Preview

Edgar Alan Poe's "Annabel Lee" vs "Daddy" by Sylvia Plath

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
947 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Edgar Alan Poe's "Annabel Lee" vs "Daddy" by Sylvia Plath
Professor William Smith
English 106
25 October 2013
Death Makes Love Stronger
Love and Death go hand in hand; it seems as though love carries on and becomes even stronger once a loved one has passed away. When comparing the two poems “Daddy,” by Sylvia Plath and “Annabel Lee,” by Edgar Allan Poe. I found that these two particular poems have many similarities, as well as differences, but I feel that the similarities are more apparent.
First, in both of these poems, the authors discuss how they want to be nearer to their loved one, even though they are not alive. Plath says “At twenty I tried to die / and get back, back, back to you. / I thought even bones would do” (58-60). Sylvia Plath is implying that when she attempted suicide, she did so in an attempt to try and be physically closer to her father whom she seemingly hated, but obviously loves. Poe also describes being nearer to his dead lover at the end of “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 surrounding sea” (Line 38-41).
Coincidentally, Poe is stating that he physically lies next to his late lover while she is deceased in her tomb. Plath’s father and Poe’s lover are dead, and despite this fact they still long to be near their loved one. Plath does seem to have an intense feeling, maybe hate that is making her reminisce in a way that someone like Poe would be reminiscing about someone he is deeply in love with.Throughout both poems, the poets reminisce about their loved ones. Poe reflects back to when he and Annabel Lee were younger. Poe goes into slight detail about their young relationship: “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-“(7-10). Poe’s
“Annabel Lee,” is describing to us how they have been in love since they were young, further explaining



Cited: Plath, Sylvia. “Daddy.” Backpack Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, Drama, and Writing. 4th ed. Ed. X.J. Kennedy and Dana Gioia. New York: Pearson, 2012. 630-632. Print. Poe, Edgar Allan. “Annabel Lee.” Backpack Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, Drama, and Writing. 4th ed. Ed. X.J. Kennedy and Dana Gioia. New York: Pearson, 2012. 633. Print.

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    This essay will be comparing both of Edgar Allan Poe’s iconic poems of loss and moving on. These poems “The Raven” and “Annabel Lee” both conveyed this message about dead loved ones.But what makes these poems different is how they go about putting off this message. For example “The Raven” likes to use actual repetition of words such as nevermore. While in “Annabel Lee” poe likes to repeat the same theme without actually repeating the same words. Finally these essays are apart of early american literature history these were pioneers of their time by having darker themes and utilizing a mixing of many types of literature we take for granted today.…

    • 597 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    There are many themes that are seen in both the poems. These include Revenge, Anger, Depression and Death. The two key themes in the both poems; Murder and Jealousy are both portrayed in different ways according to each killer’s motives.…

    • 671 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    According to Poe’s biography, Annabel Lee was the last piece he wrote and then died after he composed it. Many has debated who really is Poe referring to as Annabel Lee, but Virginia…

    • 284 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    With insistent meter and captivating rhyme schemes, Edgar Allan Poe's "Annabel Lee" and "The Raven" are both very similar. However, in their views of love, namely the loss and mourning of beautiful women, they differ greatly. Through analysis of the two poems, the reader observes that whom Poe had chosen for a speaker, the tone and the sound effects are all factors in both poems that make two poems with a similar theme contrast.…

    • 521 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Diction In The Raven

    • 699 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Poe utilizes the raven as a means of placing a dark tone on his poem when the narrator asks if “[he] shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore-/ Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore” (94-95). The raven responds with “‘Nevermore’” (96). The widower questions the raven if he will ever get the chance to hold his wife again, and the raven replies that he will not, showing Poe’s tone of despair and misery. On the other hand, Poe creates a hopeful tone in “Annabel Lee” when, at the end of the poem, the narrator says, “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” (30-33). Declaring that even death cannot tear him and his love apart, the narrator believes that their souls will forever be together, no matter if she is in Heaven or Hell. This is much unlike “The Raven” in which the widower learns that he will never see his wife again. Poe’s tone in “Annabel Lee” provides a more peaceful atmosphere regarding the death of a loved one than that of “The Raven”. Both poems illustrate the ambiguities and uncertainties that that surround the death of a loved one and offer reactions to such…

    • 699 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    <br>With insistent meter and captivating rhyme schemes, Edgar Allan Poe's "Annabel Lee" and "The Raven" are both very similar. However, in their views of love, namely the loss and mourning of beautiful women, they differ greatly. Through analysis of the two poems, the reader observes that whom Poe had chosen for a speaker, the tone and the sound effects are all factors in both poems that make two poems with a similar theme contrast.…

