Exam #2 – Poetry

Instructions:
Write a well-organized essay with an introduction, body paragraphs, and a conclusion. You
MUST incorporate quotes into your essay, but do not let the quotes dominate over your own
ideas. When you quote anything, make sure you properly cite it—using MLA (which you may
have to look up). A Works Cited page is a necessity, as well.
This is an open book test, so you may use notes, Blackboard, web resources, etc. Please complete
your essay in Word and email it to me as an attachment. You may send to either email address:
[email protected] or [email protected].
Essay:
Two very important aspects of poetry are imagery and figurative language. First, find a poem in
our text that WE HAVEN’T DISCUSSED YET. Second, discuss it in terms of imagery and
figurative language. Keep in mind you will need to define imagery and figurative language.
You’ll also want to make sure you discuss how these things contribute to the communication of
the meaning of the poem. (Obviously, you may have to spend some time finding a poem with a
nice amount of each aspect.)
I will be grading not only on content, but also on correct grammar, mechanics, sentence
structure, spelling, etc. Be sure to proofread your essay very well before submitting. Please be
sure you have thoroughly discussed what I’m asking for in your essay. (A couple of paragraphs
won’t be enough.) These essay exams are designed to prepare you for the final research paper,
hence the requirement to include quotes, so please make sure you are following directions
completely.

Term: Imagery
Imagery is the name given to the elements in a poem that spark off the senses. Despite "image"
being a synonym for "picture", images need not be only visual; any of the five senses (sight,
hearing, touch, taste, and smell) can respond to what a poet writes. Examples of non-visual
imagery can be found in Ken Smith's 'In Praise of Vodka', where he describes the drink as having
"the taste of air, of wind on fields, / the wind through the long wet forest", and James Berry's
'Seashell', which puts the "ocean sighs" right in a listener's ear.
A poet could simply state, say, "I see a tree", but it is possible to conjure up much more specific
images using techniques such as simile ("a tree like a spiky rocket"), metaphor ("a green cloud
riding a pole") or synecdoche ("bare, black branches") - each of these suggests a different kind of
tree. Techniques, such as these, that can be used to create powerful images are called figurative
language, and can also include onomatopoeia, metonymy and personification.
One of the great pleasures of poetry is discovering a particularly powerful image; the Imagists of
the early 20th century felt it was the most important aspect, so were devoted to finding strong
images and presenting them in the clearest language possible. Of course, not every poem is an
Imagist poem, but making images is something that nearly every poem in the Archive does.
An interesting contrast in imagery can be found by comparing Alison Croggon's 'The Elwood
Organic Fruit and Vegetable Shop' with Allen Ginsberg's 'A Supermarket in California'; although
both poets seem to like the shops they write about, Ginsberg's shop is full of hard, bright things,
corralled into aisles, featuring neon, tins and freezers, while the organic shop is full of images of
soft, natural things rubbing against one another in sunlight. Without it being said explicitly, the
imagery makes it clear that the supermarket is big, boxy, and tidy, unlike the cosy Elwood's. This
is partly done with the visual images that are drawn, and in part with Croggon's images that mix
the senses (this is called synesthesia), such as the strawberries with their "klaxons of sweetness"
or the gardens with "well-groomed scents", having the way the imagery is made correspond with
what the imagery shows.
How to use this term
Fleur Adcock's poem, 'Leaving the Tate', uses imagery of picture-making to build up the overlap
between art and sight at the centre of the poem. - See more at:
http://www.poetryarchive.org/glossary/imagery#sthash.okasI4bP.dpuf

Figurative Language:
Whenever you describe something by comparing it with something else, you are using figurative
language.

Simile

A simile uses the words “like” or “as” to compare one object or idea with another to suggest they
are alike.
Example: busy as a bee

Metaphor

The metaphor states a fact or draws a verbal picture by the use of comparison. A simile would
say you are like something; a metaphor is more positive - it says you are something.
Example: You are what you eat.

