Hello and welcome to the Discourse. Annabel Lee is the last complete poem by Edgar Allan Poe written a few months before he died in 1849. The poem was posthumously published in The Southern Literary Messenger in November 1849. The poem is believed to be in memory of Virginia Clemm, Poe's wife who married him at the age of thirteen and who died in 1847 before she turned twenty-five. Poe believed that death was a kind of rebirth and a sublimation of the soul and that it helped people find a "supernal beauty" in another world. He also believed that the terror and ugliness of death was another form of eternal beauty that transcended time and space. This poem too concerns the death of a young woman (the titular Annabel Lee) and the narrator’s belief that her death is a result of the jealousy the angels feel for the love the couple shares.
Poe famously wrote, “The death, then, of a beautiful woman is, unquestionably, the most poetical topic in the world”. He also said the lips best suited for such a topic were those of a bereaved lover. The speaker of the poem is an unnamed young man. It is safe to say that Poe is the speaker grieving his wife's death. The poem specifically mentions the youth of Annabel Lee, and it celebrates child-like emotions in a way consistent with the ideals of the Romantic era. The poem may remind the readers of the Lucy poems by William Wordsworth.
Unlike his other poem, The Raven, in which the speaker believes he will "nevermore" be reunited with his love, "Annabel Lee" says the two lovers will be together again, as not even demons "can ever dissever" their souls.
Structure of Annabel Lee:
The poem consists of 41 lines set in six stanzas of varying lengths. The first, second, and fourth stanzas contain six lines each, the third and sixth stanzas contain eight lines, and the fifth stanza contains seven lines. Poe used an irregular meter for the poem. Primarily Anapestic and Iambic meters have been used with some variations (amphibrach, dactyl, and trochee). Overall, the irregular meter offers a sense of ebb and flow to the poem. The rhyming scheme varies for different stanzas. The overall rhyme scheme: ababcb dbebfb abgbhbib fbabjb ebbebkb lbmbnnbb. Each stanza ends with the rhyming of b (me, sea, Lee), offering a haunting refrain to the poem.
It is a tragic narrative poem in which the speaker expresses his undying love for his dead beloved Annabel Lee. It is a lyric poem that reveals as much about the speaker’s distraught mental state as it does about the tragic event he narrates. The poet used various Gothic elements in the poem along with Assonance, Repetition, Imagery, and Symbolism.
Summary of Annabel Lee:
Stanza 1 Lines 1 - 6
“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.”
The poet begins with imagery, creating an aura of a fairy tale, and takes the reader to a time long ago, in a kingdom far away, somewhere on the coast of a distant sea. The fairy tale setting of the poem suggests the distraught mental state of the speaker who is mourning a great loss to him. Then the speaker mentions the maiden who lived in the far land by the sea. She is the central figure of the poem and her name is Annabel Lee. The speaker familiarizes the maiden to the reader (‘you may know’) offering an instant memory of a beautiful, young, maiden girl. In the next two lines, the speaker declares his relationship with the maiden girl and says that Annabel Lee and he were in deep love when they were young. This offers a relatable characterization as many of the readers will be able to connect with a memory of young love.
Stanza 2 Lines 7 - 12
“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.”
In this stanza, the speaker clarifies that the two lovers weren’t even young adults, they were children. Virginia Clemm was just 13 years old when she married Poe. The speaker repeats that the two loving adolescent children lived in the ‘kingdom by the sea’ reminding the fairy tale setting to the reader while maintaining the rhythm. In the next line, the speaker stresses that though they were children, they were responsible and conscious enough to recognize the love they felt for each other. The speaker also suggests his intense possessive attitude towards his beloved Annabel Lee. The two love each other so naturally, so intensely, that even the angels look down and feel a jealous pang because of the love that the two children share. The angels are the antagonists of the poem. The angels are depicted as jealous beings who look at the children and long for that which they cannot have- human love.
