tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-73099195122329186472024-02-06T18:42:54.294-08:00Poe Forward's Edgar Allan Poe BlogEdgar Allan Poe and his influence on Pop CultureBrian Aldrichhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13104092197262241906noreply@blogger.comBlogger820125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-34076341243697462072012-12-30T20:11:00.000-08:002012-12-30T20:11:00.509-08:00"Ulalume" Published 1847<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWOV3iT4aXRtD6dojqEHtDUFR-GJY7QtFD1NLZqZkVx6QpDn_at_H45PDkVH0PICigc-4UkfHKwMjMTYllAnUpsaWNhvqBL0U7AMIrcfKv5hqn4TkXtLyOAiI146jYjLmxzTfwmlzR1Gxh/s1600/ulaume.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWOV3iT4aXRtD6dojqEHtDUFR-GJY7QtFD1NLZqZkVx6QpDn_at_H45PDkVH0PICigc-4UkfHKwMjMTYllAnUpsaWNhvqBL0U7AMIrcfKv5hqn4TkXtLyOAiI146jYjLmxzTfwmlzR1Gxh/s320/ulaume.jpg" height="640" width="416" /></a></div>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<strong><span style="color: red;">Ulalume</span></strong></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<strong>by Edgar Allan Poe</strong> </div>
<br />
<strong>The final stanza was only included in its initial publication in the American Review in December 1847. Subsequent reprints, including those authorized by the author, removed it.</strong> <br />
<br />
<strong>The skies they were ashen and sober;</strong><br />
<strong>The leaves they were crisped and sere--</strong><br />
<strong>The leaves they were withering and sere;</strong><br />
<strong>It was night in the lonesome October</strong><br />
<strong>Of my most immemorial year:</strong><br />
<strong>It was hard by the dim lake of Auber,</strong><br />
<strong>In the misty mid region of Weir--</strong><br />
<strong>It was down by the dank tarn of Auber,</strong><br />
<strong>In the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Here once, through an alley Titanic,</strong><br />
<strong>Of cypress, I roamed with my Soul--</strong><br />
<strong>Of cypress, with Psyche, my Soul.</strong><br />
<strong>These were days when my heart was volcanic</strong><br />
<strong>As the scoriac rivers that roll--</strong><br />
<strong>As the lavas that restlessly roll</strong><br />
<strong>Their sulphurous currents down Yaanek</strong><br />
<strong>In the ultimate climes of the pole--</strong><br />
<strong>That groan as they roll down Mount Yaanek</strong><br />
<strong>In the realms of the boreal pole.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Our talk had been serious and sober,</strong><br />
<strong>But our thoughts they were palsied and sere--</strong><br />
<strong>Our memories were treacherous and sere,--</strong><br />
<strong>For we knew not the month was October,</strong><br />
<strong>And we marked not the night of the year</strong><br />
<strong>(Ah, night of all nights in the year!)--</strong><br />
<strong>We noted not the dim lake of Auber</strong><br />
<strong>(Though once we had journeyed down here)--</strong><br />
<strong>Remembered not the dank tarn of Auber,</strong><br />
<strong>Nor the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>And now, as the night was senescent</strong><br />
<strong>And star-dials pointed to morn--</strong><br />
<strong>As the star-dials hinted of morn--</strong><br />
<strong>At the end of our path a liquescent</strong><br />
<strong>And nebulous lustre was born,</strong><br />
<strong>Out of which a miraculous crescent</strong><br />
<strong>Arose with a duplicate horn--</strong><br />
<strong>Astarte's bediamonded crescent</strong><br />
<strong>Distinct with its duplicate horn.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>And I said: "She is warmer than Dian;</strong><br />
<strong>She rolls through an ether of sighs--</strong><br />
<strong>She revels in a region of sighs:</strong><br />
<strong>She has seen that the tears are not dry on</strong><br />
<strong>These cheeks, where the worm never dies,</strong><br />
<strong>And has come past the stars of the Lion</strong><br />
<strong>To point us the path to the skies--</strong><br />
<strong>To the Lethean peace of the skies--</strong><br />
<strong>Come up, in despite of the Lion,</strong><br />
<strong>To shine on us with her bright eyes--</strong><br />
<strong>Come up through the lair of the Lion,</strong><br />
<strong>With love in her luminous eyes."</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>But Psyche, uplifting her finger,</strong><br />
<strong>Said: "Sadly this star I mistrust--</strong><br />
<strong>Her pallor I strangely mistrust:</strong><br />
<strong>Ah, hasten! -ah, let us not linger!</strong><br />
<strong>Ah, fly! -let us fly! -for we must."</strong><br />
<strong>In terror she spoke, letting sink her</strong><br />
<strong>Wings until they trailed in the dust--</strong><br />
