Tuesday, September 7, 2010
Poe's use of rhetorical devices in The Raven
Poe utilizes both pathos and ethos in The Raven. Pathos can be found in the fear, paranoia, and hopelessness in the poem to make it feel human. While ethos is used to make the story relatable, Poe finds an audience in people who have an inability to let go, but at the same time those who try to ignore their past. The paranoid beginning where the narrator tries to convince himself the rapping is just someone at the door grabs those who are hiding from their past, covering things up in an attempt to soften what has happened to them. The repetition of "nevermore" found in the poem is for both sides of the audience, it represents that feeling of something that will not leave the mind, no matter how hard a person may try to forget it. But Poe is not only looking to relate to his audience, it seems he wants to give them advice. By ending the poem on such a hopeless not, "And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor/ Shall be lifted - nevermore," Poe shows that their is nothing to be gained from ignoring or obsessing over your past, but facing it to learn from mistakes is reasonable.
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I agree he really focused on the Pathos and Ethos appeals rather than logos. For the pathos appeal, the poem really did seem to exhibit a feeling of paranoia, but I also think it's important that he didn't say "I'm scared" by the raven or "I am very sad about Lenore outright" because he would lose that impersonal feeling and the emotion the reader attributes to such a frightening situation would not be as strong. It is an intersting point to make that he he is obsessing over his past, but I disagree when you say that Poe tries to teach readers the benefits from learning from his mistakes. I think Poe is too busy wallowing in his own misery to learn much from his past.
ReplyDeleteI have to to agree with the fact that Poe wields pathos and ethos in order to evoke a feeling of hopelessness. But in a way- the tone he uses to do so almost make me feel the opposite of human. Poe uses words such as "ghastly, grim" and adjetives like "evil and devil." This tone is almost demonic, and evokes the worst side of humanity- a morbid, demonic side that questions humanity, which almost makes it hard to relate to. It was interesting that you found a flip side to Poe's intent. It seems that the Raven itself is symbolic of Poe's past, (maybe even Lenor herself) and his negative, hopeless reaction to it, is a cry to readers. Lesson learned: Let go over your past before it really haunts you.
ReplyDeleteRebecca makes an excellent point. Even the alliteration in the phrase "ghastly, grim" and the internal rhyme in "evil and devil" point to the importance of these words, and precicely as Rebeccas suggests, what is otherworldly about the Raven is that it (Lenore, his love, both, more than that, too) continue to haunt him. It's almost a love poem to haunting. And to death.
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