ENG 510 Chapter Full Text: 7. Ligeia
Document Summary
Narrator: a man obsessed with his first wife, even after her death; addicted to opium. Ligeia: an incredibly learned, black-haired, large-eyed, mysterious woman; narrator"s first wife; dies and returns from the dead. Lady rowena trevanion, of tremaine: narrator"s hated second wife; short, blonde, blue-eyed; dies and her body is replaced by ligeia"s return. The narrator begins telling how he doesn"t quite recall when or how he met his wife, Yet he can recall perfectly how she was in character; tall, thin, dark-haired, large-eyed, unbelievable intelligent and learned; a beauty more wondrous for its strangeness and otherworldliness. Ligeia falls ill, begins to waste away, and on the day of her death, she recites a poem where death is the ultimate destroyer. She then recites another poem, where the force of one"s will is stronger than death. The narrator moves to a secluded part of england in an old castle and marries a girl he hates, rowena (short, blonde, blue-eyed).