<strong>In agony sobbed, letting sink her</strong><br />
<strong>Plumes till they trailed in the dust--</strong><br />
<strong>Till they sorrowfully trailed in the dust.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>I replied: "This is nothing but dreaming:</strong><br />
<strong>Let us on by this tremulous light!</strong><br />
<strong>Let us bathe in this crystalline light!</strong><br />
<strong>Its Sybilic splendour is beaming</strong><br />
<strong>With Hope and in Beauty tonight!--</strong><br />
<strong>See! -it flickers up the sky through the night!</strong><br />
<strong>Ah, we safely may trust to its gleaming,</strong><br />
<strong>And be sure it will lead us aright--</strong><br />
<strong>We safely may trust to a gleaming,</strong><br />
<strong>That cannot but guide us aright,</strong><br />
<strong>Since it flickers up to Heaven through the night."</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Thus I pacified Psyche and kissed her,</strong><br />
<strong>And tempted her out of her gloom--</strong><br />
<strong>And conquered her scruples and gloom;</strong><br />
<strong>And we passed to the end of the vista,</strong><br />
<strong>But were stopped by the door of a tomb--</strong><br />
<strong>By the door of a legended tomb;</strong><br />
<strong>And I said: "What is written, sweet sister,</strong><br />
<strong>On the door of this legended tomb?"</strong><br />
<strong>She replied: "Ulalume -Ulalume--</strong><br />
<strong>'Tis the vault of thy lost Ulalume!"</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Then my heart it grew ashen and sober</strong><br />
<strong>As the leaves that were crisped and sere--</strong><br />
<strong>As the leaves that were withering and sere;</strong><br />
<strong>And I cried: "It was surely October</strong><br />
<strong>On this very night of last year</strong><br />
<strong>That I journeyed -I journeyed down here!--</strong><br />
<strong>That I brought a dread burden down here--</strong><br />
<strong>On this night of all nights in the year,</strong><br />
<strong>Ah, what demon hath tempted me here?</strong><br />
<strong>Well I know, now, this dim lake of Auber--</strong><br />
<strong>This misty mid region of Weir--</strong><br />
<strong>Well I know, now, this dank tarn of Auber,</strong><br />
<strong>This ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir."</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>{Said we, then — the two, then —" Ah, can it</strong><br />
<strong>Have been that the woodlandish ghouls —</strong><br />
<strong>The pitiful, the merciful ghouls —</strong><br />
<strong>To bar up our way and to ban it</strong><br />
<strong>From the secret that lies in these wolds —</strong><br />
<strong>From the thing that lies hidden in these wolds —</strong><br />
<strong>Had drawn up the spectre of a planet</strong><br />
<strong>From the limbo of lunary souls —</strong><br />
<strong>This sinfully scintillant planet</strong><br />
<strong>From the Hell of the planetary souls ?")</strong><br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">"Ulalume"</span> is a poem written by Edgar Allan Poe in 1847. Much like a few of Poe's other poems (such as "The Raven," "Annabel Lee," and "Lenore"), "Ulalume" focuses on the narrator's loss of a beautiful woman due to her death. Poe originally wrote the poem as an elocution piece and, as such, the poem is known for its focus on sound. Additionally, it makes many allusions, especially to mythology, and the identity of Ulalume herself, if a real person, has been questioned.</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Overview</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>The poem takes place on a night in the "lonesome October" with a gray sky as the leaves are withering for the autumn season. In the region of Weir, by the lake of Auber, the narrator roams with a "volcanic" heart. He has a "serious and sober" talk with his soul, though he does not realize it is October or where his roaming is leading him. He remarks on the stars as night falls, remarking on the brightest one, and wonders if it knows that the tears on his cheeks have not yet dried. His soul, however, mistrusts the star and where it is leading them. Just as the narrator calms his soul, he realizes he unconsciously has walked to the vault of his "lost Ulalume" on the very night he had buried her one year before.</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Analysis</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Unlike Poe's poem "Annabel Lee", this poem presents a narrator who is not conscious of his return to the grave of his lost love.[1] This reveals the speaker's dependence on Ulalume and her love; his losing her leaves him not only sad but absolutely devastated and, by visiting her grave, he unconsciously subjects himself to further self-inflicted anguish.