"It was a night in the lonesome October of my most immemorial year"

[lisefrac]

Comments

[laurion]

Ping me through other mediums and I can put it in your hands.

[breakinglight11]

That Poe show sounds great! I actually LOVE Poe's poetry, though. I know everybody knows The Raven because it's so famous, but it really is a work of art. Even if you don't love it aesthetically, I've always found the technical accomplishment it represents to be mindblowing.

[lisefrac]

Now I feel kind of like a Philistine for not appreciating it :( I dunno. Maybe it's the kind of thing I need to study in more depth, like Edna. But I think I have a problem with the sing-song rhyminess of it not matching my expectations of the subject matter. I have the same problem with Emily Dickinson--it's hard to take seriously anything you can sing to the tune of "The Yellow Rose of Texas," I guess?

[breakinglight11]

Oh, God, not at all-- if anything I'M the Philistine for having such a mainstream, easy-to-understand favorite! :-) I completely get not liking the singsong quality, definitely a feature of Poe's poetry-- in fact, I think the accessible, child's-nursery-rhyme feeling of it is what makes it so memorable to people who don't really have the capacity to get into more complicated poetry. I do stand by my comment about the technical aspects of it being pretty cool though. Whether you actually LIKE that rhythm of it or not, he manages with both "Annabel Lee" and "The Raven" to establish a fairly precise and demanding rhythm without his word choice ever sounding forced or awkward. That's hard, man. And that impresses me. :-)