Week Four - Lionizing, Ligeia, and Morella

Lionizing

This is amazing. I never realized what a sense of humor Poe had... or that he was kind of perverted. I do realize he is using satire to make a point, and I appreciate that. Had I read this short story back when it was first written/published, I am sure I would have gotten it right away. As it was, I read this in the year 2009 and had to look up a bunch of stuff and I still didn't get that he wasn't actually referring to nosology. Upon my third reading of the story, and replacing "nose" with "penis" this story became so much better. I thought I would die of laughter, and I have to be honest: totally impressed with Poe. He comes off as a very dark, depressing person but this short just goes to show that he has a sense of humor and isn't as dark and scary as people seem to think.

Ligeia

This is the first time I have read Ligeia and it was trippy. There is a theme of resurrection in this that is very creepy. Ligeia is someone the narrator is married to and of course she dies. He seemed to love her very much, though he had no idea what her last name was. How does one miss that information? That is really confusing to me. Anyway, he ends up remarrying someone who seems to be Ligeia's exact opposite. Her name is Rowena. The narrator seems to hate Rowena and I get the impression that he tortures her because of this. When Rowena dies, the narrator watches her come back to life... but the body seems to transform and become Ligeia. The narrator is most likely happy as all get out since he loved Ligeia more than Rowena.

Morella

This story seems very simple to me. Morella is pregnant and dying, but the narrator only lets on that he knows she is dying. I don't know how he doesn't know she's pregnant, but a lot of people don't think much of it. He wants Morella to die, too, he doesn't really care for her. Morella knows she is dying and tells her husband that she will live on after her death. She dies giving birth, and the baby does not breathe until Morella is dead.
According to the text, the child grows faster than normal and even shows signs of having adult powers and the faculties of a woman. All signs point to Morella inhabiting the child. The narrator loves the child though, which I find to be the only normal thing about the man (you know, that he actually loves his kid). This changes though when he finally names her... he names her Morella and when she is named she yells out "I am here!" So... by being named she is really reincarnated into the child. Then she dies (we don't know how but I think that the narrator killed her) and when he puts her in the tomb he sees that there is nothing left of the first Morella. That could be for a few reasons... my favorite one being that the daughter was truly Morella reborn and that the body was just... gone.