Stanza 1: It's late.

The poem's speaker is tired and weak, reading an old collection of folklore (note that Ravens are prevalent in folklore). As he's about to fall asleep, he hears something tapping at his door. The speaker, somewhat startled, consoles himself by muttering "tis some visitor" and "nothing more." Stanza 1 Analysis: The ambiguity of the narrator's mental state is introduced in the first stanza and becomes a topic of debate throughout the entire poem. Keep in mind that it's late and the narrator is extremely tired. It's quite possible he dreams the entire episode. Stanza 2: We are told this incident takes place in December and that the narrator had been reading in order to forget about his lost love, Lenore. Stanza 2 Analysis: Stanza 2 provides background information. The incident takes place in December and the narrator suffers from depression. He is searching desperately to end his sorrow. The mood, somewhat established in Stanza 1 with "midnight dreary" and "forgotten lore," becomes entrenched as Poe includes details such as "bleak December," dying ember," "ghost upon the floor," sorrow," and a bevvy of alliterative phrases and words with Anglo-Saxon roots. Summary of Edgar Allan Poe's The Raven: Stanzas: 3-5 Stanza 3: To combat the fear caused by the wind blown curtains, the narrator repeats that the commotion is merely a visitor at the door. Stanza 3 Analysis: The opening line of the stanza contains the greatest example of consonance, alliteration, and internal rhyme in the history of poetry. Why the speaker is so frightened by the curtains fluttering in the wind is unclear. It could be a demonic movement of the curtains, which would cause even the most stalwart individual to mutter to himself, or the speaker could be crazy. Stanza 4: The narrator musters the courage to speak to the "visitor" at his door. Nobody answers. He opens the door and sees only darkness. Stanza 4 Analysis: Things are getting stranger by the stanza. Poe builds suspense by delaying the unveiling of the "visitor." Stanza 5: The narrator stares into the darkness. He stares. He stares some more. He starts dreaming about the impossible and finally whispers "Lenore." "Lenore" is echoed back. Stanza 5 Analysis: We begin to sense the heartbreak experienced by the narrator. He so longs for his lost love that he begins whispering her name, desperately hoping for a response. Does he actually hear a response or is he hallucinating? Summary of Edgar Allan Poe's The Raven: Stanzas: 6-9 Stanza 6: The narrator returns to his chamber and soon hears a louder tapping, this time at his window. He decides to explore the noise, telling himself it is merely the wind. Stanza 6 Analysis: Like the narrator, you're probably wondering when something's going to happen. The narrator is in denial. He knows something is there, but refuses to acknowledge it. Stanza 7: The narrator opens the shutter and a raven flies in. He ignores the occupant and perches himself on a statue of Pallas Athena, Greek goddess of wisdom. Stanza 7 Analysis: The mystery has been solved. It's just a bird! Something tells me this bird is no ordinary feathered friend.