    • 413 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    “Dying is an art, like everything. I do it exceptionally well. I do it so it feels like hell. I do it so it feels real. I guess you could say I’ve a call” – Sylvia Plath. Sylvia Plath was born in Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts on October 27th, 1932 and died in London, United Kingdom on February 11th, 1963 at the age of 31 years old. Sylvia is well known for her astonishing poem such as “The Bell Jar” and “Daddy”. Her parents were Aurelia Schober, who was a student at Boston University and Otto Plath, who happened to be Aurelia Schober’s professor at the time (Academy of American Poets). “In 1940, when Plath was eight years old, her father died as a result of complications from diabetes. He had been a strict father, and both his authoritarian attitudes and his death drastically defined her relationships and her poems—most notably in her elegiac and infamous poem "Daddy."” (Academy of American Poets).…

    • 599 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Masque of the Red Death

    • 367 Words
    • 2 Pages

    It reflects his personal life because Poe had a lot of deaths happen in his life, starting with his parents when he was young. These deaths were all related because at that time tuberculosis was the main cause of death. Reading his biography we soon see that all his loved ones died from tuberculosis. Although it is not clear of what he…

    • 367 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Poe had a really depressing childhood. His mother was an actress, which was not very high in the working class back then, who played Juliet in the play Romeo and Juliet. Six or seven times a week when Edgar was very young he would have to sit and watch his mother die in the play and then be alive again afterwards back stage. This probably messed his idea of death up greatly. Then when Edgar was almost three his mother died of tuberculosis then shortly after that his father, who was an alcoholic, disappeared. Luckily after both his parents were gone the Allan family adopted Edgar and raised him like he was there own son. They moved to England where Poe was sent to a private school. All was well for a few years, but as he got older the other students at his school rejected him. He had problems with his step father; the closer he got with his new mother, the farther he drifted from his new father. When he was 13 he moved back to Virginia with his family, where he fell in love with the mother of a girl in his class. Shortly after he fell in love with her she died of a brain tumor; this started the list of loved ones that were lost. One good thing that came out of her death, though, was it inspired Poe to write poems.…

    • 890 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Sylvia Plath was born on October 27, 1932 in Boston, Massachusetts. She lived with her parents Otto Emil Plath and Aurelia Schober Plath and later her brother Warren in the suburbs of Boston (Steinberg). Plath published her first poem at eight years old and was very intelligent. Some would even call her a model daughter because of her straight A’s, popularity in school, and her thrive to be perfect at everything (Gilson).…

    • 2845 Words
    • 12 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Better Essays

    "Alone," the simple yet complex poem by Edgar Allan Poe, can be viewed to be born from many different origins. What we do know about the poem is that it is simply beautiful. Even though its beauty is known by the contrasting metaphors and what not, we do have to take notice in why he wrote such a thing. Was it as a basis of telling us his thoughts or was it just for our entertainment? To me, "Alone" is a direct view of Poe's life and his hardships that came from it. His constant struggles and losses geared him into what he was during his time and in this poem, he expresses that very same thing. He takes notice in the bad and the good of every event. "Alone" is the epitome of Poe's thinking and his view of himself in the eyes of the public.…

    • 1505 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    The Raven Gothic Elements.

    • 1338 Words
    • 6 Pages

    In the first stanzas, Poe establishes that the character is filled with grief and sorrow, describing…

    • 1338 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Lady Lazarus Essay

    • 1516 Words
    • 7 Pages

    Sylvia Plath uses dark imagery, disturbing diction, and allusions to shameful historical undertakings to create a morbid yet unique tone that reflects the necessity of life and death in her poem, Lady Lazarus. Even though the imagery, diction and allusions presented in Lady Lazarus are entirely dark and dreary, it seems, looking more closely at Plath’s use of poetic devices, as if that the speaker’s attitude towards death is a positive one. The speaker longs for death, and despises the fact the she is continually raised up out of it. Shown mainly through the word choice, images, allusions, this depressing tone emphasizes the speaker’s feelings about death.…

    • 1516 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Poe is trying to say that it is only when we reach the end of our lives that we can truly sit back and appreciate the beauty in life. Often times it can take a new light to see the truth lurking in the shadows, perhaps in denial by ourself. Poe regrets not taking the time to experience the fullness of life, either getting caught up in trying to live out his life, that he forgets to stop and smell the roses.…

    • 621 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    1) De Nervaux, L. (2007). The Freudian Muse: Psychoanalysis and the problem of self-revelation in Sylvia Plath’s “daddy” and “medusa”. E-Rea : Revue Électronique D’Études Sur Le Monde Anglophone, (1). Retrieved from: http://erea.revues.org/186…

    • 1156 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays

Related Topics