; ( NEED HELP ON ELDORADO (explication)

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Need help. ---Explication of Poes' poem Elorado---ASAP Any help Appreciated, Thanks

-- Anonymous, November 28, 2003

Answers

Critics suggest that the poem "Eldorado" was Poe's response to all the excitement at the time of the great gold rush in California that occurred in 1849. The ballad is constructed of four six-line stanzas, with short lines replicating a journey on horseback. The poem reflects the Arthurian tradition of a questing knight, and the unfinished search and task to which the now-old knight has dedicated himself. Instead of a holy grail or a maiden in distress, however, the knight of the poem seeks the mythical Eldorado, which means "gilded one," and he hopes to find the golden man in his city of gold. The heroic striving of the knight to find Eldorado has dominated his life since youth, and now has little hope of completing his quest before mortality takes its toll. The knight meets the "pilgrim shadow," which encourages him to travel "Over the Mountains of the Moon,/Down the Valley of the Shadow,/Ride, boldly, ride" beyond all earthly limits. Rather than the idealistic quest of Arthur, Poe's knight seeks material enrichment, yet he, too, must accept that the only lasting reward is the spiritual reward. This was one of Poe's last published poems before he died that same year on October 7, 1849.

-- Anonymous, November 28, 2003

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