Edgar Allan Poe is known as one of America’s most famous poets. His poems were typically based on chilling imagery such as death, decay, supernatural powers and worldly evil, and looking into Edgar’s life, one could say that he wrote his poems based on his own life experiences. For instance, the fact that he lost most of the females close to his heart, are reflected in most of his poems, mainly by the death of a beautiful maiden. A short biography on Poe talked a little about a part of Poe’s troubled background, “Poe’s father, David Poe, Jr., a traveling actor of Irish descent, was neither talented nor responsible, the family suffered financially. After apparently separating from David Poe, Elizabeth died in Richmond, Virginia, in 1811.”(May).
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In this poem, Poe says that Death has reared himself a throne, thereby personifying death. He talks about a city which lies beneath the seas where everyone goes for eternal rest after they die. Here, Poe disregards the popular western myth that there is an afterlife where those who die rich remain rich because it is assumed that they die with their riches. In this city, everyone goes to the same place regardless of who they were before death. Death sits as a ruler of this city lapped by the melancholy water of the sea. The city is described as completely dim as the only source of faint light is given by the seas. Poe paints beautiful scenery to make the readers more relaxed so as to feel at peace but soon, he reminds his readers that all this beauty is long forgotten and it now lies beneath the sea as death watches from his proud tower. The next stanza continues to talk about how the city and sea is completely motionless and without soul. The sea without soul can be compared with decaying human body that lies within the city. Finally, towards the end the waves move. The towers of the City are inseparable from the sea as hell rises and swallow the whole city. Death had been ruling the city before hell took over after a thousand years, and so the devil owes respect to
In this poem, Poe says that Death has reared himself a throne, thereby personifying death. He talks about a city which lies beneath the seas where everyone goes for eternal rest after they die. Here, Poe disregards the popular western myth that there is an afterlife where those who die rich remain rich because it is assumed that they die with their riches. In this city, everyone goes to the same place regardless of who they were before death. Death sits as a ruler of this city lapped by the melancholy water of the sea. The city is described as completely dim as the only source of faint light is given by the seas. Poe paints beautiful scenery to make the readers more relaxed so as to feel at peace but soon, he reminds his readers that all this beauty is long forgotten and it now lies beneath the sea as death watches from his proud tower. The next stanza continues to talk about how the city and sea is completely motionless and without soul. The sea without soul can be compared with decaying human body that lies within the city. Finally, towards the end the waves move. The towers of the City are inseparable from the sea as hell rises and swallow the whole city. Death had been ruling the city before hell took over after a thousand years, and so the devil owes respect to