What Is The Setting Of The Raven

contains
several clues that tell the reader about the setting of the poem. They are found in stanzas 1,
2, 3, and 7.

In the first stanza, the speaker provides the reader with the
time: it was a midnight dreary. If you reverse the order of these two words, you will find its
description easiera dreary midnight.  Therefore, the speaker recalls his experience of the
Ravens visitation occurring one unexciting late night, early morning.

Later
in this same stanza, the speaker provides us with another clue to the setting; this one provides
the place: the speaker hears a knocking at his chamber door. The speaker assumes that 'tis
some visitor, which shows us that the speaker can often be found there in his chamber.  The
chamber is likely the speakers bedroom or a room in which he studies his books--his many a
quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore.

In the second stanza, more
setting related to specific time is provided by the speaker: he says this experience occurred
in the bleak December. (One interesting correlation here is similarity of the adjectives used
for both descriptions of time: Midnight dreary and
bleak December are equally gloomy.) With this extra description, the
reader now knows that the Raven visits the man one midnight during December.

In the third stanza, one additional small description is given:

And the silken, sad, uncertain rustling of each purple
curtain

This silk purple curtain is one of the few
descriptions from the chamber itself. The flutter of the curtain is likely an eerie occurrence
that is meant to increase the speaker's "terror." Another description of the speaker's
room--the setting of this strange tale--comes in stanza seven where the Raven perches:

upon a bust of Pallas just above [the speakers] chamber
door.

This may be something you wish to note, for the
spot on which the Raven perches is a sculpture of the helmeted head of Pallas Athena, an
Olympian Greek goddess.  She is the goddess of wisdom, among other things.  Depending upon what
you might do with this poem later in class (or for yourself), it might be important to note that
particular of the setting.

Ive provided a link below to help you with other
particulars of Poes The Raven.