The Raven (Poetry Explication

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Poetry Explication of “The Raven” by Edgar Allen Poe “The Raven” is a poem written about a man who is grieving about his lost lover. He has great difficulty with dealing with her death and the object in the poem that is used continually to remind him of the lack of her presence is that of the raven. Starting with the first stanza, there is indication of in climate weather and it also tells us that the setting is at night. There is an air of uncertainness and a definite dark side to the poem with the uncovering of some great tragedy that has befallen the narrator and he also has a fear of something coming to disturb him at rest. We find more out about what this tragedy that befell him is and we discover that the supposed date of this unfortunate happening occurred in the month of December. Poe uses the phrase “dying ember” to insinuate that someone had died, and also that it is cold as well. Death is reinforced with the use of ghost in the same sentence as dying ember. We can begin to assume that Lenore is the lost lover that he is grieving for. He hears the curtains rustling briskly and is immediately filled with horror of something that he can not see entering his living quarters. A picture starts to develop of a ghost that has come into his room to haunt him of his memory of this lover. Although his fear tries to hold him back from going to the door he creeps to it anyway and when he opens the door, it reveals that there is no one outside. He is continued to be unnerved by the fact that he heard something outside, but when he checked there was no one standing by the door. He tries to convince himself that it was simply the wind blowing outside his window, and crosses the room to check on his suspicion. When he reaches the window and opens it, he finds a raven flapping wildly against the glass. As the window is opened the raven flies to the bust
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