#annabell

The poem acts as a requiem for a young maiden's life, and if the title of it wasn’t convincing enough, it’s quite obviously what Lenore was based off.

The first section of the poem is the narrator calling everyone to weep over Lenore’s death. “An anthem for the queenliest dead that ever died so young--A dirge for her the doubly dead in that she died so young...” These two lines set a mood in the poem. As if they were mourning what she could’ve been since she died so young, not what she was. Nerveless there are people mourning Lenore, but in the webcomic you can get the sense they are doing it out of politeness, not grief.

It’s made clear in the next section that she wasn’t well liked for being herself. “Wretches! ye loved her for her wealth and hated her for her pride..” which is a constantly shown in Lenore’s flashbacks, and even at Nevermore. She has to dumb herself down in the living world. When Thomas dies her grief is ignored, and when she shows the slightest bit of her true self she is berated and forcefully driven into insanity (which may also may happen with the stuff they give her her but that’s for another post). Even at Nevermore Academy her demanding answers and confidence is shameful, the main difference though is it’s shameful because she’s being a disruptive student, in the living world it’s shameful because she’s a woman. 

Another point could be this: She has the wealth, why can’t she play along? If she just went with the status quo she could play along, use her dad’s wealth. If she plays along she can get a rich husband, and use his wealth. Lenore isn’t like that though. She refuses to sacrifices her wants and desires for a comfortable life and sticks to her morals. You can see this at the Academy when she refuses to give the Deans respect because she doesn’t fell as if they deserve it. It one of the main identifying parts of her character.

Yet another thing to point out, the narrator is calling the people he’s talking to insults. That it was shameful to only love the materials she had instead of her. So who is the narrator? My first thought is maybe in episode 66 where we see Annabel’s thoughts, maybe this could be her. She is the one mad about Lenore’s death. She is the only one to mourn, in quietness, but she still does. She’s the only one who knows Lenore, not her wealth. But I don’t really think this too much honestly...

“And when she fell in feeble health, ye blessed her--that she died!“ Is the line directly after. This could be public opinion. One, she was in so much pain and suffering, that it’s nice she’s in peace now. Two, the one I’m leaning toward, she was contributing nothing, and causing uneasiness due to her insanity, so it’s good she’s gone. That may not be what the poem itself is implying, however, it does seem to be the opinion in the living world of Nevermore. Even in episode 66, Lenore’s father forsakes her refusing to acknowledge she ever existed because she’s dead now. She’s not a problem anymore.

The poem starts talking about how the narrator hopes she ascends to heaven, and there is stuff that I could talk about but I’ll save that for another post.

However following that, one line that I find interesting is “Leaving thee wild for the dear child that should have been thy bride--For her, the fair and debonair, that now so lowly lies...” The narrator seems to be mourning that she will never marry, which is a key thing Lenore hates with the whole “I rather die then marry.” mentally she states to have. But society only thinks of her good for marrying, giving kids, and dying. 

The part of the sentence that I find more intriguing is the “For her, the fair and debonair, that now so lowly lies...” At first I thought this was referencing the groom she would never have, when I looked up the word debonair.

Debonair- One who exhibits charming, confident, and stylish traits, usually referring to a man

But then I remembered how to read English and it says. “For her, the fair and debonair...”. Which fits perfectly to the comic with her taking her a man’s identity. Her being charming, confident, stylish, and prideful was no longer shamed once she was under the lens of a man. 

Moving on. “The life upon her yellow hair but not within her eyes--The life still there, upon her hair--the death upon her eyes.” So for the poem I think it’s talking about her corpse. However it does bring up some symbolism. It takes her fake death for Lenore to regain her will of life. Even more, it takes Annabell. She probably thought she’d live out her life in a room, being forced to take the drugs she hates. It took her metaphorically killing her previous self, to be who she was. It takes someone else’s name for her to be recognized and accepted. The girl she was is dead. She now has a new life, and she wants to share it with Annabel.

The rest of the poem is wishing her a good ascent to heaven so she can rest.

So, ending thoughts.

The comic making her prideful and confident, being something that is hated in the in her life is implied in the poem, and it’s just cool to see the inspiration for Nevermore, and how it correlates. 

It seems Nevermore’s writers, used the seemly innocent and good wishing requiem of a young maiden's death to make a deep character who would probably hate her own eulogy because that wasn’t her. Which is insanely interesting. It’s actually awesome how they could've took the smallest word to make a big plot point in the comic (debonair). I’m just glad I figured out that the webcomic was based on Edgar Allens Poe’s works.