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"The Raven" is a narrative poem by American writer and poet Edgar Allan Poe first published in January 1845. Noted for its musicality, stylized language and supernatural atmosphere, it tells of a talking raven's mysterious visit to a distraught lover, tracing the lover's slow descent into madness. The lover, often assumed to be a student, is lamenting the loss of his love Lenore. The raven, sitting on a bust of Athena, seems to further instigate his distress with its repeated word, "Nevermore." Throughout, Poe makes allusions to folklore and various classical works.

Poe claims to have written the poem very logically and methodically. His intention was to create a poem that would appeal to both critical and popular tastes, as he explains in a follow-up essay "The Philosophy of Composition." The poem was inspired in part by a talking raven in the Barnaby Rudge: A Tale of the Riots of 'Eighty by Charles Dickens. Poe borrows the complex rhythm and meter of Elizabeth Barrett's poem "Lady Geraldine's Courtship."

The first publication of "The Raven" on January 29, 1845 in the New York Evening Mirror made Poe widely popular in his day. The poem was soon heavily reprinted, parodied, and illustrated. Though some critics disagree about the value of the poem, it remains one of the most famous poems ever written.

Overview

"The Raven" follows an unnamed narrator who sits reading "ancient lore" as a method to forget the loss of his love Lenore (the name was previously used in Poe's poem of the same name, "Lenore"). A "rapping at chamber door" reveals nothing, but excites his soul to "burning." A similar rapping, slightly louder, is heard at his window. When he goes to investigate, a raven steps into his chamber. Paying no attention to the man, the raven perches itself on a bust of Pallas, "perched, and sat, and nothing more."

The man, amused by the raven's comically serious disposition, demands that the bird tell him its name. The raven's only answer is "Nevermore." The narrator is actually surprised that the raven can talk, though it will not say anything further. He remarks that his "friend" the raven will soon fly out of his life, just as "other friends have flown before" along with his previous hopes. As if answering, the raven responds again with "Nevermore." The narrator is convinced that the word is all that the bird can say, possibly learned from a previous owner with bad luck.

Even so, the narrator pulls his chair directly in front of the raven, determined to learn more about it. He thinks for a moment, not saying anything, but his mind wanders back to his lost Lenore. He thinks the air grows denser and feels the presence of angels. Confused by the association of the angels with the bird, the narrator becomes angry, calling the raven a "thing of evil" and a "prophet." As he yells at the raven it only responds, "Nevermore." Finally, he asks the raven if Lenore is in heaven. When the raven responds with its typical "Nevermore," he shrieks and commands the raven to return to the "Plutonian shore," though it never moves. Presumably at the time of the poem's recitation by the narrator, the raven "still is sitting" on the bust of Pallas. The narrator's final admission is that his soul is trapped beneath the raven's shadow and shall be lifted "Nevermore."

Analysis

The narrator has a perverse conflict between desire to forget and desire to remember. In fact, he seems to get some pleasure from focusing on loss. The narrator assumes that the word "Nevermore" is the raven's "only stock and store" and yet he continues to ask it questions, knowing what the answer will be. His questions, then, are purposely self-deprecating and further incite his feelings of loss.

Allusions

The narrator is often assumed to be a young scholar. Though this is not explicitly stated in the poem, it is suggested by his reading books and by the image of the bust of Pallas which represents wisdom.

He sits in that bleak December reading over "many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore." Similar to the studies suggested in Poe's short story "Ligeia," this lore may be about the occult or black magic. This is emphasized in the author's choice to set the poem in December, a month when the forces of darkness are believed to be especially active. The use of the "devil bird" of the raven also suggests this. This devil image is emphasize by the narrator's belief that the raven is "from the Night's Plutonian shore," or a messenger from the afterlife, referring to Pluto, the Roman god of the underworld (also known as Hades in Greek mythology).

Poe's raven is thought to have been inspired by the raven Grip in Barnaby Rudge: A Tale of the Riots of 'Eighty by Charles Dickens. Dickens's bird had many words and comic turns, including the popping of a champagne cork, but Poe emphasized the bird's more dramatic qualities. Poe had written a review of Barnaby Rudge for Graham's Magazine saying, among other things, that the raven should have served a more symbolic prophetic purpose. At the end of the fifth chapter, Grip makes a noise and someone says, "What was that -- him tapping at the door?" The response is, "'Tis someone knocking softly at the shutter."

Poe may also have been drawing upon various references to ravens in mythology and folklore. In Norse mythology Odin possessed two ravens named Hugin and Munin representing thought and memory, just as Poe's raven. In Hebrew folklore, Noah sends a white raven to check conditions while on the ark and learns the floodwaters are beginning to dissipate, but does not immediately return with the news. It is punished by being turned black and being forced to forever feed on carrion. In Ovid's Metamorphoses, a raven also begins as white before Apollo punishes it by turning it black for delivering a message of a lover's unfaithfulness. The raven's role as a messenger in Poe's poem may draw from those stories.

