Lenore
From Free net encyclopedia
- For the character invented by Roman Dirge, see Lenore, the Cute Little Dead Girl.
"Lenore" is a poem by the American author Edgar Allan Poe. It was first published in 1841, and was revised in the following years. It may have been influenced by the declining health of his young wife, Virginia Poe (she had ruptured an artery in 1842, from tuberculosis). It discusses proper decorum in the wake of the death of a young woman, described as "the queenliest dead that ever died so young". The poem concludes: "No dirge shall I upraise,/ But waft the angel on her flight with a pæan of old days!" The narrator finds it inappropriate to "mourn" the dead; rather, one should celebrate their ascension to a new world. A character by the name of Lenore, also a deceased wife, is also central to Poe's poem "The Raven".