A summary of a classic poem

'Why is a raven like a writing desk?' This was the riddle posed by the Mad Hatter in Lewis Carroll's 1865 book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Probably the most famous solution proposed to this riddle (for the riddle has never been answered with a definitive solution) is: 'Because Poe wrote on both.' 'The Raven' is undoubtedly Edgar Allan Poe'due south most famous poem. It was start published nether Poe's proper noun in January 1845, and has been popular ever since. Information technology is the simply literary work to inspire the name of a sporting team (the American Football squad the Baltimore Ravens). According to Poe himself, in a after work of literary analysis, if he hadn't had a modify of heart we might well be reading a poem called, not 'The Raven', but 'The Parrot'. The poem is so famous, so widely anthologised, that perhaps a closer analysis of its features and linguistic communication is necessary to strip away some of our preconceptions about it. Start, here is the verse form.

The Raven

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore—
While I nodded, most napping, all of a sudden in that location came a borer,
As of some ane gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
''Tis some visitor,' I muttered, 'tapping at my sleeping room door—
Merely this and cipher more.'

Ah, distinctly I think it was in the dour Dec;
And each split up dying ember wrought its ghost upon the flooring.
Eagerly I wished the morrow;—vainly I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow—sorrow for the lost Lenore—
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore—
Nameless here for evermore.

And the silken, sad, uncertain rustling of each royal pall
Thrilled me—filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that at present, to still the chirapsia of my heart, I stood repeating
''Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door—
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door;—
This it is and nothing more.'

Before long my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,
'Sir,' said I, 'or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore;
Merely the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,
And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my sleeping accommodation door,
That I scarce was sure I heard yous'—here I opened wide the door;—
Darkness there and nothing more.

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood at that place wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before;
Only the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token,
And the but word at that place spoken was the whispered word, 'Lenore?'
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, 'Lenore!'—
But this and nil more.

Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,
Soon once more I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.
'Surely,' said I, 'surely that is something at my window lattice;
Let me come across, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore—
Allow my heart be yet a moment and this mystery explore;—
'Tis the air current and nothing more!'

Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly days of yore;
Not the least obeisance made he; non a minute stopped or stayed he;
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched to a higher place my chamber door—
Perched upon a bosom of Pallas just above my chamber door—
Perched, and sabbatum, and nil more.

Then this ebony bird beguiling my deplorable fancy into smiling,
Past the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,
'Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,' I said, 'art sure no chicken,
Ghastly grim and aboriginal Raven wandering from the Nightly shore—
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Dark's Plutonian shore!'
Quoth the Raven 'Nevermore.'

Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so manifestly,
Though its reply little meaning—fiddling relevancy bore;
For we cannot assistance agreeing that no living human being
Ever all the same was blessed with seeing bird above his sleeping accommodation door—
Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his bedchamber door,
With such proper name equally 'Nevermore.'

Just the Raven, sitting solitary on the placid bust, spoke only
That one word, as if his soul in that one give-and-take he did outpour.
Nothing farther and so he uttered—not a feather and so he fluttered—
Till I scarcely more muttered 'Other friends have flown before—
On the morrow he volition leave me, as my Hopes have flown before.'
And then the bird said 'Nevermore.'

Startled at the stillness broken by reply and so aptly spoken,
'Doubtless,' said I, 'what it utters is its only stock and store
Caught from some unhappy master whom bestial Disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore—
Till the dirges of his Promise that melancholy burden diameter
Of "Never—nevermore".'

But the Raven all the same fallacious all my fancy into smiling,
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird, and bust and door;
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking
Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore—
What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore
Meant in croaking 'Nevermore.'

This I sabbatum engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing
To the fowl whose fiery eyes at present burned into my bosom's core;
This and more I saturday divining, with my caput at ease reclining
On the absorber's velvet lining that the lamp-lite gloated o'er,
Just whose velvet-violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o'er,
She shall press, ah, nevermore!

Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer
Swung by Seraphim whose pes-falls tinkled on the tufted floor.
'Wretch,' I cried, 'thy God hath lent thee—by these angels he hath sent thee
Respite—respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore;
Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe and forget this lost Lenore!'
Quoth the Raven 'Nevermore.'

'Prophet!' said I, 'thing of evil!—prophet still, if bird or devil!—
Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee hither ashore,
Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted—
On this home by Horror haunted—tell me truly, I implore—
Is there—is there balm in Gilead?—tell me—tell me, I implore!'
Quoth the Raven 'Nevermore.'