Stanza 3 Lines 12 - 20
“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 speaker continues to repeat ‘ in this kingdom by the sea’ which offers the gothic character of the poem. The kingdom by the sea is lonely and in an undefined but mysterious location. Poe does not describe the setting with any specificity, and he weaves a hazy, romantic atmosphere around the kingdom until he ends by offering the stark and horrific image of a "sepulchre” there “by the sea."
The tone of the poem shifts as the speaker is no longer talking of a fairy tale, rather, it is about the ill intentions of the jealous angels. The speaker says that because of their jealousy, the angels caused a “wind that blew out of a cloud” and hit Annabel Lee and she was chilled, caught cold, and got ill, or maybe she died. The speaker repeats his possessive love saying ‘My beautiful Annabel Lee,’ suggesting the deep feelings he had for his beloved.
‘A highborn kinsman’ of Annabel Lee came and took her away. It is not clear if Annabel Lee died or if she just got ill. Maybe someone who had died before her and came to take her soul to heaven. Or, if she got ill, someone from her family came to take Annabel Lee away in her sickness. In any case, the speaker was left alone. The kinsman ‘shut her up in a sepulchre.’ The sepulcher could be a beautiful tomb if Annabel Lee died, or if she was ill, it could be a large mansion where she lived and was taken when she got ill. In any case, the speaker feels the mansion is a tomb because he can no longer see or be with his Annabel Lee.
Stanza 4 Lines 21 - 26
“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.”
In this stanza, the speaker clarified that the wind from the cloud hit Annabel Lee mortally who got ill, and died. The speaker expresses his deep sorrow, distress, and distraught mental state as he blames everyone but himself for her death, pointing at the conspiracy of angels with nature and at the show of paternalism inherent in her "highborn kinsmen" who "came and bore her away," and he remains dependent upon her memory. He expresses the angels as vindictive, and envious of him. He mentions again that it happened to him while he was ‘In this kingdom by the sea.’ The Gothic nature of the kingdom by the sea adds to the overall melancholy of the poem.
Stanza 5 Lines 27 - 33
“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:”
In this stanza, the speaker reiterates that though they were children, his and Annabel Lee’s love was more profound and deep than those of the adults, who might be far wiser than them. He asserts that his love was not a silly, childish love that would be easily forgotten at the death of Annabel Lee. The speaker asserts that though Annabel Lee died, he won’t stop loving her. He claims that his soul would go on loving her soul so that even the angels of death could not succeed in separating them from one another. While they may have taken her body away from him physically, he asserts that they could never tear their souls apart from one another. Here, the speaker also suggests that it is not the end of their love story, they will meet again and be together.
Stanza 6 Lines 34 - 41
“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 her sepulchre there by the sea,
In her tomb by the sounding sea.”
The speaker reveals his connection of soul with now-dead Annabel Lee and says that whenever the moon appears, it brings dreams to him and he sees, and meets his beautiful beloved Annabel Lee. Though she is physically no more, he can still feel her presence in nature as whenever he observes a rising star, he feels the eyes of Annabel Lee. The speaker was a child when Annabel Lee died. But he may not be a child now when he is narrating this past story. She is no more, but he mentions her as ‘my darling—my life and my bride,’ suggesting the deep feelings he always had for her and that he continues to harbor in his heart. He mentioned their love was so pure that angels were jealous of him, and their love was stronger than the love of older and wiser people, and now he also reveals that his love is a life-long commitment, and even beyond life, he will continue to love Annabel Lee and she will continue to love him.
In the last two lines, the speaker mentions that he is currently sitting beside the tomb of his beloved Annabel Lee and he enters her tomb possibly preparing himself to die “by the sounding sea,” and meet her again and be with her forever.
The poem tells a tale of undying love but it is not a typical fairy tale, rather it suggests Gothic nature.
So this is it for today. We will continue to discuss the history of American English literature. Please stay connected with the Discourse. Thanks and Regards!
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