Анализ стихотворения Эдгара А. По "Ворон" (Text analysis "The Raven").
учебно-методический материал на тему

Text Analysis

Edgar Allan Poe “The Raven”

The poem is written by Edgar Allan Poe. He is a well-known writer of the USA. His works are often noted for their mysticism, musicality, stylized language, and supernatural atmosphere. These peculiarities attract the readers. That is why the Poe’s art is very popular. I admire this author, because he is really talented.

“The Raven” is an unusual title, but after reading we can understand why Poe gave such a title. When I have read it I thought that there was something mystic in the work. My expectations were tragic and mysterious, because such a bird as the raven is associated with unhappiness and bad news or loneliness. Now I see why the author called it in such a way “The Raven”. It tells of a talking raven's mysterious visit to a distraught lover, tracing the man's slow descent into madness. From the title we may consider that the bird is like a sign of the poem and a symbol of the main character’s suffering.  Poe’s title is obscure. We can’t tell about the content of the poem only according to the sign, because we know about the raven that something will happen, but we can only guess that the main hero is suffering from the loss of his love forever. I consider that the title is the stylistic device – personification. This bird is the central figure in the poem who talks to the hero.

The narrator of this poem is the author himself. He uses a personal pronoun ‘I’. We understand that he tells us about himself in relation to his own life. From Poe’s biography we know the fact that he lost his wife in her pride of years who died from tuberculosis. After his loss he began writing the works dedicated his wife. The poem “The Raven” was dedicated her. A prototype of a lyric heroine in the poem became Poe’s wife Virginia Clam.  Also the narrator is internal who is one of the main characters.

The action of this poem takes place in the USA in 19th century, because we know that this story is connected with the author’s own life and he lived and wrote in the USA and first published his work in January, 1845. While reading, I imagined that the action takes place in Scotland in 19th century. I thought that the main character was living in a huge castle. The atmosphere of the poem is mystic that’s why I connected all the events of the poem with the ghosts, mystery and the ravens were everywhere. In his castle he was sitting and suffering as a lonely man. It seemed he stayed alone in the world.

The events are presented in a chronological order.  The author is depressed because of the loss of his love, Lenore. He is waiting for her coming for a long time and tries to hear every sound around him connected with Lenore.  It seems that the door may be opened now and she will come in. Sitting on a bust of Pallas, the raven seems to further instigate his distress with its constant repetition of the word "Nevermore". In the poem there is an imaginary dialogue between the raven and the main hero. The bird’s mechanical answers sound as a sudden coincidence. When the Raven often starts repeating the word “Nevermore” it reminds us a mystic regularity and the bird’s words sound as an ominous prediction. This bird looks like a harsh messenger of the spiritual world. The narrator is surprised that the raven can talk, though it says nothing further. The narrator remarks to himself that his "friend" the raven will soon fly out of his life, just as "other friends have flown before" along with his previous hopes. 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.

 The author draws the reader’s attention to the following atmosphere of the poem. In my opinion, we can find climax in the end of the work. The last raven’s word is “Nevermore” and from this time the character understood that his sorrow was so sad that he couldn’t see his love again and he would never return her back. It’s like a fate. He couldn’t do anything to choose the fate. Before the bird he hoped that he would meet her someday. He was full of the hopes. But the raven broke his hopes. The narrator calls the raven ‘a bird or devil”.  

In the poem there are some conflicts.  An external conflict is ‘the character against his fate and the spiritual powers’. This conflict is clear-cut and easily defined. The author couldn’t believe that he had lost his love forever and wanted to overcome his fate. But it is impossible; people’s fate is the strongest thing in our life. The raven is like a symbol of the character’s loneliness and unhappiness. When something happens, a person can exist just thinking about the good moments, especially when somebody dies. It is a big sorrow in people’s life. They imagine and remember the wonderful moments spent with that person. They think this person is still alive. Someday people can’t overcome their suffering and stop to believe. Something breaks their hopes as the raven did it in the poem. Thus we can mark an internal conflict – ‘the author against his inner self’. The main character is in conflict with his emotions, thoughts and feelings.

There are several main characters in the story – the author himself and the Raven. They are presented in the opening scene – the author’s dialogue with himself and with the raven. The characters are revealed through thoughts, actions and speech. Speaking about the hero we don’t know his appearance, age, occupation. I suppose he is 35 years old. He is a tall and slim man with brown hair and green eyes. The readers may clearly understand his feelings and emotions through his judgments concerning his life. The hero has to fight against an opposing force – a fate problem and the spiritual powers in the name of the raven.

The theme of this poem is that people can’t fight against their fate. They must try to overcome all their sorrows, problems. They must go straight on, not turning back and try to continue living. Another theme, in my mind, a death of an intimate favourite person is the strongest shock in the world. I can make a conclusion that the subject of the poem is ‘love and sorrow’ connected with fate. A grief which burns to ashes the soul and heart of a person and makes him go mad. I can define the type of narration as a tragedy with the elements of mystery.

The poem is musical, narrative, without intentionally creating an allegory. The language of the author is rich. The author employs various stylistic devices such as different repetitions ‘nevermore, nevermore’ to create the atmosphere of tragedy or fatality of the main hero, to show his suffering and loneliness; ‘nothing more, nothing more’ is a repetition again. It helps us to underline the fact that the character’s love will not come back to life and he has to exist alone without her. The metaphor ‘soul is burning’ lets us to focus the reader’s attention on the hero’s feelings and emotions. When the raven appears in the poem the narrator describes this bird as ‘grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, ominous bird’. The author uses the enumeration here. He tries to intensify the idea of a bad sign or a bad symbol. The hero isn’t glad to meet the raven because it will not bring him goods. He wants to make the raven fly away and the metaphor ‘fiery eyes’ gives the explanation of this situation. When the character was talking to the raven his eyes became fiery. In general this poem is full of the stylistic devices.

After analyzing this poem my sympathy lies with the main character. Because he is so lonely and unhappy. If I lost my love I would never overcome this fact. Such a poem really gives a chance to think about people’s life and make their own conclusion concerning their fate.        

by Vasilieva Alina Viktorovna