Edgar Allan Poe once asserted, “Beauty of whatever kind, in its supreme development, invariably excites the sensitive soul to tears.” The ingenuity of this intricate yet simple poet has molded and shaped the elegance of all aspects of modern poetry. His tumultuous life story directly effects the styles and lyrics of his poetry, leaving his audience with a captivating perspective of his personal feelings and emotions. With his insatiable desire for love and affection, Edgar Allan Poe supplies his audience with enthralling and exhilarating descriptions of beauty and love through powerful allusion, graphic imagery, and poetic form.
A Short Biography of Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe’s wealth of literary success and fame was marred by his recurrent addiction with women, mental depression, and drinking. Born in January of 1809, he became an orphan at the early age of two after both of his parents had died. Although adopted by a wealthy Virginian family, he struggled with his relationships in his new-found residency. After being expelled from the University of Virginia, he enrolled in the military academy of West Point. With no steady source of income, Poe “forced himself” into being expelled from West Point. Expulsion from West Point became the catalyst to his literary career; he published two of his works before the age of twenty one. Not realizing his literary success, Poe worked as a literary critic with various newspapers and magazines (Magill 2240-2241). This job sparked his literary career, as he became an unpopular yet successful critic, known for his “probing, analytical quality” (Harris 491). He married his cousin, Virginia Clemm, who died at an early age from technicalities of an erupted blood vessel. Poe published a literary work during this hardship with his wife, a poem entitled “The Raven,” after which he became a renowned and qualified poet. He never fully recovered from the death of his wife, investing his time in drinking and other women. This poet’s brief life of fame came to an abrupt halt when on October 7, 1849, he died from excessive drinking and delusion. Abuse of alcohol and bouts of depression destroyed his unique ability for writing and criticizing poetry and other literary works (Magill 2241).
With Poe having an unaltered obsession with morbidity and love, both views are frequently expressed throughout the tales of his poetry in explicit yet complex detail. His poems are overflowing with vivid imagery, multifaceted diction, and a myriad of poetic strategies. His poetry voiced general themes of nature, love, and death. He often wielded the rhetorical strategies of alliteration and allusion to facilitate emphasis on important characteristics of his poetry. Poe believed that the “poet must be concerned above all with the effects to be produced on the reader.” The quality of diction, theme, setting, and other literary devices employed in Poe’s work demonstrates his unique and distinguished writing style (Magill 2241-2246).
In the poem below, Edgar Allan Poe elaborately expresses his admiration for the beauty of a woman, Helen, and his descriptions of that beauty.
Edgar Allan Poe’s To Helen Analysis
“To Helen”
Helen, thy beauty is to me
Like those Nicaean barks of yore,
That gently, o’er a perfumed sea,
The weary, way-worn wanderer bore
To his own native shore.
On desperate seas long wont to roam,
Thy hyacinth hair, thy classic face,
Thy Naiad airs have brought me home
To the glory that was Greece
And the grandeur that was Rome
Lo! in yon brilliant window-niche
How statute-like I see thee stand,
The agate lamp within thy hand!
Ah, Psyche, from the regions which
Are Holy Land!
Dwelling within “To Helen” is the persuasive and vigorous utilization of mythological and historical allusion. Both forms of allusion play an important role in the message of the poem. Firstly, Poe launches his poem with a historical allusion to the Byzantine city of Nicaea. This city prospered in the Byzantine Empire, known for its illustrious architecture and splendor. He compares this city and its beauty to “Helen” and her “beauty” (l. 1). Poe continues in his poem to make historical allusions to “the beauty of fair Greece and the grandeur of old Rome” (ll. 9-10). Greece and Rome were both prolific and wealthy empires during their time of reign; these allusions, along with the allusion to Nicaea, lavish praise upon Helen. The strength of these allusions presents Helen as an item of worship and adornment, not just an attractive woman with “hyacinth hair” and a “classic face” (l. 7). Secondly, Poe integrates mythological allusion to add a sense of mystery and wonder to Helen’s loveliness. In lines 3 through 5, Poe alludes to Greek mythology to convey an awareness of attraction to Helen, the legendary Helen of Troy. His allusion pertains to that of Ulysses, “returning from his victorious campaign against Troy, weary, way-worn, approaching Ithaca at last…”. With Ulysses returning home after a strenuous journey, he is undoubtedly relieved and joyous that he has returned to his own residence (Claudel 235-236). Poe wields this allusion to articulately describe Helen’s lover: Poe himself. Poe finds a sense of physical as well as emotional attraction to Helen. He is ecstatic and blessed to be within her charming countenance, even though he is “weary” and “way-worn” (l. 4). Wielding these two types of allusions emphasize Helen’s beauty and Poe’s appreciation of it.
Vision is one of the most powerful tools for memory, and Poe masters this tool through his use of vibrant imagery. Poe accentuates Helen’s physical features through imagery. Helen’s hair is comparative to that of a hyacinth, a flower that is small and compact with spiked, bell-shaped blossoms. This flower furnishes the image of a lady with her hair placed delicately in buns. Roger Asselineau describes Helen as having a “classic face” (l. 7), which refers to the supernatural beauty of a “goddess” (Asselineau 18). Imagery in the poem reveals Helen as a “statute-like” (l. 11) woman standing “in yon brilliant window-niche” (l. 10). His portrayal of Helen is like a tall woman erected as a goddess within a “window-niche” (l. 10), which is a recess in a wall or window specifically for a vase or a statue. Veneration comes to a climax when Poe depicts Helen with an “agate lamp within thy hand” (l. 13). An agate lamp is used to hold an agate, a delicate spectacle of awe, possibly a precious gem or metal. This apex of the visionary description of Helen embellishes the idea that, as Roger Asselineau asserts, “the poet worships her for her holiness rather than her beauty” (Asselineau 18).
The stability of a poem relies on the structural basis on which it is established. Written in a three-stanza, cinquain format, “To Helen” builds itself upon this firm foundation of literary excellence. Each stanza represents a gradual change in the flow of the poem. The first stanza recollects the idea of Helen’s idealistic visage from the thoughts of a “weary, way-worn wanderer” (l. 4). This introspective view gives insight into the personal emotions and feelings towards Helen as the “wanderer” awaits her. The second stanza aptly intensifies Helen’s magnificence, where the reader can see the change from the past, introspective image to the present, realistic image of Helen. In the third and final stanza of the poem, the reader looks into the future as Helen is portrayed as a manifestation of radiance, so much so as to be compared with the Greek goddess “Psyche” (l. 15). The differing collections of visual imagery exploit the author’s personal attractions to this seemingly unattainable lady. Poe displays Helen superbly with the use of the past, present, and future descriptions of her.
Amidst the hardships and depression of life, Poe produced thrilling and priceless works of literary genius throughout his wavering career. Poe conveyed his elaborate messages by mastering the intricate details of the short story and the poem. Although his life was short-lived, his works remain buried deep within the heart of American literature.
Works Cited
Magill, Frank N., ed. Critical Survey of Poetry. Vol. 5. Edgewood Cliffs: Salem Press, Inc., 1982.
Claudel, Alice Moser. “Poe as Voyager in ‘To Helen.'” New Approaches to Poe: A Symposium. Hartford: Transcendental Books, 1970.
Asselineau, Roger. “Edgar Allan Poe.” American Writers. Vol. 3. 22 Jan. 2006. http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/Scribner/s1449#SourceCitation
Harris, Laurie Lanzen, ed. Nineteenth-Century Literature Criticism. Vol. 1. Detroit: Gale Research Company, 1981.