'Prophet!' said I, 'matter of evil!—prophet yet, if bird or devil!
By that Heaven that bends above us—by that God nosotros both adore—
Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the afar Aidenn,
It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore—
Squeeze a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels proper noun Lenore.'
Quoth the Raven 'Nevermore.'

'Be that discussion our sign of parting, bird or fiend!' I shrieked, upstarting—
'Go thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore!
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Get out my loneliness unbroken!—quit the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my centre, and take thy form from off my door!'
Quoth the Raven 'Nevermore.'

And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, nonetheless is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas simply higher up my sleeping room door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon'due south that is dreaming,
And the lamp-lite o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the flooring;
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall exist lifted—nevermore!

First, a brief summary of 'The Raven'. The unnamed narrator (we can telephone call him a narrator equally 'The Raven' just about qualifies as a narrative poem) sits upward late ane December night, mourning the loss of his beloved, Lenore, when a raven appears at the window and speaks the repeated single word, 'Nevermore'. The narrator starts to view the raven as some sort of prophet. Throughout the verse form, the narrator sits and ponders the pregnant of the raven, and asks information technology questions, such as whether he will exist see his dear Lenore again in heaven, but the bird only responds enigmatically each time, 'Nevermore'. In the end, the narrator demands that the raven exit him lone, but it replies once again, 'Nevermore.'

Poe credited 2 main literary works in the genesis and composition of 'The Raven': he got the idea of the raven from Charles Dickens'due south novel Barnaby Rudge (whose title grapheme has a pet raven, Grip – the aforementioned name of Dickens's own pet raven in real life), and he borrowed the metre for his poem from Elizabeth Barrett Browning's poem 'Lady Geraldine's Courting'. Hither is a stanza from Barrett Browning's poem:

Dear my friend and fellow-student, I would lean my spirit o'er yous:
Down the royal of this bedchamber, tears should scarcely run at will:
I am humbled who was apprehensive! Friend,—I bow my head earlier you!
Yous should lead me to my peasants!—but their faces are also still.

The metre of this poem, and of Poe's 'The Raven', is relatively rare in English-linguistic communication verse: trochaic octameter. (Trochaic because the stress falls on the commencement syllable in each pes, and then 'Honey my friend and fellow student', and 'In one case upwardson a midnight dreary'; octameter because at that place are 8 feet in each line, then 'Once upon a midnight dreary, while I swimmingered, weak and weary'. Simply Poe added something to this rhythm, past including internal rhyme in each stanza of 'The Raven':

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious book of forgotten lore—
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some ane gently rapping, rapping at my bedroom door.
"'Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my chamber door—
Only this and goose egg more."

And then although each stanza of 'The Raven' is rhymed abcbbb, with the 'ore' rhyme being abiding throughout the poem, the a and c rhymes are complemented by a mid-line rhyme: dreary/weary, napping/tapping. This makes 'The Raven' the perfect poem for reading aloud on a dark, wintry night – but it as well arguably underscores the poem'due south focus on speech, and on the talking raven that provides the refrain, and final word, of many of the poem'south stanzas. 'Nevermore' rhymes with the expressionless honey of the poem's narrator, Lenore, but it is also an inherently 'poetic' plough of phrase to end a poem (or successive stanzas of a poem): compare Hardy's 'never once more', or Edward Thomas's, or Tennyson's 'the days that are no more'. The word 'Nevermore', like 'never again' and 'no more', evokes finality, something gone from us that will not be regained: time, our youth, a lost lover. Whether Lenore in 'The Raven' is the narrator's dead beloved – possibly even his wife – is non spelt out in the poem, leaving united states of america not so much to analyse every bit to speculate upon that betoken. But the broader point remains: a door has closed that will not be opened once more.

As nosotros mentioned at the outset of this analysis, in that location is reason to believe that Poe originally planned to have a parrot, rather than a raven, utter the refrain 'Nevermore' in the poem. In his 'Philosophy of Limerick', he wrote that in his mind at that place 'arose the thought of a non-reasoning creature capable of speech communication; and very naturally, a parrot, in the first instance, suggested itself, but was superseded forthwith by a Raven, as equally capable of spoken language.' Whether Poe was but retrospectively having us on, or whether he was being genuine here, the parrot does seem the natural selection for a bird capable of mimicking human speech, and Poe implies that he soon dropped the idea of writing a poem called 'The Parrot'. Ravens are closely associated with omens and with the dead: it had to exist 'The Raven'.

Paradigm: John Tenniel, 'The Raven', public domain.