[2] The poem has a heavy focus on decay and deterioration: the leaves are "withering" and the narrator's thoughts are "palsied".[3] Like many of Poe's later poems, "Ulalume" has a strong sense or rhythm and musicality.[4] The verses are purposefully sonorous, built around sound to create feelings of sadness and anguish.[5] The poem employs Poe's typical theme of the "death of a beautiful woman", which he considered "the most poetical topic in the world".[6] Biographers and critics have often suggested that Poe's obsession with this theme stems from the repeated loss of women throughout his life, including his mother Eliza Poe, his wife, and his foster mother Frances Allan.[7]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>The identity of Ulalume in the poem is questionable. Poe scholar and distant relative Harry Lee Poe says it is autobiographical and shows Poe's grief over the recent death of his wife Virginia.[8] Scholar Scott Peeples notes that "Ulalume" serves as a sequel to "The Raven".[9] Poetically, the name Ulalume emphasizes the letter L, a frequent device in Poe's female characters such as "Annabel Lee", "Eulalie", and "Lenore".[10] If it really stands for a deceased love, Poe's choosing to refer to Ulalume as "the thing" and "the secret" do not seem endearing terms.[11] In one possible view, Ulalume may be representative of death itself.[11]</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Allusions</span></strong><br />
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<strong>The "dim lake of Auber" may be a reference to composer Daniel François Esprit Auber.Much work has been done by scholars to identify all of Poe's allusions, most notably by Thomas Ollive Mabbott, though other scholars suggest that the names throughout the poem should be valued only because of their poetic sounds.[12] The title itself suggests wailing (from the Latin ululare).[13] The name may also allude to the Latin lumen, a light symbolizing sorrow.[14] The narrator personifies his soul as the ancient Greek Psyche, representing the irrational but careful part of his subconsciousness. It is Psyche who first feels concerned about where they are walking and makes the first recognition that they have reached Ulalume's vault.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>The bright star they see is Astarte, a goddess associated with Venus[3] and connected with fertility and sexuality. The "sinfully scintillant planet" in the original final verse is another reference to Venus.[1] Astarte may represent a sexual temptress or a vision of the ideal.[15] Mount Yaanek, with its "sulphurous currents" in the "ultimate climes of the pole", has been associated with Mount Erebus, a volcano in Antarctica first sighted in 1841,[13] although Yaanek's location is specified as being in "the realms of the boreal pole", indicating an Arctic location rather than an Antarctic one for the fictional counterpart. The Auber and Weir references in the poem may be to two contemporaries of Poe: Daniel François Esprit Auber, a composer of sad operatic tunes,[16] and Robert Walter Weir, a painter of the Hudson River School famous for his landscapes.[17]</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Publication history</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>"Ulalume" as it first appeared in the "American Review" in 1847.Poe wrote the poem on the request of Reverend Cotesworth Bronson, who had asked Poe for a poem he could read at one of his lectures on public speaking. He asked Poe for something with "vocal variety and expression". Bronson decided not to use the poem Poe sent him, "Ulalume." Poe then submitted the poem to Sartain's Union Magazine, which rejected it as too dense.[18] Poe probably saw Bronson's request as a personal challenge as well as an opportunity to enhance his renown, especially after his previous poem "The Raven" had also been demonstrated for its elocution style.[19]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>"Ulalume - A Ballad" was finally published, albeit anonymously, in the American Whig Review in December, 1847. Originally, Poe had sold his essay "The Rationale of Verse", then unpublished, to the Review's editor George Hooker Colton. Colton did not immediately print the manuscript, so Poe exchanged it for "Ulalume".[20]</strong><br />
