Survey and outline

ABOUT EDGAR ALLAN POE’SPOEMS.

Author: Víctor Antonio Vargas Gómez

SUBJECT: READING AND WRITING TECHNIQUES, GROUP A. | GERARDO BARRIOS UNIVERSITY
 Survey

 Title: The Raven and other poems.

 Subheadings:
1. Dreams.
2. The Lake.
3. Sonnet- to Science.
4. Alone.
5. Romance.
6. To Helen.
7. The Valley of Unrest.
8. The City in the Sea.
9. The Haunted Palace.
10. The Raven.

 Summary: welcome to the weird and intense world of Edgar Allan Poe. Inside you
will find darkness; terror lives here and so does unrest. From the immortal word of
The Raven to the mournful tomb of Annabel Lee, Poe’s work abound with eerie
thoughts and strange sensations. Read on and you will enter the heart of your
deepest nightmares.

 Introduction: how lucky you are, you who are about to read these poems for the first
time. I hope you read it when you are alone, at night as I did when I first came across
it. I hope your creeps and your skin crawls and the blood turns to ice in your veins. I
hope that your soul, like mine, will even afterward be in thrall to that sinister, solemn
word, The Raven’s one mysterious message: “Nevermore”

 The first and the last sentence through paragraphs:

1. The first poem tell us about a man who wishes his life were an eternal
dream, even when this long dream were hopeless sorrow, because his
trust on the hope, the hope which belongs to the youth.

2. This poem is about a person whose lot was to haunt a spot full of
incredible loneliness and even so, his solitary soul could make an Eden of
that dim lake.

3. The poem is about science, the true daughter of Old Time thou art and
who alters all thing with his peering eyes. The narrator was wondering if
this science hadn’t torn him yet from the summer dream beneath the
tamarind tree.
 4. The poem is about a person who from childhood’s hours has not been as
others were and hasn’t seen as other saw. When the rest of the heavens
was blue, the cloud in his view took the form of a demon.

5. The net poem is about romance, who loves to nod and sing with drowsy
head and folded wing among the green leaves. By this place the narrator
a familiar bird which taught him the alphabet to say with a most knowing
eye. But unfortunately his dreaming-book will be ignored even by the
most experienced.

6. This poem is to Helen, whose beauty is to the poet like those Nicéan barks.
He considers her a Psyche from the regions which are holy land.

7. This poem is about a dell, where the people did not dwell and over the
lilies, there that wave, perennials tears descend in gems.

8. The following poem talks about death which has reared himself a throne
in a strange city lying alone, for down within the dim west. The hell, rising
from thousand thrones, shall do it reverence.

9. This poem is about a palace, which its head is reared in the greenest
valley. Out the palace, a hideous throng rush out forever and laugh.

10. The following poem is about a man who was inside of his house when he
heard a mysterious tapping. He went outside to receive this intriguing
visitor, it was a raven who entered and settled in a statue; this raven was
interrogated by the man but he just answered one word: nevermore. The
man continued asking but his visitor always answered the same until the
poor speaker started to lose his sanity.

 The conclusion: Edgar Allan Poe was a shadowy writer, who was surrounded by
loneliness and tragedy. He conveyed all those feelings in most of his texts. Most of
the poems written by him Poe are really frightening and only a few are brave enough
to read and experiment the deepest nightmares of a gloomy soul.

 Questions:
1. What is the title about?
2. Who is the author?
3. Who are the main characters of the poems?
4. What did the author want to express?
 (Outline)
The Raven and other Poems

I. Subheadings: Dreams
Thesis Statement: the poet dreams about an eternal dream.

A. Topic sentence:
1. Oh! That my young life were a lasting dream.
B. Secondary sentence:
1. My spirit not awakening till the beam of an eternity should bring the
morrow.
C. Conclusion part:
1. I have been happy, though but in a dream.

II. Subheadings: The Lake

Thesis Statement: the poet celebrates the solitude and sadness through the thoughts
inspired by a lake.

A. Topic sentence:
1. It was my lot to haunt of the wide earth a spot which I could not love
the less.
B. Secondary sentence:
1. My infant spirit would awake to the terror of the lone lake.
C. Conclusion part:
1. Death was in that poisoned lake and its gulf a fitting grave for him
who thence could solace bring to his dark imagining.

III. Subheadings: Alone

Thesis Statement: the protagonist feel surrounded by solitude.

A. Topic sentence:
1. From my childhood’s hour I have not been as others were.
B. Secondary sentence:
1. All I loved I loved it alone.
2. I could not awaken my heart to joy at the same tone.
C. Conclusion part:
1. When the rest of heaven was blue, the darkness came to mine.
IV. Subheadings: To Helen
Thesis Statement: Helen is a beautiful woman from the regions which are Holy-land.

A. Topic sentence:
1. Helen’s beauty is to me like those Nicéan barks of yore.
B. Secondary sentence:
1. On desperate seas, Helen's airs bring me home.
C. Conclusion part:
1. Helen is so lovely that she doesn't come from the common world.

V. Subheadings: The Raven

Thesis Statement: A raven come to the house.

A. Topic sentence:
1. While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a taping,

B. Secondary sentence:
1. Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door.

C. Conclusion part:
1. The man loses his sanity because he can get a clear answer from the
raven.
Mind Map