What Does The Raven Symbolize

The raven
initially symbolizes what Poe describes as "mournful, never-ending remembrance." The
narrator's sorrow over his lost loveprovides the impetus for his unusual conversation with the
dark, strange bird. But the raven provides no comfort for the narrator, a broken man still
nursing a broken heart.

It's noteworthy that the raven is perched on top of a
statue of Pallas Athena, the goddess of wisdom. This gives its constant refrain of
"Nevermore!" a significance that it would otherwise lack. Through the raven's
unconscious expression of wisdom, the narrator realizes that Lenore has been lost forever, never
to return. And the narrator comes to hate the raven for this. He so desperately wants to hold on
to the illusion that Lenore will one day come back. The shattering of that illusion by the raven
changes the symbolism of what the bird represents. In the narrator's fevered imagination, the
raven has now come to represent evil itself:

"Prophet!" said I, thing of evil!prophet still, if bird or
devil!"

At the same time, the narrator acknowledges
that the raven's dark shadow hangs over his soul. It's going to be nigh impossible for him to
expel the evil that's now entered into the very depths of his being.