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<strong>It was reprinted by Nathaniel Parker Willis, still anonymously, in the Home Journal with a note asking who the author was, on Poe's request, to stir up interest. Some, including Evert Augustus Duyckinck, presumed that the poem's author was Willis.[21] The initial publication had 10 stanzas. Poe's literary executor Rufus Wilmot Griswold was the first to print "Ulalume" without its final stanza, now the standard version.[22] Poe himself once recited the poem with the final stanza, but admitted it was not intelligible and that it was scarcely clear to himself.[23]</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Critical response</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Aldous Huxley, in his essay "Vulgarity in Literature", calls "Ulalume" "a carapace of jewelled sound", implying it lacks substance.[24] Huxley uses the poem as an example of Poe's poetry being "too poetical", equivalent to wearing a diamond ring on every finger.[25] Poet Daniel Hoffman says the reader must "surrender his own will" to the "hypnotic spell" of the poem and its "meter of mechanical precision". "Reading 'Ulalume' is like making a meal of marzipan", he says. "There may be nourishment in it but the senses are deadened by the taste, and the aftertaste gives one a pain in the stomach".[26]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>The poem did, however, receive some praise. An early 20th century edition of Encyclopædia Britannica referred to noted how the sound in "Ulalume" was successful. It said the "monotonous reiterations [of] 'Ulalume' properly intoned would produce something like the same effect upon a listener knowing no word of English that it produces on us."[4] George Gilfillan remarked in the London Critic:</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>These, to many, will appear only words; but what wondrous words! What a spell they wield! What a weird unity is in them! The instant they are uttered, a misty picture, with a tarn, dark as a murderer's eye, below, and the thin yellow leaves of October fluttering above, exponents of a misery which scorns the name of sorrow, is hung up in the chambers of your soul forever.[27]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>After Poe's death, Thomas Holley Chivers claimed "Ulalume" was plagiarized from one of his poems. Chivers made several similar unfounded accusations against Poe.[28] Even so, he said the poem was "nector mixed with ambrosia".[29] Another friend of Poe, Henry B. Hirst, suggested in the January 22, 1848, issue of the Saturday Courier that Poe had found the "leading idea" of the poem in a work by Thomas Buchanan Read.[30]</strong><br />
<strong>Bret Harte composed a parody of the poem entitled "The Willows" featuring the narrator, in the company of a woman called Mary, running out of credit at a bar:</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>And I said 'What is written, sweet sister,</strong><br />
<strong>At the opposite side of the room?'</strong><br />
<strong>She sobbed, as she answered, 'All liquors</strong><br />
<strong>Must be paid for ere leaving the room.[31]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">In other media</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>In F. Scott Fitzgerald's debut novel This Side of Paradise, the protagonist Amory Blaine recites "Ulalume" while wandering through the countryside. Another character, Eleanor Savage, calls Blaine "the auburn-haired boy who likes 'Ulalume.'" When the two are caught in a thunderstorm, Savage volunteers to play the role of Psyche while Blaine recites the poem.[32]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>In H. P. Lovecraft's novella At the Mountains of Madness, a character refers to the poem. While looking at a mountain, a character suggests "this mountain, discovered in 1840, had undoubtedly been the source of Poe's image when he wrote seven years later", followed by a few lines of "Ulalume".</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Roger Zelazny's 1993 novel, A Night in the Lonesome October, gets its title from this poem, though the book seems to draw little else from Poe.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>In the Tennessee Williams play A Streetcar Named Desire the character Blanche DuBois likens the residence of her sister Stella to the "ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir", a reference to "Ulalume".</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>In Stanley Kubrick's Lolita (1962), Humbert Humbert (James Mason) reads a fragment of the poem to Lolita (Sue Lyon).</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>In his history of the Union Army, This Hallowed Ground, Pulitzer Prize-winning author, Bruce Catton places the American Civil War Battle of Chickamauga as occurring in a dark and frightening place evocative of Poe's "ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir".</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>The singer Jeff Buckley recorded a reading of this poem.</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">References</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>1.^ Kennedy, J. Gerald. "Poe, 'Ligeia,' and the Problem of Dying Women" collected in New Essays on Poe's Major Tales, edited by Kenneth Silverman. Cambridge University Press, 1993: 116. ISBN 0521422434</strong><br />
