The Bells, and Other Poems — Reading Notes

Sound as Structure in 'The Bells'

Poe's 'The Bells' is a study in acoustic mimicry. The poem's four sections each adopt a distinct bell type—silver, golden, brazen, iron—and a corresponding mood: merriment, happiness, terror, solemnity. The diction shifts accordingly: 'jingling and tinkling' gives way to 'screaming' and 'shrieking,' then to 'moaning and groaning.' The repetition of 'bells, bells, bells' mimics the relentless tolling, while the irregular line lengths and internal rhymes ('swells' / 'dwells' / 'tells') create a hypnotic, almost musical pattern. Dulac's illustrations for the poem capture these tonal shifts: the first plate shows a moonlit sleigh ride, the second a wedding scene, the third a fire engulfing a tower. The visual narrative reinforces the poem's descent from joy to despair.

Dulac's Visual Vocabulary

Dulac's illustrations for this volume are characterized by rich color, intricate detail, and a tendency toward the fantastical. In 'Annabel Lee,' the lovers are depicted in a moonlit seascape, the maiden's hair flowing like seaweed, while the kingdom by the sea is rendered as a dreamlike castle. For 'The Raven,' Dulac chooses a moment of stillness: the raven perched on a bust of Pallas, the scholar slumped in his chair, shadows pooling around them. The palette is muted—deep blues, greys, and blacks—contrasting with the brighter hues of 'Eldorado' and 'The City in the Sea.' Dulac's style, influenced by Persian miniatures and Art Nouveau, often frames scenes with ornate borders or decorative elements, as in 'Al Aaraaf,' where the text is surrounded by floral motifs and celestial figures.

Poe's Recurring Motifs: Loss, Beauty, and the Supernatural

Across the collection, Poe returns to a cluster of themes: the death of a beautiful woman ('Annabel Lee,' 'Lenore,' 'To One in Paradise'), the haunting power of memory ('Dreams,' 'A Dream within a Dream'), and the boundary between life and death ('The Sleeper,' 'Ulalume'). The language is consistently elevated, with archaic diction ('thee,' 'thou,' 'hath') and formal inversions. In 'The Conqueror Worm,' the metaphor of life as a play watched by angels culminates in the worm's victory, a grim image of mortality. Dulac's plate for this poem shows a skeletal figure in a theatrical setting, reinforcing Poe's fusion of spectacle and terror. The poems often employ a first-person speaker whose grief or obsession drives the narrative, as in 'The Raven,' where the protagonist's dialogue with the bird reveals his descent into madness.

The Range of Poe's Lyric Voice

While Poe is best known for his dark, rhythmic poems, this collection also includes lighter pieces. 'Eulalie—A Song' celebrates a love that transforms the speaker's world, with lines like 'Ah, less—less bright the stars of the night / Than the eyes of the radiant girl!' 'To Helen' (the shorter version) praises classical beauty, while 'The Lake—To——' finds solace in nature's solitude. Even in these poems, however, a note of melancholy persists: 'Eulalie' ends with the speaker's 'soul' growing 'faint' with joy, and 'The Lake' describes a 'terror' that is 'not fright, / But a tremulous delight.' Dulac's illustrations for these poems often soften the mood—'To Helen' shows a serene classical figure—but the text retains Poe's characteristic tension between ecstasy and dread.

Readers approaching this edition should attend to the interplay between Poe's sound patterns and Dulac's visual choices. The poems reward reading aloud, especially 'The Bells' and 'Ulalume,' where rhythm carries emotional weight. Dulac's plates are best examined after reading each poem, as they offer interpretive glosses rather than literal depictions. This volume provides a compact survey of Poe's poetic methods, from the musical to the macabre, and invites comparison between the verbal and visual arts.

Dulac’s Poe makes me think of how sound can carry a kind of ache—those bells that ring on past the poem. I found a similar echo in Ledwidge’s quieter music, where the fields remember their own losses. There’s a gentle sorrow in The Complete Poems of Francis Ledwidge with Introductions by Lord Dunsany — A Closer Reading that stays with you, like a bell heard from far off.