The Oval Portrait

“To all appearance it had been temporarily and very lately abandoned.”

Rather than simply state that no one is at home, the narrator describes the chateau as “abandoned.” This diction contributes additional meaning—there is something in the atmosphere of the chateau that suggests its former occupant fled from it. The syntax, which offers high-visibility positions at the sentence’s beginning and end to the ideas of “appearance” and abandonment, highlights that the emptiness of the chateau is not certain, contributing to the mysteriousness of the setting. This sense of mystery is heighted through the detail that the abandonment seems to have happened “very lately.”

“Its walls were hung with tapestry and bedecked with manifold and multiform armorial trophies, together with an unusually great number of very spirited modern paintings in frames of rich golden arabesque.”

“The Oval Portrait” is structured as a frame narrative in which a narrator is captivated by a particular painting and then reads the story of its creation. This image of the turret room emphasizes both the paintings and the frames that contain them, signaling to the reader that both the inner story and the frame narrative are significant and should be understood in relation to one another.

“I bade Pedro to close the heavy shutters of the room—since it was already night—to light the tongues of a tall candelabrum which stood by the head of my bed—and to throw open far and wide the fringed curtains of black velvet which enveloped the bed itself.”

This passage introduces the light and dark symbolism that will pervade the rest of “The Oval Portrait.” Poe’s diction is particularly worth noticing in this passage: The narrator is surrounded not just by curtains but by “black velvet” curtains, and the candle wicks are “tongues” that are made to emit the light that will eventually reveal the eponymous portrait. This passage links both storytelling and portraiture to the symbolism of light and dark.

“I wished all this done that I might resign myself, if not to sleep, at least alternately to the contemplation of these pictures, and the perusal of a small volume which had been found upon the pillow, and which purported to criticise and describe them.”

Although the sentence begins with the idea of what the narrator “wished,” it quickly transitions to the idea of the narrator’s resignation. Given his injuries and mental state, he feels powerless over the question of whether or not he will sleep. The idea that he has relinquished his own agency is reinforced by the syntax “had been found upon the pillow,” which uses the passive voice to obscure the active agent who did this finding—the narrator himself. It is as if some outside power is arranging this event; the loosely parallel structure “which had been found […] and which purported to criticize” hints that the real active agent in this scene is the book of criticism itself. This passage reinforces the lack of agency motif found throughout the story.

“The rays of the numerous candles (for there were many) now fell within a niche of the room which had hitherto been thrown into deep shade by one of the bed-posts.”

This image uses a parenthetical to stress how numerous the candles are, drawing attention to the idea of light. The sentence immediately juxtaposes this intense image of light against the intense darkness of the niche with the words “deep shade,” again emphasizing the symbolic importance of light and dark in this story.

“It was the portrait of a young girl just ripening into womanhood.”

Although the use of the term “girl” to infantilize women was common in Poe’s day, the redundant language used here—“young girl”—makes a point of the wife’s age. The choice of “ripening” metaphorically compares the wife to a consumable fruit or vegetable, making her more object than subject. This characterization of the painter’s wife as essentially a child and a thing to be devoured stresses her loss of agency in her relationship.

“That I now saw aright I could not and would not doubt; for the first flashing of the candles upon that canvas had seemed to dissipate the dreamy stupor which was stealing over my senses, and to startle me at once into waking life.”

Before the story’s action begins, the narrator has suffered some terrible injury, and by the time he and Pedro enter the chateau, he is on the verge of delirium. When he first sees the portrait, he is so startled by it that he wonders if he is hallucinating. Significantly, though, when he reflects on the moment, he realizes that the portrait is not only real, but it has also instantly provoked a new kind of alertness that, for the narrator, is like being brought back to life; this reflection introduces the story’s thematic interest in The Relationship Between Art and Life.

“It was a mere head and shoulders, done in what is technically termed a vignette manner.”

The detail that Poe includes here—that the painting is a vignette—creates an interesting juxtaposition. The reader first learns that the painting is a “mere” head-and-shoulders portrait, meaning that most of the woman’s body has been cut off. This nod to the story’s motif of the lack of agency is set against the idea of a borderless portrait (a “vignette”). This suggests that the idealized, artistic representation of the painter’s wife possesses a kind of power that the real woman lacked.

“The arms, the bosom and even the ends of the radiant hair, melted imperceptibly into the vague yet deep shadow which formed the back-ground of the whole.”

Poe once again contrasts the light and the dark. This time, he identifies the woman with light through her “radiant hair.” His description of how her image seems to be melting into the darkness of the painting’s background foreshadows her tragic early death.

“I remained, for an hour perhaps, half sitting, half reclining, with my vision riveted upon the portrait. At length, satisfied with the true secret of its effect, I fell back within the bed. I had found the spell of the picture in an absolute life-likeliness of expression, which at first startling, finally confounded, subdued and appalled me.”

The narrator’s position—“half-sitting, half-reclining”—physically demonstrates the way that he is suspended between confusion and understanding. His vision is “riveted” on the painting, which is casting a “spell” on him: The connotation of this diction is that he is somewhat helpless and enthralled. These details speak to the power of art—and especially the power of this particular portrait.

“She was a maiden of rarest beauty […] loving and cherishing all things: hating only the Art which was her rival: dreading only the pallet and brushes and other untoward instruments which deprived her of the countenance of her lover.”

The use of the word “countenance” is an ironic piece of foreshadowing that creates an equivalence between the painter and his wife. In this passage, the painter’s wife feels jealousy toward his art because it takes him away from her. Poe chooses “countenance” to express this because it will later actually be the wife’s countenance that the husband seeks to capture in his art—an action that will lead to her being lost to him forever. This underscores The Dangers of Obsession and reinforces the text’s messages about The Relationship Between Art and Life and The Nature of Romantic Relationships.

“But she was humble and obedient, and sat meekly for many weeks in the dark high turret-chamber where the light dripped upon the pale canvas only from overhead.”

The diction of this passage repeatedly stresses the wife’s lack of agency. She is “humble,” “obedient,” and sitting “meekly” despite her feelings and despite her fading health. She has been quite literally cast into the shadows, and the text’s light and dark symbolism is invoked as the only source of light/life in the room drips slowly into the canvas.

“And he was a passionate, and wild and moody man, who became lost in reveries; so that he would not see that the light which fell so ghastly in that lone turret withered the health and the spirits of his bride, who pined visibly to all but him.”

Here, the light is characterized as “ghastly,” a word with horrifying and supernatural connotations. This suggests that the death of the painter’s wife is not simply due to her pining away for him—her “spirits” are being drained by something else, likely the portrait itself. This supports both the story’s Gothic atmosphere and its concern with The Relationship Between Art and Life.