Milly Pnotporn Jantarakolica

Mr. Jamie
English 11
29 May, 2017

The Journey of Edgar Allan Poe

Edgar Allan Poe is one of the great poets of the 19th century. Before he became

successful, he had endured many obstacles. His mother died, and his father left him, when he

was only three. His brother and sister were separated from him and he was sent to live with

John and France Allan, successful tobacco merchants. (Edgar Allan Poe, 2017) Although

they took good care of him and raised him as if he was their son, conflict emerged when Poe

held no interest in carrying out their business. The situation worsened when Poe went to

study at University of Virginia, and John Allan only gave him a third of the money he

needed. Poe gambled it away, in an attempt to get more. (Biography, n.d.) Not only this, he

returned home and discovered that his fiance had become engaged to someone else.

Devastated, Poe moved to Boston to live with his aunt Maria Clemm and her daughter

Virginia. He began publishing short stories and poems in magazines. He fell in love with and

married Virginia, his thirteen year old cousin. Things went well for thirteen years, until

Virginia developed tuberculosis for another five years and died. Poe suffered for a long

period of time and was not able to write poems. As time passed by, he was then engaged to

his first fiance, Sara Elmira Royster, now a widow. Poe died travelling, the cause is still a

mystery. The death of his mother and wife, and the marriage of his fiance to another man,

all had a huge impact on his life, and resulted in the gloomy tone of his poems. It seems

likely that these misfortunes influenced him to write poems about the deaths of beautiful

women.

The Raven, possibly Poes most well-known poem, relates directly to Virginias

sickness. The poem is about a man trying to forget a girl named Lenore, who is his lost love.

He spends time reading books in order to forget her, but is unable to do it. Despite this, he

keeps hearing whispers of her name and knockings on the door, and tries to believe that it is

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just a visitor visiting him. He opens the door and finds no one. From this he panics a bit, but

reassures himself that it was just the wind passing by. Towards the end of the poem, the raven

arrives and he speaks to it. He is obsessed with thoughts of Lenore. He thinks that God has

sent this raven to help him forget Lenore, but the raven replies with nevermore. He keeps

asking the raven questions and its answers are always nevermore. Lastly, he asks the raven

if he will ever embrace Lenore again. Same answer as usual: nevermore. He gets mad and

he tells the raven to get lost. (The Raven, n.d.) Throughout Poes life, he had been through

rough circumstances and this is shown in parts of his poem. The first line of The Raven

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary, has a gloomy tone. Using

the word midnight, it is the darkest part of the day. Dreary has a depressive meaning, and

weak and weary both have negative feelings. Another part of the poem And the silken, sad,

uncertain rustling of each purple curtain states that even the sound of the curtain moving

seems sad to him. This poem was written and published during the time when Virginia had

tuberculosis. This is one of the reasons he wrote sad poems. Since his wife was sick, Poes

feelings were in pain and he used it to create this poem. He started to drink a lot to relieve the

pain until this poem gave him fame. Although he earned a lot of money as a result of this

poem, he was not able to earn enough money to support her. (Edgar Allan Poe Biography,

2017) The supporting quote from the poem shows that he is mad when the raven stated that

he would not be able to embrace Lenore again which is how he felt about Virginia. He knows

that she has tuberculosis, but he is unable to help her or do anything for her.

Ulalume is written during the same period as The Raven which is when Poe was

facing the circumstances mentioned in the previous paragraph. The poem begins with The

skies they were ashen and sober;/ The leaves they were crispd and sere/

The leaves they were withering and sere; which states a gloomy tone. Ashen has a meaning

of gray which is a sad color and sober is to cry and whimper. The leaves were crispd, sere,

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and withering showing that it is very dry and it is about to die, symbolizing lifelessness. At

the beginning of the poem, the speaker is walking with his soul, named Psyche. He is very

active. However, he is not able to remember where he is and what time it is. Psyche and the

speaker then see a light pass by, where he argues that it is a goddess coming to save them

while Psyche believes that is an evil sign. Towards the end of the poem, the speaker bumps

into a tomb. He then realizes that in the tomb was Ulalume, his lost love. In this stage of the

poem, he remembers their anniversary date and that he was in this place to bury her last year.

Psyche and the speaker now wonder what the light they saw was and were upset about it.

(Ulalume, n.d.) By creating an amnesia narrator, it reflects that Poe would also like to

suppress the memory that his wife was sick. Then my heart it grew ashen and sober / As the

leaves that were crispd and sere/ As the leaves that were withering and sere, This part is

a repetition of the first part of the poem. By changing the subject of the sentence from leaves

to heart, it emphasizes that the things he sees on the beginning do actually have a big impact

with his true feelings. Moreover, it links how Poe describes the mood of the poem to meet his

gloominess. This reflects how Poe felt after he accepted the fact that Virginia had

tuberculosis and she would not be able to live with him.

Annabel Lee, Poes last poem, relates to Virginia after she had died from

tuberculosis. The poem starts off with the narrator having a long lost love named Annabel

Lee. He claims that they both loved one another when they were young and that they were

truly in love despite their youth. By stating this, With a love that the winged seraphs of

heaven / Coveted her and me., he tries to interpret that his love towards Annabel Lee was so

much that it made the angels jealous. A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling/ My beautiful

Annabel Lee;/ So that her highborn kinsman came/ And bore her away from me,/ To shut her

up in a sepulcher/ In this kingdom by the sea. He then sets the mood of the poem to become

gloomy and shows that her family took her away from him and shut her up in a tomb before

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Annabel Lee dies. He blames that the angels make her sick and eventually kill her which

represents a negative and darkness feelings. By the end of the poem, he ends up sleeping in

her tomb every night because he really loves her. (Annabel Lee, n.d.) Annabel Lee was

published after Edgar Allan Poe died. This poem is written after his wife died and Edgar

Allan Poe struggled during those times and wasnt able to write for a while. It resulted in him

becoming drunk, and he became ill. Annabel Lee relates to Edgars wife who died when he

was still alive. Of my darling--my darling--my life and my bride, This particular part of the

poem shows that Annabel Lee is an essential support and comfort, losing her was a big lost to

him and it affected him exceedingly, just like how Poe lost Virginia.

In Edgar Allan Poes poetry, it can be seen that theme relating to loss and beautiful

women were influenced by his lifes situations. The fact that his mother died when he was

young and his father abandoned him left him hanging off on his own. His fiance leaving him

to marry another guy hurt his feelings terribly. After he was able to find a comfort zone with

Virginia, she developed tuberculosis and died. His tremendous loss affected his emotions and

how he wrote his poems. His life issues helped him develop the theme of his poems.

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Bibliography

Annabel Lee. (n.d.). Retrieved May 24, 2017, from shmoop:

http://www.shmoop.com/annabel-lee/

Biography. (n.d.). Retrieved May 24, 2017 , from POE MUSEUM :

http://www.poemuseum.org/poes-biography

Edgar Allan Poe. (2017). Retrieved May 24, 2017, from Biography.com:

http://www.biography.com/people/edgar-allan-poe-9443160

Edgar Allan Poe Biography. (2017). Retrieved May 24, 2017, from Encyclopedia of World

Biography : http://www.notablebiographies.com/Pe-Pu/Poe-Edgar-Allan.html

The Raven. (n.d.). Retrieved May 24, 2017, from shmoop: http://www.shmoop.com/the-

raven/summary.html

Ulalume. (n.d.). Retrieved May 24, 2017, from shmoop:

http://www.shmoop.com/ulalume/poem-text.html