Gabriela Tovar

00118188
Think Piece # C2
04-09-2018

Poe’s Style and its Influence on the Reader’s Emotions

When I started reading “The Raven”, I was trying to keep track of my emotions and
overall how I felt about the poem. Parting from this, I came to these verses: “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 named
Lenore – / Nameless here for evermore” (9-12). What they caused in me was a huge sense of
sadness and nostalgia. The narrator is living a depressed life; he uses books as a way of not
remembering his significant other, that is Lenore. He has got some memories about her, but
as soon as they come out, he feels sad and repels them; she is therefore the one that cannot
be named. The way Poe he uses rhymes and repeats words like “sorrow” and “Lenore”,
seem to me as a way of enhancing his feelings of loss and hopelessness, and personally I felt
very sorry and sad about it.
In the following lines I found myself more anxious and tense rather sad about the
narrator. As he continues to repeat words such as “tapping” and “rapping” and “nothing
more” (20-40) while describing the opening of the front door and discovering nothing
outside, it contributed to the tension and even incremented an odd feeling in myself. This got
worse when the narrator finally encounters the raven. This raven comes out of nowhere and
would not say anything but “nevermore” no matter what the narrator would ask him (38-
105). In addition, when the narrator says “`Wretch,’ I cried, `thy God hath lent thee – by
these angels he has sent thee / Respite – respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore!
/ Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe, and forget this lost Lenore!” (81-84), I understood that
he is begging the bird to help him to erase the pain somehow, as it is too much to handle.
When I came to this part I felt hurt, as I had been the one who lost Lenore myself. As the
description is too emotional, you get to lament the loss as well, but also become a bit
desperate as the narrator to find an answer.
The arrival of the raven gives a little hope to the narrator, and to me as well at least
for a short time. We can see this on the verses where he asks the bird: “Tell this soul with
sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn, / It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels
named Lenore – / Clasp a rare and radiant maiden, whom the angels named Lenore?” (93-
95). We know that Lenore is dead, but if we get an answer from the raven that she at least
made to Heaven, we could feel somehow better. I, myself, could have felt a little better about
the narrator and his significant one at least. However, this does not happen, because the
Raven answers as the same way he always does: “Nevermore” (96). He becomes a constant
reminder of the misery and hopelessness of the narrator. Therefore this made me feel sad and
more sorry about him, as his soul “shall be lifted – nevermore” (108).

Word Count: 536

Works Cited

Poe, Edgar. “The Raven”. American Literature

Compendium, 4th ed. Ed. Scott Gibson. Quito: Universidad San Francisco de Quito,
2018, 95-97.