<strong>2.^ Kennedy, J. Gerald. "Poe, 'Ligeia,' and the Problem of Dying Women" collected in New Essays on Poe's Major Tales, edited by Kenneth Silverman. Cambridge University Press, 1993: 117. ISBN 0521422434</strong><br />
<strong>3.^ Silverman, Kenneth. Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance. New York: Harper Perennial, 1992: 336. ISBN 0050923318</strong><br />
<strong>4.^ Peeples, Scott. Edgar Allan Poe Revisited. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1998: 168. ISBN 0-8057-4572-6</strong><br />
<strong>5.^ Jannaccone, Pasquale (translated by Peter Mitilineos). "The Aesthetics of Edgar Poe", collected in Poe Studies, vol. VII, no. 1, June 1974: 7.</strong><br />
<strong>6.^ Poe, Edgar Allan. "The Philosophy of Composition" (1846).</strong><br />
<strong>7.^ Weekes, Karen. "Poe's feminine ideal", collected in The Cambridge Companion to Edgar Allan Poe, edited by Kevin J. Hayes. Cambridge University Press, 2002: 149. ISBN 0521797276</strong><br />
<strong>8.^ Poe, Harry Lee. Edgar Allan Poe: An Illustrated Companion to His Tell-Tale Stories. New York: Metro Books, 2008: 126. ISBN 978-1-4351-0469-3</strong><br />
<strong>9.^ Peeples, Scott. Edgar Allan Poe Revisited. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1998: 169. ISBN 0-8057-4572-6</strong><br />
<strong>10.^ Kopley, Richard and Kevin J. Hayes "Two verse masterworks: 'The Raven' and 'Ulalume'", as collected in The Cambridge Companion to Edgar Allan Poe, edited by Kevin J. Hayes. Cambridge University Press, 2002: 200. ISBN 0521797276</strong><br />
<strong>11.^ Kagle, Steven E. "The Corpse Within Us", as collected in Poe and His Times: The Artist and His Milieu, Benjamin Franklin Fisher IV, ed. Baltimore: The Edgar Allan Poe Society, 1990: 110. ISBN 0961644923</strong><br />
<strong>12.^ Kopley, Richard and Kevin J. Hayes. "Two verse masterworks: 'The Raven' and 'Ulalume'", collected in The Cambridge Companion to Edgar Allan Poe, edited by Kevin J. Hayes. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002: 197–198. ISBN 0521797276</strong><br />
<strong>13.^ Meyers, Jeffrey. Edgar Allan Poe: His Life and Legacy. New York: Cooper Square Press, 1992: 211. ISBN 0815410387</strong><br />
<strong>14.^ Peeples, Scott. Edgar Allan Poe Revisited. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1998: 170. ISBN 0-8057-4572-6</strong><br />
<strong>15.^ Robinson, David. "'Ulalume' - The Ghouls and the Critics", collected in Poe Studies. Volume VIII, Number 1 (June 1975): 9.</strong><br />
<strong>16.^ Wolosky, Shira. Poetry and Public Discourse 1820 - 1910 collected in The Cambridge History of American Literature Vol.4, ed. Sacvan Bercovitch, p. 260, Online version of the book (ret: 15 April 2008)</strong><br />
<strong>17.^ Nelson, Randy F. The Almanac of American Letters. Los Altos, California: William Kaufmann, Inc., 1981: 185. ISBN 086576008X</strong><br />
<strong>18.^ Silverman, Kenneth. Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance. New York: Harper Perennial, 1991: 335. ISBN 0060923318</strong><br />
<strong>19.^ Kopley, Richard and Kevin J. Hayes. "Two verse masterworks: 'The Raven' and 'Ulalume'", collected in The Cambridge Companion to Edgar Allan Poe, edited by Kevin J. Hayes. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002: 198. ISBN 0521797276</strong><br />
<strong>20.^ The Essays, Sketches and Lectures of Edgar Allan Poe, from the Poe Society online</strong><br />
<strong>21.^ Thomas, Dwight and David K. Jackson. The Poe Log: A Documentary Life of Edgar Allan Poe, 1809–1849. Boston: G. K. Hall and Co., 1987: 792. ISBN 0816187347.</strong><br />
<strong>22.^ Robinson, David. "'Ulalume' - The Ghouls and the Critics", collected in Poe Studies. Volume VIII, Number 1 (June 1975). p. 8.</strong><br />
<strong>23.^ Quinn, Arthur Hobson. Edgar Allan Poe: A Critical Biography. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998: 630. ISBN 0801857309</strong><br />
<strong>24.^ Kopley, Richard and Kevin J. Hayes. "Two verse masterworks: 'The Raven' and 'Ulalume'", collected in The Cambridge Companion to Edgar Allan Poe, edited by Kevin J. Hayes. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002: 197. ISBN 0521797276</strong><br />
<strong>25.^ Huxley, Aldous. "Vulgarity in Literature", collected in Poe: A Collection of Critical Essays, Robert Regan, editor. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall Inc., 1967: 32.</strong><br />
<strong>26.^ Hoffman, Daniel. Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1972: 69. ISBN 0807123218</strong><br />
<strong>27.^ Phillips, Mary E. Edgar Allan Poe: The Man. Volume II. Chicago: The John C. Winston Co., 1926: 1248.</strong><br />
