William Cullen Bryant and Edgar Allen Poe are among the many poems that the exercise the art of writing Romantic literature. These two poet writers use romantic literature as a way of expressing their feelings towards the global community. Romantic literature in most case is impractical in terms of the language used by the poem but it is also imaginative form of expressions one’s feelings (Canuel 172). It is important to note that romantic organicism literature portray strong feeling towards something without necessarily giving a reason. To understand the difference between Bryant’s and Poe’s literature, it is crucial that we look at some of their respective poems. This paper will examine two poems written by Bryant and Poe, “Thanatopsis” and “The Tell-Tale Heart” respectively, as samples of romantic literature and also to compare both of their unique forms of writing.
“Thanatopsis” is a romantic masterpiece poem written by William Cullen Bryant in the 19th century (Canuel 175). Thanatopsis is a romantic poem is humankind and nature. The poem structurally narrates how man and nature are linked. Bryant’s uses this poem to echo religious beliefs that man comes from earth but in his last days on earth he will be rejoined with earth again. The poem points out that when a person dies, he/she meets his ancestors and those that died before him. In this poem, Bryant personifies Mother Nature as a ‘she’ and uses ‘man’ to represent the human race. It is crucial to note that through these two gender roles, they are both attracted to each and in the process they can rekindle the romance between them. Bryant starts the poem by writing, “To him who is in love of Nature holds - Communion with her visible forms (Bryant 470).” For one to understand the element in this poem, one needs to keep in mind that nature represents ‘she’. This line in the poem symbolizes a linkage between man and nature is inevitable. The writer makes this poem romantic by writing, “Go forth under the open sky, and listen - To nature’s teachings while from all around - Earth and her waters, and the depths of air, - comes a still voice (Bryant 470).” Bryant describes Mother Nature that surrounds the human kind, calm and comforting. The comfort aspect is symbolic of a lover that always gives one a piece of mind and one’s partner who offers support when things get tough (Canuel 179). This poem is filled with romantic ideas and gestures that happen between Mother Nature and man. In addition, Bryant makes use of personification to drive the point home. For example, Bryant writes, “Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim – Thy growth, to be rolv’d to earth again..”(Bryant 471). This line parallels Genesis in the Bible where Adam was made from dirt by God and when one dies, his body become dirt after decomposition. This indicates that Bryant is writing his feelings to express how man and earth will become one again after his human death. After the death of the human kind, one will “be brother to the insensible rock (Bryant 471).” Bryant uses this connection to show how the human race and nature are inseparable. This can also invoke reason as why the human race should be gentle on Mother Nature as they are part and parcel of the same nature they are destroying.
Bryant uses romantic literature to reflect the communion of life and death. Life and death are the two things that the human race cannot escape on this earth despite one’s social or economic status (Canuel 176). Thus, Bryant uses a softer outlook to these two elements through a romantic sense such that the human flesh has to go back into dirt after death. This poem illustrates that man should not be scared of death but rather embody it because man and nature have a communion. Bryant write that, “Thou go not , like the quarry-slave at night, - Scourged to his dungeon, but sustain’d and sooth’d – By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave, - Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch – About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.”(Bryant 471). This line in the poem is powerful in that Bryant wants people to embrace death despite leaving one’s family and friends. He believes that death should be beautiful and makes one free like the ‘drapes of the couch’. According to this poem, death should not be fearful but a celebration of one’s life and a reunion with Mother Nature.
Edgar Allan Poe is also known for his unique romantic literature by writing a poem known as “The Tell-Tale Heart.” Unlike Bryant, Poe uses his poem characters in the poem to deliver a different perspective of death. Poe’s perspective to death is a negative one unlike Bryant’s who looks at death in a positive manner and something that human kind should yearn for as one joins their ancestors. Poe uses his poem to criticize death and portray it as a negative aspect to the human race. The poem “The Tell-Tale Heart” plotline is one man being haunted and tormented by another man’s eye. One of the lines in the poem that is symbolizes romance is where Poe writes, “I loved the old man’ ‘I think it was his eye!-yes, it was this! He had the eye of a vulture-a pale blue eye, with a film over it! Whenever it fell upon me, my blood ran cold; and so, by degrees I made up my mind to take the life of the old man, and thus rid myself of the eye forever (Poe 727).”
This poem indicates a love-hate relationship between a man and an old man with an evil eye. Though the character in the poem loved the old man, the old man had an evil eye such that the character in the poem killed him because of his unusual eyes. The controversy in the poem makes Poe a unique poet compared to other romantic poets. This is because in the poem the character kills the old man despite the fact that he/she loves the old man. The old man physical looks were weird such that the character in the poem wanted to kill him despite his strong romantic feelings towards him. Poe takes up romantic literature by explaining to the audience the relationship between the character and the old man before his death. Poe indicates that the character visited the old man seven times after the midnight so as to kill the evil eye (Canuel 277). However, the character could only accomplish killing the old man when the ‘evil eye’ is open. Due to this reason, the character kept going back to the old man’s house at night to accomplish the deed, kill. However, the eighth night is the pinnacle of the romantic story between the main character and the old man. Poe writes that on the eighth day the ‘EVIL EYE’ was opened and had a ray of light shining on it (Poe 727).
Poe uses romantic terms to demonstrate a romantic relationship between the eye and the main character in the poem. In addition, the poet capitalizes the evil eye to indicate that the old man and the evil are two separate components and are in one. Thus, the main character has to kill the evil eye that dwells inside the old man that the character loves (Canuel 278). However, this is not that case in that after the main character accomplishes the killing of the old man with an evil eye, the old man is deemed as dead but the evil eye continues on living. At the end of the poem, Poe indicates that the police are called because of screams in the apartment where the old man had been killed by the main character (Poe 728). It is until this time that it dawns to the character that the evil eye, which symbolizes death, keeps on living whereas the dead old man whom the character loved, dies. This makes the character feel guilty because his act when he kills the old man. As a result, Poe gives a unique view towards death because he believes that despite the fact death takes away many lives, it continues to live (Canuel 280). This shows that Poe does not like the game played by death as it is an unfair one. Given the fact that people die but death continue to be inexistent in the global community, it is an unfair game. At the end of the poem, Poe indicates the eye with the evil will continue to haunt the main character through death thereby, causing the main character to take more lives with the aim of destroying the evil eye.
In conclusion, both Poe and Bryant are two prominent romantic literature poets that have different lenses when describing death. In the poem “Thanatopsis,” written by Bryant he describes death as something that is attached to the human kind. Thus, humans should embrace death because it symbolizes a reunion between nature and man as recorded in religious texts. On the other hand, Poe takes a different phenomenon in describing death as a negative aspect and something that unfair. Poe describes a form of complicated relationship between the main character and the old man with the evil eye, where both of these two features represent two different things. The main character has love for the old man but hates the evil eye in him and has to kill him. In the long run, the main character loses someone he loves to death whereas the evil eye that represents death keeps on living.
Works Cited
Bryant, William Cullen, and J. P. Simmons. Thanatopsis, and other poems. New ed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1930. Print.
Canuel, Mark. Shadow of death: literature, romanticism and the subject of punishment. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2007. Print.
Poe, Edgar Allan. The complete tales and poems of Edgar Allan Poe. New York: Modern library, 1938. Print.