Personification

A figure of speech in which human characteristics are given to an animal or an object.

Alliteration

The repetition of the same initial letter, sound, or group of sounds in a series of words.
Alliteration includes tongue twisters.
Example: She sells seashells by the seashore.
Onomatopoeia

The use of a word to describe or imitate a natural sound or the sound made by an object or an
action.
Example: snap crackle pop

Hyperbole

An exaggeration that is so dramatic that no one would believe the statement is true. Tall tales are
hyperboles.
Example: He was so hungry, he ate that whole cornfield for lunch, stalks and all.

Idioms

According to Webster's Dictionary, an idiom is defined as: peculiar to itself either grammatically
(as no, it wasn't me) or in having a meaning that cannot be derived from the conjoined meanings
of its elements.
Example: Monday week for "the Monday a week after next Monday"

Clichés

A cliché is an expression that has been used so often that it has become trite and sometimes
boring.
Example: Many hands make light work.

The Raven:

Poe has a great talent to expose the development of madness in people--a condition not discussed
in private or in public during his time. Today, awareness for different mental illnesses is
common and often looked upon with compassion. In Poe's day as well as today, however, the
process through which a person turns mad is interesting, intense, and suspenseful in and of itself.
One might ask how a person gets to the point of overwhelming madness or loss of self-control.
Poe uses this curious process as the background for "The Raven."

Along with the use of an intense and confusing scene, Poe uses the techniques of repetition,
alliteration and rhythm to bring about the madman's process towards loss of self-control. Words
that are repeated often are: "Lenore," the symbol of his emotional pain; "chamber door," the
focus of audible irritation; and the bird's unsatisfying response, "Nevermore." Examples of
alliteration that create the repetition of maddening sounds are: "While I nodded, nearly napping";
"Perched upon the bust of Pallas"; and, "Startled at the stillness." Finally, the rhythm of the
rhyme scheme (trochaic octameter) seems to remind one of a spastic rhythm that can't quite be
grasped or understood fully as Poe does not finish some lines' meter but does finish others. Here,
Poe creates chaos that the character and reader alike cannot align or make sense of. Through
these techniques, confusion and chaos are maintained throughout the drunken period of grief that
the main character travels through. The raven then becomes the most confusing symbols of death
and chaos in literature as seen through a madman's maddening state of mind.

Sources:

 http://www.enotes.com/topics/raven

 http://www.enotes.com/topics/raven/critical-essays

 http://www.enotes.com/topics/raven/in-depth

gojsawyer | Teacher | (Level 1) Assistant Educator

Posted March 20, 2013 at 4:26 AM (Answer #2)

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In the poem “The Raven,” Poe uses imagery through the image of the black bird, the raven. The
bird’s presence and one word, which Poe references throughout the poem, symbolize death not
only literally but also figuratively. A person has literally died, but so has the soul or spirit of the
person left to grieve. As a symbol, the raven leaves open to interpretation in the poem its
meaning in terms of death, questions of the supernatural, and an afterlife.

For example, the raven says “nevermore” several times in the course of the poem. This one word
builds suspense because its meaning can be interpreted as changing each time the word is uttered
toward a dramatic climax. It is ambiguous as to whether the bird is literally saying “nevermore”
or if the word is simply reverberating again and again in the tortured mind of the narrator.

The imagery is evoked of a bird literally saying the word while the actions of the poem take
place in the narrator’s recollection of Lenore. Yet, the repetition of “nevermore” by the bird also
works figuratively as an imagination by the narrator through grieving for her and contemplating
an end to life with the visitor, who could be interpreted as the grim reaper. As such, the word
“nevermore” certainly refers to Lenore, yet also foreshadows doom for the narrator.

