THE RAVEN

Mouhamadou bah

ENG2200

Professor: Noonan

10/28/23

THE RAVEN

While reading the assignment, I found both authors very interesting, but one that spoke to me was Edgar Allen Poe’s story.

Edgar Allen Poe was an adopted child who was a genius writer and poet, his father was David Poe Jr. an actor, who left them when Edgar was 1 year old and died when he was 3, and his mother was Eliza Poe an actress who died of tuberculosis a disease that caused her a lot of pain and she died when Edgar was just 2 years old. He was later adopted by John Allan a tobacco merchant and Francis Allan a housewife.

Growing up with the Allan’s, Edgar learned how to be a total gentleman, with a great education and everything, but he was not very close to his adopted father, and they later grew apart. After he went to college, he was not sure if he wanted to be a writer or an artist and later because of his lack of financial aid from his father, he ended up with 2000 dollars in debt because of his gambling to make money. He went to the army as a way of running from his debtors. His biography tells everything about his financial problems, his need for a family which led him to create one, how he struggled with his writing because of the publishers, and how he worked as an editor because he needed to provide for his new family, it also talks about his harsh criticism on most of the stories he edited which earned him title tomahawk man. It describes his rags-to-riches story.

One of the poems by Edgar that I enjoyed reading was the one named THE RAVEN. This poem is one of my favorite poems because of the genre, and the way it was told. The story is about a man who expresses grief and despair about the love he lost named Lenore.

The poem is set on a stormy night when the man is visited by a raven that can only say “nevermore”. The Raven’s repeated words tormented the man and drove him mad, as he interpreted it as a sign that he would never see Lenore again. This story reminded me of a few shows that I’ve seen and books that I read that I loved, like the Netflix hit series WEDNESDAY or the WEBTOON comic Nevermore Academy. These stories are all very dark, in one way, and macabre in another and the parts about death and dark creatures made me more invested in the stories. I also liked Edgar’s other poems like the black cat and The Fall of the House of Usher, which I recently watched a show-of.

I agree with what critics say Edgar Allen Poe was a literary/poetic genius who has experienced it all in life.