“Lenore” is unusual in that it has not one but two speakers. The poem is structured as a dialogue between Lenore’s bereaved fiancé, named Guy de Vere, and what appears to be a chorus of people from the town where Guy de Vere lives. Although the chorus never uses the first-person plural pronoun, “we,” they do use the Latin word “peccavimus” (line 13), which means “We have sinned.” For this reason, it’s logical to assume that the chorus consists of multiple people speaking out of concern for a fellow community member. The use of this type of chorus originated in ancient Greek theater, which often featured a group of players who commented on the action of the drama. These players are collectively referred to as “the chorus.” The chorus plays a similar role in “Lenore,” where they express their concern about Guy de Vere’s failure to grieve for his dead fiancée. They remark that he has not yet shed a single tear, nor has he performed the proper funerary rites. Such rites would help him process his grief. They would also aid Lenore’s spirit as it crosses from the realm of the living to the realm of the dead.

In contrast to the chorus’s evident concern, Guy de Vere speaks with bitterness and even paranoia. He blames the chorus for Lenore’s death, claiming they collectively cursed her with their “evil eye.” He also rejects the chorus’s advice that he authorize proper funerary rites. He explains his decision with apparently rational logic. He claims that addressing a funeral dirge to Lenore would merely disorient her spirit and disrupt her passage from this world to the next. Instead of singing a song of lament, like a dirge, a jubilant song of praise would aid her spirit in its ascent to the heavenly sphere. But however much Guy de Vere frames his refusal of traditional funerary rites as a way of ensuring Lenore’s safe arrival in Heaven, the reader must evaluate his words against those of the chorus. If the chorus is correct in their observation that Guy de Vere has not properly grieved his fiancée’s death, then it stands to reason that his preference for a celebratory tone may serve his own needs more than Lenore’s. That is, Guy de Vere may refuse to mourn her death because he can’t find it in himself to let her go.