<strong>28.^ Moss, Sidney P. Poe's Literary Battles: The Critic in the Context of His Milieu. Southern Illinois University Press, 1969: 101.</strong><br />
<strong>29.^ Chivers, Thomas Holley. Chivers' Life of Poe, edited by Richard Beale Davis. New York: E. P. Dutton and Co., Inc., 1952: 78.</strong><br />
<strong>30.^ Campbell, Killis. "The Origins of Poe", The Mind of Poe and Other Studies. New York: Russell and Russell, Inc., 1962: 147.</strong><br />
<strong>31.^ Walter Jerrold and R.M. Leonard (1913) A Century of Parody and Imitation. Oxford University Press: 344-6</strong><br />
<strong>32.^ Fitzgerald, F. Scott. This Side of Paradise. James L. W. West III, editor. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1995: 206–209</strong>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-41569282755065106672012-12-25T14:30:00.000-08:002012-12-25T14:30:00.884-08:00"Bon-Bon" Published 1832<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<strong><span style="color: red;">"Bon-Bon"</span> is a comedic short story by Edgar Allan Poe, first published in December 1832 in the Philadelphia Saturday Courier. Originally called "The Bargain Lost," the story follows a man named Pierre Bon-Bon, who believes himself a profound philosopher, and his encounter with the devil. The humor of the story is based on the verbal interchange between the two, which satirizes classical philosophers including Plato and Aristotle. The devil reveals he has eaten the souls of many of these philosophers, intriguing Bon-Bon.</strong><br />
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<strong>The story, which received moderate praise, was originally submitted by Poe as "The Bargain Lost," and was his entry to a writing contest. Though none of the five stories he submitted won the prize, the Courier printed them all, possibly without paying Poe for them. This early version of the story has many differences from later versions, which Poe first published as "Bon-Bon" in 1835.</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Plot summary</span></strong><br />
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<strong>Pierre Bon-Bon is a well-known French restaurant owner and chef, known both for his omelettes and for his metaphysical philosophies. The narrator describes him as profound and a man of genius, as even the man's cat knew. Bon-Bon, who has "an inclination for the bottle", is drinking on a snowy winter night around midnight when he hears a voice. He recognizes it as the devil himself, appearing in a black suit in the style of the previous century, though it was a bit too small for him. He wore green spectacles, had a stylus behind one ear, and a large black book in his breast-pocket. Bon-Bon shook his hand and offered him a seat.</strong><br />
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<strong>The two engage in conversation, Bon-Bon pressing the devil for a philosophical exchange. He hoped to "elicit some important ethical ideas" which Bon-Bon could publish and make himself famous. Bon-Bon learns that the devil has never had eyes but the devil is convinced his vision is better and "more penetrating" than Bon-Bon's. In fact, the devil reveals he can see the thoughts of others and, as he puts it, "my vision is the soul."</strong><br />
<strong>The two share several bottles of wine until Bon-Bon cannot speak without hiccuping. The devil explains how he eats souls and gives a long list of famous philosophers he has "eaten" as well as his assessment of how each tasted. When Bon-Bon suggests that his own soul is qualified for a stew or soufflé, Bon-Bon offers it to his visitor. The devil refusing, says he could not take advantage of the man's "disgusting and ungentlemanly" drunken state. As the devil leaves, Bon-Bon in his disappointment tries to throw a bottle at him. Before he can, however, the lamp above his head comes loose and hits him on the head, knocking him out.</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Themes and analysis</span></strong><br />
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<strong>Like many of Poe's early tales, "Bon-Bon" was, as Poe wrote, "intended for half banter, half satire"[1] and explores attempts at surviving death.[2] Poe pokes fun at the pretentiousness of scholars by having his character make references to classic Greek and Latin authors, only to hear their souls have been eaten.[3] The comedy in the story is verbal, based on turns of phrase, funny euphemisms, and absurd names.[2]</strong><br />
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<strong>The phrase "Bonbon" stems from the French word "bon," literally meaning "good," and is often used to describe sweet eatables. Poe examines the Greek tradition of the soul as Pneuma, an internal flame which converts food into a substance that passes into the blood.[4] As the narrator of "Bon-Bon" says, "I am not sure, indeed, that Bon-Bon greatly disagreed with the Chinese, who held that the soul lies in the abdomen. The Greeks at all events were right, he thought, who employed the same words for the mind and the diaphragm."</strong><br />
