Thoughts of a Cynical Bastard

Annabel Lee

Let me ask you all a question, and hopefully Dr. Jerz can answer this before class--is it Ann-a-bell Lee or Aw-na-ball Lee?

Here's the poem, in it's entirity:

It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of ANNABEL LEE;
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.

I was a child and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea;
But we loved with a love that was more than love-
I and my Annabel Lee;
With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven
Coveted her and me.

And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her highborn kinsman came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in heaven,
Went envying her and me-
Yes!- that was the reason (as all men know,
In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we-
Of many far wiser than we-
And neither the angels in heaven above,
Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee.

For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling- my darling- my life and my bride,
In the sepulchre there by the sea,
In her tomb by the sounding sea.

Anyways, to prepare for the class tonight I've been reading the poem (obviously) and some thoughts have come to mind, that i'll be asking in class, but I thought I'd give everyone a chance to formulate their answers now:

-Is Poe pining over a lost love?
-Many of Poe's women friends claim to have inspired this poem. But is that really the case? Or could it have a deeper meaning for the poet?
-Poe wrote this as one of his last poems. Did he know he was going to die only a few years after the publication here?

I closed comments, temporarily (until after class) because I want to hear people's comments--even Dr. Jerz's--in class, not on my blog. When I open them up again, you are more than welcome to post anything else you want on my blog.

Posted by lougagliardi at October 19, 2005 01:11 PM | TrackBack