Stanza 8: The narrator is relieved and somewhat amused by the bird's appearance. He asks the raven its name and he replies, "Nevermore." Stanza 8 Analysis: We are presented with symbols of night and death in stanza 8: the "ebony" bird; "grave and stern decorum"; "nightly shore"; "Night's Plutonian (the Roman underworld) shore." Stanza 9: The narrator marvels at this strange bird who has entered his room. Stanza 9 Analysis: Our bewildered narrator has no idea what to make of this bird, much like I'm not sure what to say about this stanza. Stanza 10: The Raven just sits there and says "nevermore." The narrator, a little spooked by the entire episode mutters the bird will probably just leave tomorrow. Stanza 10 Analysis: There is something in the word "nevermore" that brings despair to the narrator. He believes the raven is pouring out his soul with each utterance of the word, similar to the pouring out of the narrator's soul as he longs for the return of Lenore. Stanza 11: The narrator rationalizes that the raven's repetition of "nevermore" has nothing to do with his own hopeless state, and that the word is the only one the bird knows. He creates a plausible story about the bird probably having escaped from his master who met an ill fate at sea. Stanza 11 Analysis: The narrator experiences the paranoia/denial cycle. He unreasonably believes the raven is some bad omen, which it then becomes, omens being nothing more than a negative psychological interpretation of an otherwise neutral event, followed by a complete negation with an implausible explanation. The narrator's nuts. Stanza 12: The narrator wheels his chair around, stares at the bird, and attempts to figure out what this all means. Stanza 12 Analysis: Although the narrator draws no explicit conclusion, descriptive words such as "grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt" displays the narrator's negative attitude toward the strange visitor. Summary of Edgar Allan Poe's The Raven: Stanzas: 13-15 Enjoy this analysis of "The Raven" by E.A. Poe with stanza summaries. Stanza 13: The narrator stares at the bird, whose eyes appear to be on fire and burn the narrator's heart. He ponders how he will nevermore see his lost Lenore. Stanza 13 Analysis: There's a raven in the living room with fiery eyes staring at the narrator and all he can think about is some girl! Stanza 14: The narrator senses the arrival of angels who burn incense. He suspects the raven's purpose is to help the narrator forget about his sorrows. He asks to drink a magic potion for that purpose. The raven replies, "nevermore." Stanza 14 Analysis: Angels arrive. The narrator hopes that he will be spared despair and sorrow. He's wrong. Key words in this stanza: quaff means to drink; nepenthe is a drug used in ancient times to make people forget their sorrows. Stanza 15: The narrator asks the raven if he is evil. He then asks the raven if he has brought healing. The raven replies, "nevermore."

Stanza 15 Analysis: Despite several declarations by the raven himself that he is not there for good, the narrator holds on to the slim hope that the raven can help him forget his sorrows. The allusion to "balm in Gilead" in line 89 is an allusion to the Book of Job in the Old Testament. It is the same questioned asked by Job after losing his family, fortune, friends, and health. Summary of Edgar Allan Poe's The Raven: Stanzas: 16-18 Enjoy this analysis of "The Raven" by E.A. Poe with stanza summaries. Stanza 16: The narrator asks the raven if he will ever see Lenore in heaven. The raven answers, "nevermore." Stanza 16 Analysis: The narrator isn't the smartest guy alive. He again asks the raven if he will be relieved of his suffering and at least be able to see Lenore in paradise. The raven answered "nevermore." At this point I'm getting really annoyed with the narrator. He's wallowing in self pity and enjoying every second of it. He knows what the raven's answer will be, yet he purposely asks questions that will justify him feeling sorry for himself. It's time to move on. Stanza 17: The narrator commands the bird to leave. The bird says, "nevermore." Stanza 17 Analysis: The narrator is once again surprised by the raven's negative response. I'm not. Stanza 18: The raven remains sitting. He overshadows the narrator, whose soul will never see happiness again. Stanza 18 Analysis: Boo! Hoo! Get a gun and shoot that freaking bird already! The raven's shadow most likely symbolizes sadness. It covers the narrator's soul, symbolic of the narrator never being happy again. Some claim the last stanza relates the narrator's death. They're wrong. The shadow remains on the floor and It's the narrator's soul that will never climb out from under the shadow of sadness. If you're teacher tells you he died, tell him he's wrong. If he disagrees, ask him how a dead man can narrate a poem. The melancholy tone of "The Raven" relies as much on its musical sound and rhythmic pattern as on the meaning of the words. To achieve his musical effect, Poe uses rhyming words in the same line (internal rhyme), a word at the end of one line that rhymes with a word at the end of another line (end rhyme), alliteration (a figure of speech that repeats a consonant sound), and a regular pattern of accented and unaccented syllables. This pattern uses a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed