Topic > Poe's use of rhetorical appeals in The Raven

Edgar Allen Poe's “The Raven” is about the struggle of losing someone close to you, although going through the process seems more treacherous than it may seem to those who did it experienced only the second compared to the first. The Raven is a story that Poe wrote in 1845, which brought him great praise and fame upon its publication, but beneath the woven web of a great work of literary art, lie some questions to answer. Was The Raven effective in conveying Poe's intention to create a recognizable poem to his audience, who was the intended audience at the time and does his work have any credibility behind it? Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay To understand what makes “The Raven” effective in its message, one must look at its appeals. Once read thoroughly, it becomes clear that the poem is actually a pathos-based piece of literature. The entire poem is about a young man's struggle to deal with the loss of his beloved, from beginning to end it is about the young man's focus on the loss of his love, Lenore. It is only when the raven enters the story that we begin to see this man's distress at his loss. “Leave my solitude uninterrupted! - stop with that envelope over my door! Remove your beak from my heart and take your form from my door! Said the crow: "Never again." Out of his desperation, the young man begins to question the reasoning behind the raven's presence, imagining the raven as the devil who came from the depths of Hell to torture him for his loss. Because Poe delves deeply into Lenore's loss, the piece is saturated with pity, eliminating feelings of desperation, fear, and grief to make it seem like it was a human being telling their life story or a fervent dream symbolizing what it felt like. . lose someone. Lenore is the fulcrum of the young man's anguish, which constitutes the defining narrative arc of the story of the raven that torments him. The despondency the man faces and the emotional roller coaster controlled by the raven all play into the concept of absolute pathos. However, this does not mean that the story only contains pathos within it, as what was happening to Poe contributed to the use of ethos. The value of ethos comes from the fact that Poe is somewhat familiar with losing those important things. to him. Starting from the loss of his mother when he was young, to his wife's diagnosis of tuberculosis while writing "The Crow". Giving Poe the impending sense of dread and believability given how ill his wife was, and would ultimately die in the following years. Even if he hadn't lost it at the time of writing "The Raven," that doesn't mean it makes his piece any less believable because of the predicament. If anything, it would only strengthen him as it could be seen as a way for him to mentally prepare for when it's time for his wife to die. Coming to terms with a loved one who is expected to die is something everyone has to endure at some point in their life, and this piece can be seen as Poe's way of letting his grief, anxiety, and anger show through his poetry. . Connecting it to others who have lost someone close to them and involving them as part of the intended audience. “The Raven” has a very large audience but was never intended to be read by so many people over the years. “The Crow” was for a smaller audience because he published the poem in a simple magazine without the intent of reaching the masses. Since he wrote it for the magazine, the intended audience was only a small group of people like.