Narrator's Desire For Ligeia example essay topic

In Edgar Allan Poe's famous work "Ligeia", the secret urge of a man for his deceased wife Ligeia is shown through his many struggles. The narrator of this story becomes entranced by Ligeia and thinks about her so much that he loses all concern for his newly found love, Rowena. The narrator's desire for Ligeia overcomes all his logic. His experience with Rowena has only proven to him that Ligeia is more perfect than she could ever be. It is true with most people that your first true love is often your last. Poe believes that the will of man is a decision that can only be made by God and that if a person wants something bad enough He will ultimately let that person achieve it in some way.

The narrator has many reasons for his extreme love of Ligeia, but foremost is Ligeia's devastating beauty: "I felt always aroused within by her large and luminous orbs" (Poe 710). The narrator becomes entranced by his former love and her presence. After Ligeia's death, she becomes a god-like figure to the narrator; he worships her body and mind. The narrator has some realization that his magical love is doomed when he says: "If ever that spirit which is entitled Romance - if ever she, the wan and the misty-winged Ash tophet of idolatrous Egypt, presided, as they tell, over ill-omened marriages, then most surely she presided over mine" (Poe 708).

The narrator believes that his special love is too good to be true and that he does not deserve a woman of such beauty: "She came like a shadow. I was never made aware of her entrances... ". (Poe 709). She is described as more of a presence than a woman, a being who is there only to please the narrator. The narrator trusts Ligeia so much that he would do anything for her, she is his ideal woman.

Ligeia and Rowena are two completely different women when it comes to physical features. Rowena is the stunning Barbie-like figure which is seen as the perfect woman in our culture. She will not cater to his needs or be exactly what he wants. Ligeia is the brunette with devilish eyes and radiant hair who mesmerizes the narrator into loving her: "the teeth glancing back with brilliancy almost startling, every ray of the holy light which fell upon them in her sense, and placid, yet most exultingly radiant of all smiles" (Poe 709).

"They were far fuller than the fullest of gazelle eyes". (Poe 709) These images prove to us that Ligeia is more than a woman, she is a goddess. The narrator has been around this goddess for so long that he has become used to her and can accept nothing less than what she offered him, perfection. She has ruined his life in the sense that anything less than perfection will be upsetting to him. She has taken away his free will and has it in her own possession. "Without Ligeia I was but a child groping benighted" (Poe 711).

Ligeia has gained such a power over him that he believes without his beloved Ligeia he is incomplete and cannot function. His lack of willpower has made Ligeia the aggressor and the narrator the submissive follower. The narrator's logic can only point one way, back to his goddess Ligeia. His sense of logic has been blocked for his seemingly undying love for this queen. Poe portrays her as a figment which cannot be denied by the narrator. The narrator's view of human will is that he can make a choice not to love her at any time.

He firmly believes that even though he has professed his love to his wife Rowena and taken her hand in marriage, he needs to go back to true love and happiness, even though he is not truly in love with her. He has been convinced by Ligeia that there is someone for everyone and they should always find a way to be together. The narrator feels that his life cannot go on without Ligeia, his true love. He must get back to her at all costs.

Poe describes the desire of man to return to a lost love that seemed so perfect. In the end, Rowena transforms into a woman who looks similar to Ligeia and he gets what he believes will make his life complete. God has, in a sense, given to him what he desires throughout his marriage to Rowena. God gives the narrator what the narrator has been convinced will make him happy.

Whether or not this is true is unknown, but he has gotten what he longs for. Now that he has Ligeia in some form, he needs to realize that ignoring Rowena was wrong and he has sinned. The narrator's lifelong struggle for perfection shows us that it is not worth wanting the one thing in life that one cannot have. People must learn to love what they have or not to love at all..