The Raven and Ligeia a comparison Essay examples -- English Literature

The Raven and Ligeia a comparisonAlthough the two tales ar presented in different literary forms thetales themselves deal with remarkably similar assailable progeny. So muchso that it is possible to compare the style of distributively with but a littlereference to the general themes of the two works.The Raven and Ligeia are some(prenominal) about loss. The vote counters of both taleshave lost the dearest thing to them, a woman of incomparable talentsand beauty. That the loss of this woman has happened for differentreasons does not matter for it is how this loss manifests itself inthe lives of the narrators that provide the drama and the poignancy ofthe stories. In each we discover the narrator is dwelling upon thatwoman that he adored and in each we find the peculiar way in whichthey deal with this.In the Raven a man sits alone in his chamber reading ancient tomes seek desperately to keep his mind from thoughts of his lost Lenore.But he hears the sounds from without the chamber that could be perhapsthe ghost of his beloved. It is this irrational hope and fear that thebounds of goal can somehow be transcended and that he might once morespeak with his love that begins to lead to his irrational behaviour.When the titular Raven makes its appearance the narrator is workedinto such a fever of imagination guilt and fear that he perceives thebird as some emissary from beyond. So it is that its constantrepetition of never again are taken as both confirmation that thespirit of Lenore lives on and denial of him to ever speak to heragain. The narrator leaves us still locked with the bird intercommunicateupon it his own feelings of self-loathing and hate.Ligeia on the other hand is a statelier version of the narrat... ...e thing he identifies with inhis current situation. When after the raven appears to have refutedhis fantasy of Lenore he finds that he hates the raven as an extensionof himself and perhaps the raven is nothing more than the narratorsmetaphor for hi mself or at least some darker aspect of his mind.The of import difference between the two tales is that while Ligeia iscouched in real descriptive prose the Raven makes much more use ofmetaphor. That said the style of the poem is very much that of arhyming tale and as such is also similar to the prose structure of theshort story. In conclusion it should be noted that both are excellentattempts to tackle a difficult and provocative subject and they managethis in two similar but unique ways. It is the similarity, which lendsthem both business leader and the stylistic differences that mark them as beingexceptional.