Women as Ethereal and Absent Lovers: Analysis of Five Poems of Edgar Allan Poe

Abstract

The purpose of this literary research project is the analysis of the thematic content as well as the formal devices of five of the poems written by Edgar Allan Poe. In order to connect and find the common concepts that pertains to this research, the following poems were chosen: “Annabel Lee” (1849); “Leonore” (1845); “To Helen” (1831); “The sleeper” (1831); and “Ulalume” (1847). In spite of the importance of poetry for Poe, it is noticeable the lack of pieces of research about this issue when compared with the number of researchers about his short stories. With this in mind, our attempt with this work is to make a study regarding one of the most relevant and recurrent subject in his poems: the presence of women, who were an unsolved issue in his entired life. Five poems have been chosen to this purpose, and converging on the concept of women as ethereal symbols and absent lovers existing beyond the limits of the terrestrial body. These descriptions of an idealized concept of women made contrast with some lewd female characters commonly developed by other American authors that were also concerned with horror stories. Our attempt is to take the transgressive allusions present in these poems in the light of Poe`s own background through his life in the American puritan society.