18 pages • 36 minutes read
Edgar Allan PoeA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
“Annabel Lee” is comprised of six stanzas, all of which rely on irregular rhyme schemes—the long lines are often unrhymed, while the short lines always rhyme—which creates a unique tension between the work’s structural tendencies and its emotional free-spiritedness throughout the poem. In addition, with Poe’s consistent metrical employment of anapests (two unstressed syllables succeeded by a stressed syllable) and iambs (an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable), “Annabel Lee” is a poem which—as enjoyable as it is to read silently upon the page—is thrilling to read (or hear read) aloud.
A unique component of the form of “Annabel Lee” is the fact that each of the poem’s six stanzas comprise a complete sentence. In other words, the poem is six sentences long, and each of those sentences successfully employ enjambment in order to help create drama and tension at key moments in each of the stanzas.
Finally, the form of “Annabel Lee” is one of the earlier instances of narrative poetry in 19th century American poetry: It tells the complete—from beginning to end—story of its central characters in a compressed space.
By Edgar Allan Poe
A Dream Within a Dream
A Dream Within a Dream
Edgar Allan Poe
Berenice
Berenice
Edgar Allan Poe
Hop-Frog
Hop-Frog
Edgar Allan Poe
Ligeia
Ligeia
Edgar Allan Poe
Tamerlane
Tamerlane
Edgar Allan Poe
The Black Cat
The Black Cat
Edgar Allan Poe
The Cask of Amontillado
The Cask of Amontillado
Edgar Allan Poe
The Conqueror Worm
The Conqueror Worm
Edgar Allan Poe
The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar
The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar
Edgar Allan Poe
The Fall of the House of Usher
The Fall of the House of Usher
Edgar Allan Poe
The Gold Bug
The Gold Bug
Edgar Allan Poe
The Haunted Palace
The Haunted Palace
Edgar Allan Poe
The Imp of the Perverse
The Imp of the Perverse
Edgar Allan Poe
The Lake
The Lake
Edgar Allan Poe
The Man of the Crowd
The Man of the Crowd
Edgar Allan Poe
The Masque of the Red Death
The Masque of the Red Death
Edgar Allan Poe
The Murders in the Rue Morgue
The Murders in the Rue Morgue
Edgar Allan Poe
The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket
The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket
Edgar Allan Poe
The Oval Portrait
The Oval Portrait
Edgar Allan Poe
The Philosophy of Composition
The Philosophy of Composition
Edgar Allan Poe