by Reed Forrester

Created on: November 24, 2008

I'd like to propose a somewhat unusual interpretation of "The Raven." Consider the social milieu: Goethe, whom Poe admired, had recently published "Faust," the story of a man who sells his soul for knowledge of the occult and power over demons, and who, among other things, uses this forbidden knowledge to conjure the soul of Helen of Troy. The widespread revival of Christian values known as the "Great Awakening" had gripped the nation into the 1830's. Christian imagery permeated the whole nation, and there was very little doubt about the reality of God, angels, demons, heaven and the afterlife. Sin, damnation, heaven, hell, hubris, suspicion of pride, fear of necromancy, etc.. were all common parlance of the day. Poe often included the religious, the supernatural, the magical, the occult in his works, and had themes of vengeance, hubris, and tragedy. He wrote many tales in which the supernatural played a real, not imaginary, role.

The fear of death and the theme of mourning over a lost love play out in other more modern tales. Darth Vader's weakness was his fear of losing his beloved. He swore allegiance to the Sith lord in order to preserve her from death. Likewise, Lord Voldemort's weakness was his fear of his own death. Like those works, "The Raven" illustrates similar consequences of fear, pride and hubris, using the imagery of a Fundamentalist Christian age.

Here let me refer you to Poe's short story "Morella," a tale about a man whose wife Morella was a genius regarding the study of the continuation of identity after death. Their life together lacked love, but they became partners in the study of the black arts. He says "... my soul, from our first meeting, burned with fires it had never before known; but the fires were not of Eros ..." Indeed, he loved her so little that he could not bear her touch, nor her voice, nor even her glance. He says that "one instant, my nature melted into pity, but, in the next, I met the glance of her meaning eyes, and then my soul sickened and became giddy with the giddiness of one who gazes downward into some dreary and unfathomable abyss." Morella eventually dies, and at the moment of her death she does two things. First she prophesies that he will never be happy again but will live in sorrow. Second, she gives birth to a daughter who takes her first breath just after Morella breathes her last, and whom the narrator comes to love more than he believed it possible to love anyone in this world. The daughter grows inhumanly

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