Keats 33). Poe too makes use of alluding to Greek mythology as well. In the first line of the third stanza just as the speaker sits down to read an old book in order to keep his mind off of his late lover Lenore, the stately raven shutters in to his home and the ominous creature quickly perches itself upon a bust of Pallas, the goddess of wisdom in Greek mythology. This is a deliberate choice by Poe to contrast the robotic mindless, nature of the raven who has only one line available to it “Nevermore” with the Goddess of wisdom (Poe). There is also an extended simile in lines 3-4. Opium leads the speaker to lose his memory his latter mention of the river lethe is the extension of the …show more content…
Ode to a Nightingale follows an iambic meter pattern of A,B,A,B,C,D,E. “The Raven” follows a giving the mood of the poem a softer, more fluid sense of what the author is trying to convey, It flows like a brook in the middle of a June, easy, gentle, like the touch of a lovers hand across you chest, or a mother holding her child for the first time. Rhyming Trochaic Octameter (A,B,C,B,B,B) Gives the poem a more ridging sense one that keep you on the edge and jumping out of your skin every time the dreaded words come around again “Nevermore” It is as if you can not escape the terrible end those two chilling words never more. Its repetitiveness ensures that is sticks with you long after you reach the final line of the eighth
Professor Bessenbacher
English M01B
15 April 2015
The Dichotomy of Death
In “The Raven,” by Edger Allen Poe, the speaker is driven to madness as a result of essentially lamenting over the death of his beloved Lenore. This theme of meditating on death also runs through out John Keats “Ode to a Nightingale.” Although the central theme of these two poems is in essence based upon the same subject, the perspectives taken by the two authors are so immensely different that they demand an entirely different reaction from the reader.
Both poems make use of symbolism to great effect. The use of birds in order symbolize concepts that are crucial to human existence is clear in both pieces. In the Raven Poe uses the imagery of the Raven to …show more content…
This was a common practice of writers throughout the Romantic era. For example, in “Ode to a Nightingale,” Keats makes reference to “Lethe” (Keats 4). A mythological river in the Greek underworld (Hades) and when souls would drink from the river Lethe it would cause them to lose their memory. Keats mentions Greek mythology in the fourth Stanza of his poem, “Not charioted by Bacchus and his pards” (Bacchus). Bacchus is the God of wine and the grape harvest he was worshiped widely from 1500-1100 B.C.E. What Keats is saying here is that he will not be with the nightingale through drinking. He goes on to say “But on the viewless wings of Poesy,” meaning he will be with the Nightingale through his poetry (Keats 33). Poe too makes use of alluding to Greek mythology as well. In the first line of the third stanza just as the speaker sits down to read an old book in order to keep his mind off of his late lover Lenore, the stately raven shutters in to his home and the ominous creature quickly perches itself upon a bust of Pallas, the goddess of wisdom in Greek mythology. This is a deliberate choice by Poe to contrast the robotic mindless, nature of the raven who has only one line available to it “Nevermore” with the Goddess of wisdom (Poe). There is also an extended simile in lines 3-4. Opium leads the speaker to lose his memory his latter mention of the river lethe is the extension of the …show more content…
Ode to a Nightingale follows an iambic meter pattern of A,B,A,B,C,D,E. “The Raven” follows a giving the mood of the poem a softer, more fluid sense of what the author is trying to convey, It flows like a brook in the middle of a June, easy, gentle, like the touch of a lovers hand across you chest, or a mother holding her child for the first time. Rhyming Trochaic Octameter (A,B,C,B,B,B) Gives the poem a more ridging sense one that keep you on the edge and jumping out of your skin every time the dreaded words come around again “Nevermore” It is as if you can not escape the terrible end those two chilling words never more. Its repetitiveness ensures that is sticks with you long after you reach the final line of the eighth