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<strong>Among the devil's list of victims are the souls of Plato, Aristophanes, Catullus, Hippocrates, Quintilian[5] and "François Marie Arouet," the real name of Voltaire.[3] As Bon-Bon is offering his own soul, the devil sneezes, referring to a prior moment when the devil says that men dispel bad ideas by sneezing.[6]</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Critical response</span></strong><br />
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<strong>An editorial in the Philadelphia Saturday Courier thanked Poe for submitting the stories. The writer, presumably editor Lambert A. Wilmer, said that "we have read these tales every syllable, with the greatest pleasure, and for originality, richness of imagery and purity of the style, few American authors in our opinion have produced any thing superior."[7] A reviewer in the Winchester Republication wrote that "Mr. Poe's Bon-Bon is quite a unique and racy affair." William Gwynn, editor of the Baltimore Gazette, wrote that the story "sustains the well established reputation of the author as a writer possessing a rich imaginative genius, and a free, flowing and very happy style."[8]</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Publication history</span></strong><br />
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<strong>First publication under the title "Bon-Bon—A Tale," Southern Literary Messenger, August 1835Poe originally submitted "Bon-Bon" to the Philadelphia Saturday Courier under the title "The Bargain Lost" as an entry to a writing contest. Poe also submitted four other tales: "Metzengerstein," "The Duke de L'Omelette," "A Tale of Jerusalem," and "A Decided Loss."[9] Though none of his entries won the $100 prize, the editors of the Courier were impressed enough that they published all of Poe's stories over the next few months.[1] "The Bargain Lost" was published on December 1, 1831, though it is unclear if Poe was paid for its publication.[10] There were several differences between this version and later versions: originally, the main character was named Pedro Garcia, his encounter was not with the devil himself but with one of his messengers, and the story takes place in Venice rather than France.[11] Poe retitled the story "Bon-Bon—A Tale" when it was republished in the Southern Literary Messenger in August 1835.[12] It was later published as part of Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque in 1845.[13]</strong><br />
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<strong>The original epigraph preceding the story was from William Shakespeare's As You Like It: "The heathen philosopher, when he had a mind to eat a grape, would open his lips when he put it into his mouth, meaning thereby that grapes were made to eat and lips to open." Poe's final version of the story had a longer epigraph in verse from Les Premiers Traits de l'erudition universelle (The Most Important Characteristics of Universal Wisdom) by Baron Bielfeld.[14]</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Adaptations</span></strong><br />
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<strong>"Bon-Bon" has not been adapted for the screen but a rewritten version was performed off Broadway in 1920.[11]</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">References</span></strong><br />
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<strong>1.^ Meyers, Jeffrey (1992). Edgar Allan Poe: His Life and Legacy. New York: Cooper Square Press. pp. 64. ISBN 0-8154-1038-7. </strong><br />
<strong>2.^ Silverman, Kenneth (1991). Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance. New York: Harper Perennial. pp. 89. ISBN 0-06-092331-8. </strong><br />
<strong>3.^ Quinn, Arthur Hobson (1998) [1941]. Edgar Allan Poe: A Critical Biography. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. pp. 194. ISBN 0-8018-5730-9. </strong><br />
<strong>4.^ Jones, Ernest (1951). Essays in Applied Psychoanalysis. London: Hogarth. pp. 297. OCLC 220544756. </strong><br />
<strong>5.^ Silverman, Kenneth (1991). Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance. New York: Harper Perennial. pp. 90. ISBN 0-06-092331-8. </strong><br />
<strong>6.^ Leverenz, David (2001). "Spanking the Master: Mind-Body Crossings in Poe's Sensationalism". In J. Gerald Kennedy (ed.). A Historical Guide to Edgar Allan Poe. New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 103. ISBN 0-195-12150-3. </strong><br />