syllable, with a total of sixteen syllables in each line. Here is an example (the first line of the poem): Poes The Raven is a prime example of gothic poetry at its finest. Poe utilizes rhythm and flow in an original fashion not only to draw his reader in, but to create the dark and empty tone inherent in all wellwritten gothic literature. Poe employs several other literary devices in his poem, such as the main characters house, allusion to a mentally unstable narrator, an overall dark atmosphere and symbolism. In much of gothic literature, the house is designed and written about to convey a dark, depressed, and somewhat ominous mood. The reader begins to see parallels between the house and the main character, whether they be physical, emotional, or both. This is the case in The Raven, as Poe describes the main characters sitting room as a chamber with sadpurple curtains (Poe, para. 3). Later in the poem, he also describes how the Raven perches just above his chamber door, on a pallid bust of Pallas, causing the reader to imagine a room in which an ashen, eyeless Greek sculpture would seem in place. Throughout The Raven, the main characters view of the Raven changes quickly and dramatically many times. The narrator is at first weary and cautious of his unknown visitor, as he hears the tapping at his door and window. Once he opens his window and in flies the Raven, he is struck with a sort of odd happiness and respect for the bird, as he says, then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling

(Poe, para. 8) and even goes as far as to call the Raven lordly (Poe, para. 8). As the narrator hears the Raven speak, he is slightly shocked, but takes it in stride and simply accepts the fact that the bird can talk. In stanza twelve we begin to see the transformation of the Raven from friend to foe in the main characters mind. While the Raven is described as still making the narrator smile in the first line of the stanza, by the second-to-last, it is being described as grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous (Poe, para. 12). In the following stanza, the dislike for the ungainly fowl grows, as it is considered a wretch by our narrator (Poe, para. 14). By the third-to-last stanza, our narrator is actually screaming at the Raven and calling it a thing of evil (Poe, para. 16). Through the next two stanzas, the narrator realizes that there is nothing he can do about the Raven, that its an omen, and that it will remain with him for all time. The narrator falls into a depression, which is described as being lifted nevermore (Poe, para. 18). Obviously, these are not rational conclusions which a mentally healthy individual would reach. This factor, coupled with the jumpiness of the narrators emotion could indicate personal insecurity and high mental instability. Another interesting occurrence in the poem is the simple acceptance by the narrator of the Ravens ability to speak. Though the narrator shows some surprise by saying, much I marveled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly, (Poe, para. 9) it seems fleeting, as in the next line he is contemplating the relevance of the birds speechwhat the Raven meant by what it said. Such statements and reactions lead the reader again to question the narrators sanity, exposing yet another aspect of gothic literature, the unreliable narrator. From the first to the last stanza of Poes poem, a melancholy and dark mood is projected through the wording and setting to establish the hard and light-sparse ambience required for all gothic literature. In the very first line of The Raven, Poe pens, Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary. (Poe, para. 1) This could have easily been written with much more straightforward language, but it would detract from the air of the scene, as well as the poetry. Every part of the poem is rich in dismal yet colorful adjectives, all serving to further bring the plot of the story to life. The symbolism throughout The Raven is common to the majority of other gothic literature, utilizing the house as a plot device paralleling the main character. The mans large, dark chamber represents his emptiness and loneliness, now that he is without his lost Lenore. As Poe makes no mention of a fire, it is safe to assume that the chamber is very cold as well, as its near midnight in December (Poe, para. 1). December itself is generally a very dark and lonely time of year, while midnight always adds tension to literature. With both of these elements, Poe begins to set the reader up for the darkness to come. The author also often uses metaphors and allusion, such as the curious volumes of forgotten lore for escapism, and the passage other friends have flown before- on the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before, alluding to the mans loneliness and depression due to his lost Lenore. This allows the reader to use their imagination more than they would if everything was written out in simple text, event-by-event. In conclusion, Poes The Raven contains many of the key attributes of a well-written gothic poem. His blending of symbolism, such as the chamber and seasons, the overall dark atmosphere, and the mans obvious insanity all contribute to the gothic air of the poem, while conforming to the genre standards of the time.