Edgar Allan Poe Cartoon Could Haunt Me Forevermore

 

An Edgar Allan Poe cartoon is haunting me. Sent in an email by a good old friend who happens to be a fine writer, I know the cartoon was sent with good humor. I guess some people - perhaps many people - will take it as a joke. I understand that, yet I take it as something else entirely. 

The cartoon is related to Poe's famous and wonderful poem "The Raven," which even people with no clue about literature have probably heard about. This could be indirectly by those fans of the Netflix series Wednesday, which is a reboot of the popular 1960's TV show The Addams Family. The academy in the school is called Nevermore, and even if you do not watch that show you are probably familiar with the line "Quoth the Raven Nevermore" from the poem because it is part of popular culture as much as "To be, or not to be" is from Shakespeare. 

I guess in my own version of "a midnight dreary," I am taking the cartoon for much more than it is. The poem for me is about the slow, tedious, and frightening torture of a man by a seemingly sadistic bird. He is mourning his "lost Lenore." This is not a laughing matter, and I should know because I have lost people I love, and luckily never had a raven tapping on my chamber door.  

I read the poem over again to see if I was resisting the humor of the cartoon without merit; however, after reading the poem again I sat quietly and realized that there is indeed nothing to laugh about. I can somberly admire the poet for his depth and vision. I can feel the anguish that he feels, but none of the words brought a smile to my face. 

I got up, went out and took a walk, and then came back to my own chamber where a bust of William Shakespeare stares back at me from the shelf adjacent to my writing desk. I usually glance at old Will when I'm writing and hit a rough spot or need a little inspiration, and I recall that he wrote all of his works with a pen that he dipped in an inkwell. It should seem to me that I have it easy writing on a laptop, but peaks and valleys in my writing still exist. 

I stared at the picture again and read the poem over again, with an occasional glance at my bust of old Will. In the poem the bust that the Raven perches on is Pallas Athena – Goddess of Wisdom. Eddie didn't randomly pick that bust. He was contrasting the author's grief which is understandable but purely emotional, while the bust represents moving on from grief in order for it not to defeat you.

I get it now – the cartoon features the expression on Edgar's face showing his displeasure in the bird's intrusion on his grief. The bird in the cartoon says that Edgar can "quoth me on that." We accept that the bird is talking in the poem, so why not take it one step further. Is the bird trying to convince him to move on or not?

Maybe Edgar doesn't want to get over it, and perhaps the Raven drives him to go deeper into grief. The whole point is the bird goes from muse to tormentor, reminding him that he will sink deeper and deeper into the abyss. If we look again at the ending of the poem, we know the truth as well: 

And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting

On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;

And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,

And the lamplight o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the

floor;

And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor

Shall be lifted- nevermore!

The ending of the poem reflects the downward spiral of the rest of Poe's life after the publication of the poem in January 1845. His loss of parents, stepparents, and lovers is well knows. We may never know how Poe ended up being found on a Baltimore sidewalk in poor condition. He was taken to Washington College Hospital. On October 7, 1849, his reported last words were "Lord, help my poor soul."

So, okay, I'm okay with cartoon now, but I still find it somewhat less than funny. I will try to get over this now, but to add self inflicted salt to my wounds, I have printed out a copy of the cartoon and pinned it on the wall next to old Will's bust, where I think I will keep it for a long time or perhaps forevermore!