Poe also mentions the Balm of Gilead, a reference to the Book of Jeremiah in the Bible: "Is there no balm in Gilead; is there no physician there? why then is not the health of the daughter of my people recovered? In that context, the Balm of Gilead is a resin used for medicinal purposes (suggesting, perhaps, that the narrator needs to be healed after the loss of Lenore). He also refers to "Aidenn," another word for the Garden of Eden, though Poe uses it to ask if Lenore has been accepted into Heaven. At another point, the narrator imagines that seraphim (a type of angel) have entered the room. The narrator thinks they are trying to take his memories of Lenore away from him using nepenthe, a drug mentioned in Homer's Odyssey to induce forgetfulness.

Poetic structure

The poem is made up of 18 stanzas of six lines each. Generally, the meter is a trochaic octameter: the lines are built based on a series of paired "feet" or syllables which alternate stressed and unstressed, with eight "feet" to each line. The first line, for example (with / representing stressed syllables and x representing unstressed:

The rhyme scheme is ABCBBB and makes heavy use of internal rhyme ("dreary" and "weary") and alliteration ("Doubting, dreaming dreams..."). It has been suggested that this particularly strong focus on structure and meter is so formulaic that the poem is artificial but its mesmeric quality overrides that.

Poe based the structure of "The Raven" on the complicated rhyme and rhythm of Elizabeth Barrett's poem "Lady Geraldine's Courtship." Poe had reviewed Barrett's work in the January 1845 issue of the Broadway Journal and said that "her poetic inspiration is the highest - we can conceive of nothing more august. Her sense of Art is pure in itself." About "Lady Geraldine's Courtship," he said, "I have never read a poem combining so much of the fiercest passion with so much of the most delicate imagination."

Publication history

Poe first brought "The Raven" to his friend and former employer George Rex Graham of Graham's Magazine in Philadelphia. This may not have been the final version of the poem and Graham declined it, though he gave Poe $15 as charity. Poe then attempted to place the poem with The American Review. Though it was first sold to The American Review, which printed it in February 1845, "The Raven" was first published in the Evening Mirror on January 29, 1845 as an "advance copy." Following this publication the poem appeared in numerous periodicals across the United States, including New York Tribune (February 4, 1845), Broadway Journal (vol. 1, February 8, 1845), Southern Literary Messenger, (vol 11, March, 1845), London Critic (June 14, 1845), Literary Emporium (vol 2, December, 1845), Saturday Courier, 16 (July 25, 1846), and the Richmond Examiner (September 25, 1849).

"The Raven" has also appeared in numerous anthologies, starting with Poets and Poetry of America edited by Rufus Wilmot Griswold in 1847.

Illustrators

Later publications of "The Raven" included artwork by well-known illustrators. Notably, in 1858 "The Raven" appeared in a British Poe anthology with illustrations by John Tenniel, the Alice in Wonderland illustrator (The Poetical Works of Edgar Allan Poe: With Original Memoir, London: Sampson Low). "The Raven" was published independently with lavish woodcuts by Gustave Doré in 1884 (New York: Harper & Brothers). In 1875 a French edition with English and French text was published with lithographs by the famed Impressionist Édouard Manet and translation by the Symbolist Stephane Mallarmé. Many 20th century artists and contemporary illustrators crated artworks and illustrations based on "The Raven," including Edmund Dulac, István Orosz , Ryan Price, Odilon Redon and Gahan Wilson.

Composition

Poe capitalized on the success of "The Raven" by following it up with his essay "The Philosophy of Composition," in which he detailed the poem's creation. His description of its writing are probably exaggerated, though the essay serves as an important overview of Poe's literary theory.

Poe explains that the poem was created by logically considering every aspect of it. For example, the raven enters the chamber as a way of avoiding a storm (the "midnight dreary" in the "bleak December"). The dark black raven sits on a pallid white bust for visual contrast. No aspect of the poem was an accident, he claims, but is based on total control by the author. Even the term "Nevermore," he says, is used because of the effect created by the long vowel sounds (though Poe may have been inspired to use the word by the works of Lord Byron or Henry Wadsworth Longfellow). Poe had toyed with the long "o" sound throughout many other poems: "no more" in "Silence," "evermore" in "The Conqueror Worm."

