Nadica Zecevic
Dr. Jason Smith
ENG 102.0821
19 April 2010
The poet Edgar Allan Poe was born January 19, 1809 in Boston and died on October 7, 1849 in Baltimore. Poe is one of the most remarkable writers in history. The genre in his work is Gothic romance, horror fiction, and detective fiction. He reinvented science-fiction, writing humor tales and hoaxes with theme irony. He was an American poet that became more admired in Europe for his fictional tales in the 19th Century. After his wife’s death he became unstable and started to write poems with theme “death.” The poem “The Sleeper” was published in 1831. Later it was revised and then published in 1845.
Dr. Jason Smith
ENG 102.0821
19 April 2010
The poet Edgar Allan Poe was born January 19, 1809 in Boston and died on October 7, 1849 in Baltimore. Poe is one of the most remarkable writers in history. The genre in his work is Gothic romance, horror fiction, and detective fiction. He reinvented science-fiction, writing humor tales and hoaxes with theme irony. He was an American poet that became more admired in Europe for his fictional tales in the 19th Century. After his wife’s death he became unstable and started to write poems with theme “death.” The poem “The Sleeper” was published in 1831. Later it was revised and then published in 1845.
The poem is composed of five stanzas; the first stanza is composed from seventeen lines, the second stanza is composed from nineteen lines, the third stanza from eight lines, the fourth stanza from nine lines and the fifth stanza from seven lines. In the stanza 1, line 1 and line 2 rhyme together. The first twelve lines are couplets followed with line 13 which rhymes with line 14 and line 15. In stanza 2 the first sixteen lines are couplets, then followed with line 17, which rhymes with line 18 and line 19. For a difference in stanza 3 the first three lines rhymes together, followed by a couplet. Then the last three lines rhymes together. Also the same rhyme scheme is consisted in the stanza 4 and stanza 5 at the beginning. But both of the stanzas end with couplets. The first stanza is highlighted the “m” sound (Line 1-2). “At midnight, in the month of June / I stand beneath the mystic moon.” This retains the beat in the poem.
In the first stanza the speaker is at a cemetery observing the mystic moon (Line 2), with lake (line 13).”All Beauty sleeps! And lo! Where lies/ Irene, with her destinies!”(Lines 16-17), the speaker questions himself where his loved Irene is laying, in which grave. In the second stanza “Like ghosts the shadows rise and fall!/ Oh, lady dear, hast thou no fear?” (Line 12-13) when the speaker is seeing the shadows, they appear to him as ghosts, and then the speaker asks questions if Irene is afraid of the ghosts. In stanza 3”The lady sleeps! Oh may her sleep.”(Line 1), the speaker believes that his beautiful Irene is sleeping and in stanza 4 the speaker wants her to have a deep sleep, “As it is lasting, so be deep” (Line 2). In stanza 5 “Thrilling to think, poor child of sin” (Line 6) the speaker hopes that the innocent and beautiful Irene is not going to suffer any more.
According to the dictionary of symbols, the symbol “lake” represents the transition of life and death. The speaker refers to his lover as a “slumbering soul,” meaning the soul has left her body. As a result with the symbol “lake,” the speaker shows the death in this poem. “Rosemary” is a symbol for remembrance and represents loyalty. “Irene” is the goddess of peace and “Lethe” represents the river of forgetfulness in the underworld. The speaker uses the name Irene, hoping she is in a deep forgetful sleep. The symbol “ruin” represents the cemetery. According to the dictionary of symbolism “moon” represents immortality and eternity, also represents the soul, and the waning moon is a symbol for sleep. Therefore the speaker uses “moon” in the poem because he believes that his beautiful Irene is sleeping, and he hopes she will have eternal rest. The symbol “fog” symbolizes the place between reality and unreality; also it can symbolize approaching death, according to the dictionary of symbolism, accordingly the speaker doesn’t want to accept the reality; he denies the truth. He doesn’t want to accept that his loved one is dead.
The symbol “heaven” symbolizes spirit; “Garden” is the archetypal image of the soul, innocence. Therefore Irene’s soul has left her dead body, and the speaker through the whole poem uses the symbol “sleep” for death. The speaker is not accepting the loss of his loved one; he still believes beautiful Irene is asleep (“valley” symbolizes life according to dictionary of symbolism).With these symbols, the speaker is showing his timeless love and the existence of Irene’s spirit.
Even though this poem can be considered as love poem, the tone in the poem is dark, deranged. The speaker is using the words shadows (“dark entities with a nature all of their own”, according to dictionary of symbolism), and ghosts. This poem is about the love that never dies and the speaker still feels the love towards his beautiful lady. In the poem the speaker uses “My love, she sleeps! Oh, may her sleep!” (Line 1), this indicates that the speaker is referring to his loved one. With the word fog sounds like the speaker is at a place that is unreal, essentially he is in denial.
Through the whole poem “The Sleeper,” the speaker symbolically refers to death as “sleep,” such as “All Beauty sleep” (Line 16), “The lady sleeps!” (Line 1), “My love, she sleeps” (Line 1). The speaker uses “slumb’ring soul” (Line 10) and “mystic moon” (Line 2) which is a connection between immortality and sleep, her soul will have eternal rest. The speaker calls Irene, “my love” which indicates that he is still in love with her. “I pray to God that she may lie forever with unopened eye” (Line 6-7), the poet hopes she will eventually wake up. From the beginning the speaker uses comas and then towards the end of the second stanza uses numerous of exclamation points, which seems to suggest that he is becoming more dramatic and upset. The speaker appears to be more disconnected with reality. Overall the poem is about love and death, and how love can remain even in the face of death.
Work cited
Biederman, Hans. “Dictionary of symbolism.” University of Michigan Fantasy and Science Fiction Website. 2001. Web. 17 Apr. 2010 http://www.umich.edu/~umfandsf/symbolismproject/symbolism.html/
Cummings, Michael. “A Study Guide.” Cumming study guides.net. 2006. Web. 17 Apr. 2010
http://www.cummingsstudyguides.net/
“Edgar Allan Poe” Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Web. 17 Apr. 2010
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgar_Allan_Poe
“Greek Mythology.” Greek Mythology.com. Web. 17 Apr. 2010
http://www.greekmythology.com/
4 comments:
She did all the elments of form and described the it great. She did a good summary but mainly all i saw was lines of the poem i dont think it was in her own words. but besides that i got a good idea of what the poem was about. In her symbols paragraph she interpet. Instead of just writing what the symbols meant out of the poem she also said what it meant inside the poem.
Nice work, from what I read so far, you did what Dr. Smith asked you to do. Great job!!
The draft has all the elements that were required.She has a really good description and all the symbols were defined.The language used is clear and easily understandable.
That looks really good, Nadica! I agree with all of the above!
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