The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1895-07-06
Our Special COntributors-=-I8o5.
POE'S RAVEN.
Analysis of the Famous Poem.



controversy between Poe's defenders
and his critics, we prefer togive here
with our analysis, and what we be-
lieve to be the significance, of the
weird imagery of the poem. We have
talked with living witnesses, who
heard Poe declaim the piece in the
woods of Saratoga in 1843, when, by
Poe's own statement, the poem was
already nearly complete. "The era
ven," first published in 1s45, was the
slow growth of years, and the crys-
tallization of the authors bitter ex-
perience.
1t is "upon midnight dreary."
The student is physically "weak and
weary" yet led to ponder "nearly
mapping" lover many quaint and
curious volume" The ghostly light
of the dying embers flickers weirdly
on the floor. Confronted by poverty
as by an armed man, brooding over
his troubles, he tried to forget them
in his books. From Poe's many al
lusions to, and uses of Morse words,
ideas and phrases, we conjecture that
the forgotten lore" is that of our
pagan forefathers. In the legend of
Wooden latter whom Wednesday is
named) the raven of memory perches
on his shoulder, whispering in his
ears all the past. One of his hearers,
to whom Poe read the finished poem,
states that there was actually in the
room at Fordham "a bust of Pallas
just above the chamber door," The
weary reader is musing upon this
strange idea of memory in the form of
a raven, when he falls into a waking
vision of creative genius, which be-
comes the fabric of this master poem.
He imagines he hears tapping from
without. Filled with nervous terror,
he hesitates to unlatch it, but at last,
by an effort of will he filings the door
wide open, and finds-nothing. He
peers into the yawning darkness.
There is only bleak December night.
He hears but the moaning storm. He
stands, doubling, dreaming, in the
darkness, until he hears the whis-
pered word "Lenore."
This "Lenore" whose name occurs
SO often in his poems may be that
ideal woman of his fancy who never
lived on earth-the "rare and radiant
maiden" of his dreams-beautiful
only with a sensuous, ravishing
beauty in form and color and express
sion to the eye, but, like Undine, with
out soul. Others see in this "lost Le-
more" thetransfiguration of his wasted
life, of his ideals unfulfilled, of the
good lost, never to come back. The
name startles him. Intent on finding
the whisperer, he opens the lattice,
when there appears raven. "With
many a firt and futter" the bird
enters, and without further ceremony
perches upon bust of Pallas, just
above his chamber door.
What is the meaning of this strange
Doetic creation of POe2
Is it not this? The black raven of
memory had flown in from the dark
night of Poe's wasted life, and was
perching, like the Norsemen's sable
bird upon their god, yet not now on
Wooden, but on the deity which Poe
worshiped, Pallas, Minerva-the god
of literary art, of taste, of knowledge;
for Poe's religion was beauty, but not
goodness. The marble bust remained
speechless while the bird spoke.
Wisdom had almost ceased to warn,
but memory, now incarnate as ra-
ven, uttered her complaint, mocking
the voice of Lenore, and its burden
was the dirge of hope = "Never-
more:"
But the raven. sitting lonely
On that placid bust, spake only
That one word. as If his sonlin
That one word he did outpour.
Nothing further then he uttered.
Not feather then he tluttered-
Till scarcely more than mutteTed:
other friends have flown before
On the morrow he viii leave me,
AS my hopes have flown before"
Then the bird said; 'Nevermore!'"
Never again the lost opportunities
of youth! Nevermore the bright,
pure life of childhood and boyhood!
Nevermore hope, pardon, peace Out
of the Nights Plutonian shore"
only the raven was henceforth to fly,
croaking: "Nevermorep Over all the
deluge of sin, feasting on the floating
carcasses of drowned hopes, that
restless mocker was to fly to and fro
on the flood, but no white dove of
peace was to bring back the olive leaf
nor the rainbow arch gild with its
peace-token rain-swept but purified
landscape of life. Only the past