Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven" (1845) follows a grieving student visited at midnight by a raven that answers every question with one word: "Nevermore." This free worksheet gives students the full poem with numbered lines, vocabulary, five discussion questions, a writing prompt and an answer key. No signup needed.
Grades 8–10 · Common Core RL.8.4, RL.8.2, RL.8.5 · US Letter PDF, with an answer key on the last page
What’s on the worksheet
Published in January 1845, "The Raven" made Poe famous. Its 18 six-line stanzas use trochaic octameter, heavy internal rhyme and a refrain that tightens with each stanza as the speaker's grief turns to despair.
Vocabulary
- quaint: old-fashioned and curious
- surcease: an end or stop
- obeisance: a bow or gesture of respect
- beguiling: charming, distracting
- censer: a container for burning incense
- nepenthe: a drug of forgetfulness for grief
- Plutonian: of the underworld (Pluto, god of the dead)
- Balm in Gilead: a biblical cure; here, relief from pain
Discussion questions
- Who is Lenore, and how does the speaker's mood change from the first stanza to the last?
- Why does the speaker keep asking the raven questions he knows it will answer "Nevermore"?
- Find two examples of internal rhyme or alliteration. What effect do they have when read aloud?
- What might the raven symbolize? Use a line from the poem to support your answer.
- What does the final stanza suggest about whether the speaker will ever recover?
Writing prompt
Write a short poem of 8–12 lines in which a visitor (an animal, object or person) answers every question with the same word or phrase. Let the meaning of that word change by the end.
The answer key is included in the PDF, on its own page for teachers.