Sources:

 http://www.enotes.com/topics/raven/critical-essays

 http://www.enotes.com/topics/raven/in-depth

 http://www.enotes.com/topics/raven/themes
There are many similes and metaphors in The Raven. Remember that both similes and metaphors
are comparisons, but a simile uses the words "like" or "as" and a metaphor does not. Metaphors
are harder to find, but if you find words that are describing one thing by creating a picture of
something else, that is probably a metaphor. For example, in this poem:

Metaphor: And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor........the author is
talking about the fire dying out, but to him it looks like a ghost on the floor. He doesn't say "the
fire looks like a ghost" because if he did, it would be a simile.

Simile: suddenly there came a tapping, As of some one gently rapping - the author is comparing
the tapping sound that he hears to someone gently knocking (rapping) on his door, and yet it is
not someone knocking, but it sounds like someone knocking.

There are more metaphors than similes in this poem. This should get you started on trying to pick
them out!

Metaphors

1. Fiery eyes: The ravens eyes were like fire.

Similies

1. Black plume=reminder: Raven leaves a feather as a reminder of him.

Most of the allusions in Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven" are mythological or Biblical. The "bust
of Pallas" on line 11 is a reference to a statue of Athena, Greek goddess of wisdom and war. The
"Night's Plutonian shore" on line 17 is speaking of the underworld, home of Hades. The narrator
refers to the raven as "of the saintly days of yore," which refers to I Kings 17:1-6 where ravens
feed the prophet Elijah (line 38). Nepenthe is a legendary potion that supposedly relieves pain
and sorrow. The narrator asks if there are herbs that will do this in Gilead which basically
restates a line from Jeremiah 8:22 about balm in Gilead.
As "The Raven" is Gothic, its overall tone is dark and gloomy. The narrator has hidden himself
away in his room while he constantly tries to forget Lenore's death. This serves to make the
poem feel sad, and the presence of the raven even makes the poem seem creepy.
The poem is in a first person perspective. The narrator does not seem completely sane but also
not insane either, making him a semi-reliable narrator. He tells the events as they are happening,
but he is heavily affected by his mourning over Lenore. This makes it uncertain whether the
raven was ever real or just in the narrator's mind. The narrator does not seem to know this either
until the very end of the poem when he realizes what the raven represents.
"The Raven" has multiple examples of literary devices and figurative language. It especially
contains an internal rhyme scheme which helps give the poem its musical beat. There are also
many examples of alliteration ("nodded, nearly napping" on line 3), consonance ("silken, sad,
uncertain rustling" on line 13), and assonance ("rare and radiant maiden" on line 11). The raven
is also personified a lot within the poem. He not only has the ability to speak, but he also is
described as wearing a "grave and stern...countenance" which would mean he has an actual facial
expression (line 44). The narrator uses a simile when referring to the bird's eyes: "And his eyes
have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming" (line 105).
There are a few phrases that are emphasized in "The Raven." "Nevermore" is used the most. It is
repeated eleven times within the poem, every time as the last word of a stanza. Nevermore is
another way of saying 'never again'. This is important because the narrator is realizing that he
will never again see Lenore and that he will also never again be able to fully let her go. Another
word that is emphasized is "Disaster" on line 63. It is capitalized because it is being personified
along with "Hope" in line 65.
The use of a raven was chosen by Poe because of its connotation. It is a black bird that gives off
an eerie feel with its cawing. Poe had originally considered a parrot (whose speaking would have
been realistic) instead of a raven, but he decided to use the raven "because of the melancholy
tone [of the poem], and the symbolism of ravens as birds of ill-omen" (Hallqvist).
The name Lenore may have been chosen intentionally for its meanings. In Greek (a culture
referred to within the work), it means 'pity' which is what the reader feels for her and for the
narrator because of the loss of her. In Arabic (another culture that is referenced in the poem), it
means "God is my light" ("Lenore"). The narrator believes Lenore to be in Heaven now. He even
the angels gave her the name Lenore. Therefore, it would make sense that she have a name that
relates to God.