October Nightmares IV #30: Edgar Allan Poe Special (Part Three) - The Pit and the Pendulum (1842) & The Raven (1845)
I jest, obviously. Though it must be said that anyone who can make a poem about bells ringing throughout the seasons vaguely sinister, is hardcore. Even if Poe does try to pass off 'tintinnabulation' as a real word; that was the moment I realised Poe's literary genius cred was absolute bullshit.
Today I shall be looking at The Pit and the Pendulum and The Raven. These are Poe's most famous works, and ones which made an excellent Roger Corman film and The Simpsons episode (featuring an excellent James Earl Jones), respectively. The 1961 Pit and the Pendulum film takes massive liabilities with what is only a few pages long story, but features Vincent Price losing his goddamn mind.
The Pit and the Pendulum (1842)
Set vaguely during the Peninsular War (1808 - 1814), an unnamed narrator is brought before the judges of the Inquisition on trumped up charges. As he faces these sinister judges for hours, during which the long candles burn into mere stumps, the narrator realises he is going to die. One of the first lines is, "I was sick — sick unto death with that long agony", as the narrator anxiously awaits his fate. The judges sentence the man to death, and he faints in horror - like me whenever someone eats the biggest slice of my pizza.
Perhaps the reason for his fainting, can be attributed to the fact that the Spanish Inquisition is literary shorthand for authors writing the most deprived shit they can imagine. I have no doubt that during the height of the Inquisition, in the 1400's, they did some incredibly horrible things in the name of Catholic orthodoxy. But I don't think they had bottomless pits, swinging scythes, and red-hot metal walls which gradually move in towards the centre of the room. Because real-life doesn't base itself upon Hammer Horror films and heavy metal lyrics. Unfortunately.
But it is precisely those things that await our hero as he wakes up in a dark cell: the dungeons of Toledo, Spain - the Inquisition's equivalent of that torture warehouse in Hostel. Poe employs excellent use of the senses to really force home how horrible this place is. The Narrator cannot see: "I grew aghast lest there should be nothing to see...The blackness of eternal night encompassed me"; the dungeon is dank: "My outstretched hands at length encountered some solid obstruction. It was a wall, seemingly of stone masonry -- very smooth, slimy, and cold"; and the very air, oppressive: "I struggled for breath. The intensity of the darkness seemed to oppress and stifle me. The atmosphere was intolerably close."
Just your average Airbnb place, really.
It only gets worse from here. The narrator traverses the room, which is neigh impossible in size. But it does have a fucking bottomless pit in the middle of it, which he nearly falls down - saved only by his clumsiness. Explain that one, Darwin. Later when he reawakens, the Narrator discovers he is tied down on some kinky wooden frame. Above him, is a painting of Father Time (for some reason), and a razor sharp pendulum. It is swinging side-to-side, making its way down...
The Pit and the Pendulum represents Poe at the top of his game. It's entirely within his wheelhouse. Nothing is explained beyond the vague notion of the Inquisition just being absolute dicks. The dungeon itself is mysterious, resembling something H.H. Holmes would build. And by robbing the Narrator of his sight, Poe is able to drip feed the reader a vivid portrait of the unknown.
Poe has fun fucking with us throughout. Take this description of the Judges: "They appeared to me white -- whiter than the sheet upon which I trace these words -- and thin even to grotesqueness". We're so focused on the mysterious, sinister Judges that we scant realise that Poe is subtly telling us that the Narrator survives. This is in the first paragraph.
The ending's a bit of a cop-out though. The Narrator escapes the pendulum, thanks to some rats, but is forced towards the pit by the inward moving walls. Just before he can fall into the pit to his death, the Narrator is rescued by a heroic invading army. It's the fucking French army, if you can believe that.
The Raven (1845)
They're genuine words (unlike tintinnabulation), but how often do you see them outside of Poe's works? I once knew this guy who wrote his own Gothic poetry. It was all mostly repetitive shit about dead pagan girls. But one of his pieces utilised 'Plutonian Shores' - out of context, naturally. He claimed to never to have read The Raven. Of course, mate, and having a beard means you're a real Viking too.
Ok, so The Raven is a poem. But don't worry: this is no Shakespearean sonnet, it's a narrative poem. If you didn't do an English degree like all us cool kids, a narrative poem is structured more like a short story than a poem. These sort of poems feature a coherent story, narrator, and characters, but with a poem's typical structure and musicality. In the case of The Raven, it's split into 18 stanzas, or verses, of 6 lines apiece, and is (mostly) in the trochaic octameter. A trochee is a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed one, and in a octameter there will be 8 of these trochees per line. The rhyme scheme is ABCBBB, with internal (same-line) rhymes, which is apparently its own rhyme scheme known as 'The Raven Stanza'. Bitching.
Right, that's the English student side of things out of the way. Now, for the crude jokes.
The Raven opens with one of literature's greatest lines: "Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary". This line sets the tone for the rest of the poem. For one, it flows so well that the initial momentum is maintained throughout. But it also tells us that the poem is about a broody bastard. That's the best way to sum up the plot for The Raven. An unnamed narrator sits in his office, slowly going mad over his lost love, Lenore - who he simultaneously longs for and wishes to forget. Things slowly take a spooky turn, beginning with persons unseen knocking at his door and culminating in the visit of a strange raven who is able to utter a single word: "Nevermore".
Naturally, the Narrator is rather put out by this unwelcome visitor - who probably shits everywhere and eats all his seed. The Narrator attempts to argue with the bird, and ends up looking a right knob. I mean, the bird can say "Nevermore", but it's a fucking bird. A bird that is capable of speech, sure, but it's hardly capable of rational thought. He just ends up like one of those people at zoos who try to teach the parrots how to swear. Needless to say, the Raven wins: "And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting, On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door."
This is a great poem. It's exquisitely written, flows well, and has just the right amount of supernatural trappings. There are some awesome lines here: "Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing, Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before." It may have inspired several generations of Goths, but it's in a league of its own. There's more to Gothic poetry than carelessly mashing metaphors for death with the names of the classical gods.
On the surface, this is Poe's most straight forward work. It's clearly about a man who is pining for a lost or unobtainable love, and who is tormented by a bird that is not content with simply crapping on passers-by. But there are hints throughout of deeper allusions. At the start of the poem the Narrator is reading "many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore", which could be interpreted as black magic or occultism. Ravens are commonly known as 'devil birds', and the Narrator also makes reference to Pluto, the Roman god of the underworld. Ravens are also considered messengers, both good and bad, and the arrival of this particular raven coincides with the Narrator's wistful desire to see Lenore.
Then again, it could just be a poem about a man who leaves his window open and an annoying bird gets inside his home.
Comments
Post a Comment