Edgar Allan Poe Background:

  1. Edgar Allan Poe lived from ______to ______.
  2. Poe was born in ______on ______.
  3. Describe Poe’s familial relationships.
  4. Where did Poe attend college?What did Poe do after college?
  5. Who did Poe marry? How old where they?
  6. What were some traumatic influences did Poe experience?
  7. Poe’s best-known stories are tales of the ______, but an important contribution he made to the literary world was the introduction of the ______.
  8. Poe was an ______, something attributed to his father’s habits.
  9. How did Poe die?
  10. What happens every year on the anniversary of Poe’s birth?
  11. What football team is the only professional sports team to be names after a literary work?

Vocabulary:

  • Rhyme
  • Repetition
  • Alliteration
  • Onomatopoeia

“The Raven” page 434-440 (Answer questions and chart on a separate sheet of paper)

*You must know the first stanza of “The Raven” for your quiz

  1. An example of an internal rhyme (sound device of internal rhyme consists of a rhyme that occurs within a single line of a poem, not at the ends of two different lines.)
  2. Reread lines 9–12. What does this passage imply about Lenore’s connection to the speaker and the reason for her absence? Give details to support your answer.
  3. What does the speaker’s frequent repetition tell you about his emotional state?
  4. Does Poe’s use of repetition in the first three stanzas achieve its purpose?
  5. Recall that a poem’s rhyme scheme is its pattern of end rhyme. Describe the rhyme scheme of this poem. How does Poe use repetition as part of the rhyme scheme?
  6. Reread lines 37–38. What example of onomatopoeia can you find?
  7. Identify the alliteration in lines 45–46. What words are emphasized by using this technique?
  8. Reread lines 58–59. What does this comment suggest about the speaker’s past experiences and his current mood? Explain.
  9. Identify the sound device used in lines 71–72. What qualities of the raven are emphasized by the use of this device?
  10. In lines89–96, whatwords does the speaker express his hope for relief from grief?
  11. Describe how the raven influences the speaker’s state of mind.
  12. Where and when do the events of the poem take place?
  13. What is the raven’s response to all of the speaker’s questions?
  14. What is the speaker’s explanation of the raven’s one response?
  15. In what month does the story of The Raven take place?
  16. What is the time of day/night that the story takes place?
  17. Name any word in the first stanza that contributes to single effect.
  18. Poe effectively uses color in The Raven. What color are the curtains & chair?
  19. What does this color represent?
  20. What is the next word? “…While I nodded, nearly napping, _____ there came a tapping…”
  21. What activity was the man involved in when the Raven came to him?
  22. The man asks the Raven four questions. Name two.
  23. What is the only word that the Raven could say?
  24. What is the name of the “rare and radiant maiden” of the poem?
  25. The Raven flew in and perched on a statue just above the chamber door. Who was the statue of?
  26. The line “And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor, Shall be lifted nevermore!” contains an example of what kind of figurative language?

Inferences About the Speaker / Clues
State of Mind
Recent Experiences

27. Copy the above chart in your answers so that it is large enough to reference three parts of “The Raven”. What conclusions did you draw about the speaker’s situation and his state of mind?
28. Write a brief summary of “The Raven”.

Annabel Lee by Edgar Allan Poe

It was many and many a year ago,

In a kingdom by the sea,

That a maiden there lived, whom you may know,

By the name of Annabel Lee;

And this maiden she lived with no other thought

Than to love, and be loved by me.

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;

With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven

Coveted her and me.

And this was the reason that, long ago,

In this kingdom by the sea,

A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling

My beautiful Annabel Lee;

So that her high-born kinsman came

And bore her away from me,

To shut her up in a sepulcher,

In this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in heaven,

Went envying her and me.

Yes! that was the reason (as all men know)

In this kingdom by the sea,

That the wind came out of the cloud by night,

Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love

Of those who were older than we -

Of many far wiser than we;

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.

For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams

Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;

And the stars never rise but I feel the bright eyes

Of the beautiful 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 her sepulcher there by the sea,

In her tomb by the sounding sea.

  1. Who does Annabel Lee represent in Poe’s life?
  2. Complete this line “I was a child and she was a child in this kingdom by the ___”
  3. Annabel Lee’s family shut her up in a sepulcher. What’s that?
  4. What is a seraph? (or seraphim?)
  5. The poet mentions two different things that remind him of Annabel Lee at night. Name one.
  6. Who causes Annabel Lee’s death?
  7. Why? (What’s the motive?)
  8. What was used to kill her?
  9. Fill in 2 blanks in this excerpt:
  10. “But our love it was stronger by far than the love
  11. Of those who were ____ than we--
  12. Of many far _____ than we….”