*This lesson was done completely asynchronously*
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?
Do Now: TEAM CHALLENGE -- Create a list of ALL the kinds/types of bells you’ve ever heard. The Team to create a list with the most amount WINS the points!!! You have only 2 Minutes!
This activity just asks for a list of different types of bells from groups. This is my list:
Doorbell Altar bells
Sleighbell Cowbell
Church bell Handbells
Alarm bell Service bell
We were given a PDF labeled “Oh Woe is Poe! PDF” - https://drive.google.com/file/d/1cPfYjmoyLzpq9gsuLNNGZNwB6El9U8IN/view?usp=sharing
It gives a summary of Edgar Allan Poe, explaining that he had quite a miserable and lonely life, losing so many people he cared about to tuberculosis, a common yet deadly disease that was a large cause of so many people’s deaths during that time. Poe turned to writing for comfort, though his works tended to be gloomy and dark, with themes such as murder, death and betrayal. He eventually turned to drinking, and was said to have died due to “congestion in the brain.”
Notes:
Musical or sound devices: convey and reinforce meaning (or experience) through the use of sound
Cacophony: Cacophony comes from the Greek word meaning, “bad sound.” Or Involving or producing a harsh, discordant mixture of sounds. In other words, consider the noises you may hear on a crowded city street: cars honking, people yelling, dogs barking etc...
Explosive Consonants: (k, t, g, d, p, b, q, c, x)
Hissing Sounds: (ch-, sh, and s)
Example: He is a rotten, dirty, terrible, trudging, stupid dude!
Cacophony can be used to convey dark feelings/thoughts, harsh or loud noises, chaos, violence or fear.
Think/Pair/Share: Highlight or underline words that are cacophonous, in the following examples.
“Beware the Jabberwock, my son! The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!” (“The Jabberwocky” by Lewis Carroll)
“I gave him a description of cannons, culverins, muskets, carabines, pistols, bullets, powder, swords, bayonets, battles, sieges, retreats, attacks, undermines, countermines, bombardments…”
(Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift)
All the words I highlighted had hissing sounds or explosive consonants, causing a hard or unpleasant sound to relate to the meaning of the sentence.
Poetic Sound Devices...
Euphonious: involving sounds that are soothing or pleasant to the ear. It is the opposite of cacophony.
It includes all the vowels
It has harmonious consonants, such as: (l, m, n, r and softer f and v, sounds).
Additionally, it uses soft consonants or semi-vowels such as: (w, s, y and th or wh) extensively to create more pleasant sounds.
Example: “While the stars that oversprinkle all the heavens seem to twinkle” -Edgar Allan Poe
Euphony is used to make language sound beautiful and melodic. If a writer is describing something they want to make seem attractive, pleasant, or beautiful, one of the best ways of achieving this is to make the language itself sound harmonious.
Think/Pair/Share: Highlight or underline words that are euphonious, in the following examples.
“Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness” (“Ode to Autumn” by John Keats)
“While the stars that oversprinkle/All the heavens seem to twinkle” (“The Bells” by Edgar Allan Poe)
These words are euphonious, with a smoother quality that makes them more pleasing to the ear. This gives a more happy or comfortable mood to the reader.
Poetic Sound Devices...
Alliteration: A stylistic device in which consecutive words or words that occur close together in a series all begin with the same first consonant letter or sound
Example: Jackrabbits jump and jiggle jauntily.
Red Room Poetry Object Poetic Device #1: Alliteration [2:00]
Onomatopoeia: A word which imitates the natural sound of a thing.
Example: The buzzing bee flew by
Example: The rustling leaves kept me awake.
Red Room Poetry Object Poetic Device #4: Onomatopoeia [2:36]
Repetition: Repeating words, phrases, lines, or stanzas. Repetition is used 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: a repetition of similar sounds in two or more words (especially common at the ends of words). Rhyme is pleasing the ear and also lends a sense of rhythm and order to the language.
Perfect rhyme occurs when stressed syllables of the words, along with all subsequent syllables, share identical sounds (ex: pencil" and "stencil”)
Imperfect rhyme or “slant rhyme” involves the repetition of similar sounds that are not quite as precise as perfect rhyme (ex: “uptown” and “frown”)
The pleasure of poetic pattern - David Silverstein [4:46]
“The Bells” By Edgar Allan Poe (YouTube)
I.
Hear the sledges with the bells—
Silver bells!
What a world of merriment their melody foretells!
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,
In the icy air of night!
