Question

Identify the imagery used in the poem The Raven.

Answer 1

Poe has a great talent to expose the development of madness in people--a condition not discussed in private or in public during his time. Today, awareness for different mental illnesses is common and often looked upon with compassion. In Poe's day as well as today, however, the process through which a person turns mad is interesting, intense, and suspenseful in and of itself. One might ask how a person gets to the point of overwhelming madness or loss of self-control. Poe uses this curious process as the background for "The Raven."

Along with the use of an intense and confusing scene, Poe uses the techniques of repetition, alliteration and rhythm to bring about the madman's process towards loss of self-control. Words that are repeated often are: "Lenore," the symbol of his emotional pain; "chamber door," the focus of audible irritation; and the bird's unsatisfying response, "Nevermore." Examples of alliteration that create the repetition of maddening sounds are: "While I nodded, nearly napping"; "Perched upon the bust of Pallas"; and, "Startled at the stillness." Finally, the rhythm of the rhyme scheme (trochaic octameter) seems to remind one of a spastic rhythm that can't quite be grasped or understood fully as Poe does not finish some lines' meter but does finish others. Here, Poe creates chaos that the character and reader alike cannot align or make sense of. Through these techniques, confusion and chaos are maintained throughout the drunken period of grief that the main character travels through. The raven then becomes the most confusing symbols of death and chaos in literature as seen through a madman's maddening state of mind.