Eldorado Mood

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The poem, “Eldorado” by Edgar Allan Poe is about a brave knight who is searching for the mythical gold city, Eldorado. (Literally it translates to “The Golden”) The narrator is speaking to the reader about how the knight spent all of his life searching for this mythical city. At the end of the poem, the shadow is telling the narrator how to find Eldorado even after he dies. The mood of this poem starts out as optimistic as the narrator tells about the brave, valiant, knight, and the grand search for Eldorado, however, it soon shifts to a dark, depressing, type of mood. The talk of death and the desperation that the knight feels when the shadow is talking to him, it conveys a sense of gloom, desperation, and death. The theme of this poem starts …show more content…

One example is enjambment. Enjambment is the continuation of lines to emphasize specific parts of sentences. One example is in stanza one; “...Had journeyed long / Singing a song...” The split emphasizes his long journey and how he remained optimistic throughout the journey by making the reader focus on those certain parts of the area. That is only one example of how poe uses poetic devices in Eldorado. The next example is alliteration. In the last two lines of stanza one, Poe says, “Singing a song, / In search of Eldorado.” In this case, the “s” sound is repeated. Alliteration’s purpose in this case is to emphasize certain sounds, and as a result, shifts the reader’s focus to those words. The second example is in the last stanza; “‘Ride, boldly ride.’ / The shade replied... ” In this case, the “r” sound is repeated. The purpose of this alliteration is the same as the purpose for the previous phrase. The next poetic device used is the rhyme scheme. In Eldorado, rhyme is used to put emphasis on pairs of lines, and enjambment also plays a role in this device, too. With every pair of continuing lines, they rhyme. The rhyme scheme is AABCCB for all stanzas, except for the last stanza. The rhyme scheme in the last stanza is ABCDDB. Finally, the last poetic device is meter. Meter is the way in which the verses of the poem is said; in this case, what is analyzed is the syllables in each line. In every stanza except the last,

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