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The Theme Of Hope In Edgar Allan Poe's The Night Of The Hunter

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The Theme Of Hope In Edgar Allan Poe's The Night Of The Hunter
“Is there – is there balm in Gilead? – tell me – tell me, I implore!" Hope is the very essence of humanity. Without hope, without a “balm in Gilead,” what is the point of life? There is no greater punishment than the total loss of hope; the absence of hope is hell. In Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven,” the “ghastly grim and ancient” (46) Raven destroys the narrator in a way far more tortuous than a simple slit to the throat. In Davis Grubb’s gothic novel, The Night of the Hunter, Miz Cunningham, with the face “of an ancient and querulous turkey hen,” (Grubb 36) mirrors the Raven in more ways than simply her avian appearance. Like the Raven, Miz Cunningham leeches hope out of those around her, preying on the misfortune of others. Grubb uses
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