Aim: How does Edgar Allan Poe’s, “The Bells” convey and reinforce the meaning of the life cycle through his choice of poetic sound devices?
In this lesson we started with a timed team activity where we had to think of words that were related to “bell”. We were put into a breakout room, and my group came up with 9 terms: “Doorbell, chimes, sleigh bells, church bells, school bells, wedding bells, cowbells, hand bells, gong, bicycle bells”.
We then continued the lesson with the spirit reading of the provided pdf “Oh Woe is Poe” a biography of the life of Edgar Allan Poe. After reading the pdf we looked to the provided images on the slide, which summarized some of the major points of Poe's life.
The image of the gravestones with the word tuberculosis represents many people in Poe’s life dying of tuberculosis such as his mother, brother, first girlfriend, and wife. The images of the alcohol and the detective represent Poe’s alcoholism and how he is known for writing the first detective story. The image of the raccoon represents a possible cause of death (rabies) and the voting box represents how Poe might have been involved in a voting fraud before his death.
We then learned about poetic sound devices which are used to convey and reinforce meaning through the use of sound.
Cacophony: dark and harsh sounds that are used to convey dark feelings/thoughts, harsh or loud noises, chaos, violence or fear.
Cacophonous words include:
Explosive Consonants: (k, t, g, d, p, b, q, c, x, ch-, sh- etc...)
Hissing Sounds: (ch-, sh, and s)
As a team, we then identified the cacophonous words in the following sentences (underlined words)
Euphonious: soft and soothing sounds used to convey something as attractive, pleasant, or beautiful
Euphonious words include:
Harmonious Consonants: (l, m, n, r and softer f and v, sounds).
Soft Consonants/semi-vowels: w, s, y and th or wh
We also identified the euphonious words in the following sentences (underlined words)
We also learned of other poetic sound devices such as alliteration, onomatopoeia, repetition, and rhyme.
Alliteration is the consecutive use of words that begin with the same letter or sound.
Example: Jackrabbits jump and jiggle jauntily.
Video: Red Room Poetry Object Poetic Device #1: Alliteration
Onomatopoeia is a word that imitates the sound of a natural thing.
Example: The buzzing bee flew by.
Video: Red Room Poetry Object Poetic Device #4: Onomatopoeia
Repetition is repeating words, phrases, or stanzas to emphasize a feeling or idea, create rhythm, and/or develop a sense of urgency.
Example: Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.
Rhyme is the usage of words with similar ending sounds. There are two types of rhyme:
Perfect Rhyme: the ending sound of words are identical
Imperfect Rhyme/Slant Rhyme: ending sound of words are not same perfect or precise as perfect rhymes
Video: The pleasure of poetic pattern - David Silverstein
After reviewing the poetic sound devices, we moved on to reading and analyzing “The Bells” by Edgar Allan Poe. We filled out the chart below and then continued on to answering 4 more questions.
The first two stanzas are similar since they both are more positive and use euphonious words to convey a lighter tone. The first two stanzas are both using bells to describe positive things, the first stanza describes the lovely sounds of the bell and the second stanza describes the bells during a wedding, a happy occasion.
The second question was: “Now, compare the bells in stanzas 1 and 2 with the bells in stanzas 3 and 4. How does Poe’s mood shift in his poem?”
Poe’s mood shifts in his poem from light and happy in stanzas 1 and 2 to more ominous and dark in stanzas 3 and 4. The descriptions of the bell turn from euphonious words such as “molten-golden notes” to cacophonous words such as “moaning and the groaning”. The scenarios in stanzas 3 and 4 are different as well as it shifts to describe the ugly sounds of the bell and the reference of a funeral.
The third question asked was “How does Poe use sound devices to imitate the sound of bells?
Compile a list of the devices you believe he used.”
Poe used onomatopoeia, rhymes, as well as euphonious and cacophonous words to imitate the sound of bells. He used “tinkle, tinkle, tinkle”, “molten-golden notes”, “What a gush of euphony voluminously wells!/ How it swells!/ How it dwells”, “In the jangling, And the wrangling” to describe the sounds of the bell in both positive and negative tones.
The final question was This poem is as much about sound as it is about meaning. Why do you think Poe places a heavy emphasis on sound in this poem? What message does it help to express? How is this poem symbolically a metaphor for life?
Poe placed a heavy emphasis on the sound in this poem because the sounds shifted as the poem shifted from a lighter tone to a darker one. The sounds in the poem help it transition from one mood to another, the change in the poem as well as the shifting of the sounds helps express the passage of life. In the beginning stanzas it describes youth and childhood through lighter and happier sounds of the bell and as the poem progresses and the tone changes, the sounds of the bell become heavier and darker, symbolizing the darker aspects of life such as death.
Reflection:
In this lesson I learned about many different sound devices as well as their usage and impact in a poem in order to convey certains messages and ideas. In this lesson we learned about cacophony, euphony, alliteration, onomatopoeia, repetition, and rhyme. We analyzed the poem “The Bells” by Egdar Allan Poe and discussed how he used the sound devices in his poem to convey his ideas. In the first two stanzas of his poem, Poe used euphonious words to convey the beauty and happiness of childhood and youth. In the last stanzas, Poe’s words shift from euphonious to cacophonous as he shifts from a lighter mood to a darker tone. Alliteration, repetition, and rhyme are all used by Poe to create sounds that help convey certain ideas. I can use what I learned from this lesson to better understand what authors of poems are trying to say and enhance my own poems using these poetic sound devices. This lesson helps deepen my understanding of poems and allows me to create better poems of my own with the knowledge gained.
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