Dark Romanticism

The dark romantic authors would be against the Transcendental philosophy because of the things that they experienced in their lives. Nathaniel Hawthorne’s great grandfather saw that a bunch of innocent people were brutally killed all in the name of god. He wouldn’t believe that in listening to your intuition that you were listening to the voice of god. Neither would Melville, because he saw some really disgusting and terrifying things in his lifetime. While sailing around the world Melville saw cannibals. If that were me I’d think that the transcendentalists were insane. Poe had some really terrible things happen to him also. Everyone that he ever got close to died from TB.

I think that I’m more of a Dark romantic than a transcendentalist. Like the Dark Romantics I think that the transcendentalist philosophy is crazy. If I listened to everything my intuition told me to do I’d definitely be in a Prison somewhere. I also believe that everyone has a little piece of evil in them, because I’ve seen even the nicest of people turn over to the “dark side”.

I thought that the story was crazy and hilarious. I was very fun to read, but in the beginning it was kind of slow. I love the gore in the story. My favorite parts of the story are when he gouges Pluto’s eye out and hug hum, and the part where he lodged an axe into his wife’s brain and buried her within the wall. I also liked the part where the police find her corpse in the wall. The ending was a bit confusing; my thought was that it was his wife telling him to do all these crazy things. It illustrates what the dark romantics thought because it featured a character with a little bit of evil about him. “Beneath the pressure of torments such as these, the feeble remnant of the good within me succumbed. Evil thoughts became my sole intimates—the darkest and most evil of thoughts”

I thought the poem was really sweet and depressing at the same time. The poem is describing the way Poe felt as he was writing the poem. I think that the character of the Raven is not really a literal bird. I think that the raven is a symbol of Death, kind of like the grim reaper.

Alot of lines in the poem caught my attention. The first one that really stuck out to me was the part where he firsts opens the window to see who was tapping on it to find that it's nobody. And then he hears the name "Lenore". Then he hears the tapping again and opens the window and this bird flies in and perches on a bust of Athena.(Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door) I thought that part was kind of crazy. Then he asks the birds name and it says "Nevermore"(Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.')But the part that really caught my attention is when he says that the raven will problably leave him like so many people have left him before, and since we all know that all of the people that Poe ever loved died.(Till I scarcely more than muttered `Other friends have flown before -
On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before.'
Then the bird said, `Nevermore.')

That quote was definately anti-transcendentalist because it's saying that not everyone that listens to their intuition is doing the right thing. In the poem Poe states that The angels basically blessed him with this woman and then took her away for no reason.(`Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if bird or devil!
By that Heaven that bends above us - by that God we both adore -
Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn,
It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels named Lenore -
Clasp a rare and radiant maiden, whom the angels named Lenore?'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.')The Dark romantics beleived that there was a bit of evil in everybody, and i think that the bird is symbolic of the evil inside him.

One of the things you didn't mention was the fact that Edgar Allen Poe's Death is still a mystery. Some random guy found him layin in the streets deleirious. He was taken to the hopital and Died four days later on October 7th, 1849. He never was consious enough to tell them what had happened. Come to find out, he was wearing someone else's clothes. Many people started to beleive he was a victim of cooping. Which is where someone is forced to vote for a candidate over and over again.

I think that poe wrote really depressing works because of all the things he has experienced in his life. For instance "The Raven" being about his wife dying of TB, and Also Anabel Lee.