The topic itself, Poe says, was chosen because he comes to the conclusion that "the death... of a beautiful woman is unquestionably the most poetical topic in the world." Told from "the lips... of a bereaved lover" is best suited to achieve the desired effect. Ultimately, Poe considered "The Raven" an experiment to "suit at once the popular and critical taste," accessible to both the mainstream and high literary worlds.

It has been suggested that Poe worked on "The Raven" for ten years; it has also been suggested it was written in a single day. Poe seems to have recited an early version in Saratoga, New York in 1843. An early draft may have starred an owl.

Critical reception and impact

In part due to its dual printing, "The Raven" made Edgar Allan Poe a household name almost immediately. It was soon widely reprinted, imitated, and parodied. Parodies sprung up especially in Boston, New York, and Philadelphia and included "The Craven" by "Poh!," "The Gazelle," "The Whippoorwill," and "The Turkey." Another early parody was written by Robert Barnabas Brough in 1853, titled "The Vulture; An Ornithological Study", published in Graham's Magazine.

The poem made an instant impact. The New World said, "Everyone reads the Poem and praises it... justly, we think, for it seems to us full of originality and power." The Pennsylvania Inquirer reprinted it with the heading "A BEAUTIFUL POEM." Poe's popularity resulted in invitations to recite "The Raven" and to lecture - in public and at private social gatherings. At one literary salon, a guest noted, "to hear repeat the Raven... is an event in one's life."

"The Raven" was also praised by fellow writers William Gilmore Simms and Margaret Fuller though it was denounced by William Butler Yeats, who called it "insincere and vulgar... its execution a rhythmical trick." Transcendentalist Ralph Waldo Emerson said, "I see nothing in it." An anonymous writer going by "Outis" suggested in the Evening Mirror that "The Raven" was plagiarized from a poem called "The Bird of the Dream" by an unnamed author. The writer showed 18 similarities between the poems as a response to Poe's accusations of plagiarism against Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. It has been suggested Outis was really Cornelius Conway Felton, if not Poe himself. After Poe's death, frequent critic of Poe Thomas Holley Chivers said "The Raven" was plagiarized from one of his poems. Nevertheless, "The Raven" has influenced many modern works, including " Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita in 1955, Bernard Malamud's "The Jewbird" in 1963 and Ray Bradbury's "The Parrot Who Knew Papa" in 1976. The poem is additionally referenced throughout popular culture in films, television, music and more (see "The Raven" in popular culture).

See also

• "The Raven" in popular culture
• Cultural depictions of ravens

References

Notes

1. Silverman, 237
2. Poe, 773
3. Poe, 773
4. Poe, 774
5. Poe, 774
6. Poe, 774
7. Poe, 774
8. Poe, 775
9. Poe, 775
10. Poe, 775
11. Poe, 775
12. Kopley, 194
13. Hoffman, 74
14. Meyers, 163
15. Poe, 773
16. Granger, 53-54
17. "RE: Cremains / Ravens". Pro Exlibris archives. Retrieved 2007-04-01.
18. Adams,53
19. Jeremiah 8:22
20. Poe, 773
21. Kopley, 192-3
22. Hoffman, 76
23. Meyers, 160
24. Hoffman, 79
25. Sova, 208
26. Edgar Allan Poe Society online - Timeline of poems published by Poe
27. Digital Gallery for Édouard Manet illustrations
28. Anamorphic illustration for "The Raven"
29. The poet in the mirror - the same illustration with a chrome-plated brass cylinder
30. Silverman, 295-6
31. Forsythe, 439-52
32. Meyers, 163
33. Silverman, 239
34. Kopley, 192
35. Weiss, 185
36. Hoffman, 80
37. Silverman, 238
38. Silverman, 237
39. Silverman, 279
40. Meyers, 184
41. Silverman, 239
42. Silverman, 265
43. Moss, 169
44. Moss, 101
45. Kopley, 196

External links

Text

• "The Raven" - Full text of the first printing, from the American Review, 1845
• "The Raven" - Full text of the final authorized printing, from the Richmond Semi-Weekly Examiner, 1849

Commentary

• The Poe Decoder - Essay on the symbols, words and composition of "The Raven"
• The Raven. With Literary and Historical Commentary by John H. Ingram. London G. Redway. 1885.
• "The Raven" Study Guide

Illustrated

• The Raven illustrated by Édouard Manet' at Project Gutenberg
• The Raven illustrated by Gustave Doré' at Project Gutenberg

Audio

• "The Raven", complete text and audio
• Garrison Keillor's rendition of "The Raven" (RealAudio)
• Reading of "The Raven" by LibriVox
• Audiobook recording with accompanying text of "The Raven".

Video

• Video of Vincent Price giving a dramatic reading of "The Raven"

• Poetry of Edgar Allan Poe
• Fictional passerine birds
• 1845 poems
• Narrative poems