While the stars that oversprinkle
All the heavens, seem to twinkle
With a crystalline delight;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells
From the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells—
From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.
II.
Hear the mellow wedding bells,
Golden bells!
What a world of happiness their harmony foretells!
Through the balmy air of night
How they ring out their delight!
From the molten-golden notes,
And all in tune,
What a liquid ditty floats
To the turtle-dove that listens, while she gloats
On the moon!
Oh, from out the sounding cells,
What a gush of euphony voluminously wells!
How it swells!
How it dwells
On the Future! how it tells
Of the rapture that impels
To the swinging and the ringing
Of the bells, bells, bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells,bells,
Bells, bells, bells-
To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells!
III.
Hear the loud alarum bells—
Brazen bells!
What a tale of terror, now, their turbulency tells!
In the startled ear of night
How they scream out their affright!
Too much horrified to speak,
They can only shriek, shriek,
Out of tune,
In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire,
In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire,
Leaping higher, higher, higher,
With a desperate desire,
And a resolute endeavor,
Now- now to sit or never,
By the side of the pale-faced moon.
Oh, the bells, bells, bells!
What a tale their terror tells
Of Despair!
How they clang, and clash, and roar!
What a horror they outpour
On the bosom of the palpitating air!
Yet the ear it fully knows,
By the twanging,
And the clanging,
How the danger ebbs and flows:
Yet the ear distinctly tells,
In the jangling,
And the wrangling,
How the danger sinks and swells,
By the sinking or the swelling in the anger of the bells-
Of the bells-
Of the bells, bells, bells,bells,
Bells, bells, bells-
In the clamor and the clangor of the bells!
IV.
Hear the tolling of the bells—
Iron Bells!
What a world of solemn thought their monody compels!
In the silence of the night,
How we shiver with affright
At the melancholy menace of their tone!
For every sound that floats
From the rust within their throats
Is a groan.
And the people- ah, the people-
They that dwell up in the steeple,
All Alone
And who, tolling, tolling, tolling,
In that muffled monotone,
Feel a glory in so rolling
On the human heart a stone—
They are neither man nor woman-
They are neither brute nor human-
They are Ghouls:
And their king it is who tolls;
And he rolls, rolls, rolls,
Rolls
A pæan from the bells!
And his merry bosom swells
With the paean of the bells!
And he dances, and he yells;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the paean of the bells—
Of the bells:
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the throbbing of the bells—
Of the bells, bells, bells—
To the sobbing of the bells;
Keeping time, time, time,
As he knells, knells, knells,
In a happy Runic rhyme,
To the rolling of the bells—
Of the bells, bells, bells:
To the tolling of the bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells—
Bells, bells, bells—
To the moaning and the groaning of the bells.
*Link in the title is a reading of this poem
**Links attached to words in the poem are links giving the definition of these words, where some may struggle to know what they mean
ANALYSIS OF POETRY
TEAM GROUP WORK
Analyze the first two stanzas. How do they compare, in terms of similarity?
The first two stanzas were pleasing, and the narrator was happy in those times. There were euphonious sounds that implied happiness and satisfaction. These would be joyful times in the narrator’s life.
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?
While stanzas 1 and 2 are merry, stanzas 3 and 4 are the opposite. These stanzas show agitation and despair, along with a sullen and morose mood. These stanzas would represent the part where the narrator’s life went downhill.
How does Poe use sound devices to imitate the sound of bells?
Compile a list of the devices you believe he used.
Poe used sound devices to imitate the sound of bells by expressing the mood of each stanza in the narrator’s view of the bells.
Cacophony - Repetition
Euphony
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 sound in the poem to show the change in attitude towards the same sound, indicating the mood changing. This expresses the message of the progression of life and of the feelings of the narrator. This poem technically represents bells, but symbolically shows the evolution of one’s life and the development one goes through in the course of their life. It shows the arc of events and mood towards life in general.
REFLECTION
Today, we learned about poetic sound devices, and their role in literature. Sound devices, like cacophony, euphony, repetition, rhyme, and alliteration, help give a certain feeling to the literary work as one reads it. For example, cacophony gives a hard, unpleasant sound, while euphony gives more of a peaceful and happy tone. The example given to us was “The Bells” by Edgar Allen Poe, where the mood rises and falls based on these poetic sound devices, invoking different feelings within the reader. These poetic sound devices can affect a reader's perception of the mood the author gives, and can be found in any piece of writing.
