EXPLORING DARK ECOLOGY IN EDGAR ALLAN POE'S THE RAVEN: TIMOTHY MORTON'S FRAMEWORK

Abstract

This study explores Edgar Allan Poe's poem The Raven through the dark ecology framework developed by Timothy Morton to reveal the dark, ambiguous, and tense relationship between humans and nonhumans. The background of this study is motivated by the lack of studies that explicitly apply dark ecology theory to 19th century Gothic poetry, despite the work's rich potential for ecological analysis. The main objective of this study is to interpret how the raven, the atmosphere, and the ecological interventions in the poem act as nonhuman agents that undermine anthropocentric assumptions and reveal uneasy ecological connections. The research employed a qualitative textual analysis method through close reading of the poem and linking the findings to Morton's key concepts, such as strange strangers, painful interconnectedness, and ecological penetration into domestic space. The data were analyzed through three stages: data reduction, presentation, and theoretical interpretation based on four analytical categories: the agency of the raven, the intervention of nature into domestic space, the failure of anthropocentrism, and forms of painful interconnectedness. The results of this study indicate that the raven functions as an autonomous ecological agent, not simply a Gothic symbol, and reveals the fragility of the human and nonhuman boundary.