According to Edgar Allan Poe, ?Beauty is the sole legitimate province of the poem.? Examine ONE or TWO poets studied on the course in the light of this statement.
When examining the poetry of Edgar Allan Poe it is strikingly evident that the notion of aestheticism was key to his intentions as an artist. However, Poe?s statement that ?Beauty is the sole legitimate province of a poem?(1) leads his reader to question as to what exactly Poe meant by the word ?Beauty?.
Much of Poe?s work concerns personal loss or tragedy, with the theme of the ?death of the beautiful maiden? (2) acting as the perfect vessel for an exemplum of the creation of beauty through the agony of loss. Poe was obsessed with his exploration of the human psyche, and it was only when he examined the inner depths of human despair that he found a niche powerful enough for the exploration of what he believed to be truly a beautiful subject. When referring to the ?death of the beautiful maiden,? particularly in relation to his own experiences, the poignancy of his subject offers substantial bearing to the argument that the cold calculated manner Poe claims in his Philosophy of Composition to have adopted as a creative process may in fact be created as the foundation of an elaborate semi-hoax.
Poe?s notions of beauty lie within his intentions to encapsulate and astound his reader, providing them with a subject so raw and delicate, portrayed through language so ornate, that he is able to take hold of his audiences psyche and allow them to share in the most wrought and heartfelt of his narrators emotions. In short, the beauty of Poe?s poetry does not simply lie within the presentation of his literature as a beautiful object, but in the conveyance and sharing of an emotional experience so remarkable that it could only be termed an act of unparalleled beauty.
For Edgar Allan Poe, ?poetry was a passion, not merely a purpose? (3) whilst his prose dealt with mystery and suspense, manipulating...