<strong>7.^ Quinn, Arthur Hobson (1998) [1941]. Edgar Allan Poe: A Critical Biography. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. pp. 194–195. ISBN 0-8018-5730-9. </strong><br />
<strong>8.^ Thomas, Dwight and David K. Jackson (1987). The Poe Log: A Documentary Life of Edgar Allan Poe 1809–1849. Boston: G. K. Hall. pp. 174. ISBN 0-8161-8734-7. </strong><br />
<strong>9.^ Quinn, Arthur Hobson (1998) [1941]. Edgar Allan Poe: A Critical Biography. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. pp. 191–192. ISBN 0-8018-5730-9. </strong><br />
<strong>10.^ Quinn, Arthur Hobson (1998) [1941]. Edgar Allan Poe: A Critical Biography. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. pp. 195. ISBN 0-8018-5730-9. </strong><br />
<strong>11.^ Sova, Dawn B. (2001). Edgar Allan Poe: A to Z. New York: Checkmark Books. pp. 31. ISBN 0-8160-4161-X. </strong><br />
<strong>12.^ Thomas, Dwight and David K. Jackson. The Poe Log, p. 168.</strong><br />
<strong>13.^ Quinn, Arthur Hobson (1998) [1941]. Edgar Allan Poe: A Critical Biography. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. pp. 457. ISBN 0-8018-5730-9. </strong><br />
<strong>14.^ Sova, Dawn B. (2001). Edgar Allan Poe: A to Z. New York: Checkmark Books. pp. 30–31. ISBN 0-8160-4161-X.</strong>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-50702122273363200152012-12-18T14:30:00.000-08:002012-12-18T14:30:00.749-08:00Deathday: Poet & Poe Friend Thomas Holley Chivers1858<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Thomas Holley Chivers</span> (October 18, 1809 – December 18, 1858) was an American doctor-turned-poet from the state of Georgia. He is best known for his friendship with Edgar Allan Poe and his controversial defense of the poet after his death.</strong>
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<strong>Born into a wealthy Georgia family, Chivers became interested in poetry at a young age. After he and his first wife separated, he received a medical degree from Transylvania University but focused his energy on publishing rather than medicine. In addition to submitting poems to various magazines and journals, Chivers published several volumes of poetry, including The Lost Pleiad in 1845, as well as plays. Edgar Allan Poe showed an interest in the young poet and encouraged his work. Chivers spent the last few years of his life defending the reputation of Poe, who had died in 1849, though he also thought Poe had been heavily influenced by his own poetry. Chivers died in Georgia in 1858.</strong>
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<strong>As a literary theorist, Chivers believed in divine inspiration. He encouraged the development of a distinctive American style of literature and especially promoted young writers. His poems were known for religious overtones with an emphasis on death and reunions with lost loved ones in the afterlife. Though he built up a mild reputation in his day, he was soon forgotten after his death.</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Life and work</span></strong>
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<strong>Chivers was born on October 18, 1809,[1] at Digby Manor, his father's plantation near Washington, Georgia.[2] At age seven, he was introduced to poetry when he read William Cowper's "The Rose".[3] In 1827, Chivers married his 16-year old cousin Frances Elizabeth Chivers. The two soon separated due to alleged meddling by Frances Chivers Albert, the wife of the poet's uncle, prior to the birth of their daughter in 1828.[4] It has also been suggested their separation was due to abuse, though these rumors originated from the same uncle.[5] After this incident, Chivers compared himself to Lord Byron, whose wife had also left him.[6] Chivers went on to receive a degree in medicine in 1830 from Transylvania University in Kentucky. His thesis was titled "Intermittent and Remittent Fevers".[5]</strong>
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<strong>Chivers wandered throughout the West and North of the United States, publishing poetry in various places before returning to Georgia.[6] In 1832, Chivers published The Path of Sorrow, a collection of poetry based on the events of his troubled first marriage. Two years later, he published Conrad and Eudora; or, The Death of Alonzo, the first fictionalized account of the actual 1825 murder case nicknamed the "Kentucky Tragedy". The work was later renamed Leoni, The Orphan of Venice.[7] On November 21, 1834, Chivers married Harriet Hunt of Springfield, Massachusetts and the couple had four children, though all died young.[8] Chivers and his first wife never legally divorced—one such suit was dismissed in court in 1835—but Georgia law invalidated marriage after a spouse's absence of five years or more.[9] Though Chivers contributed to various newspapers and magazines, his poetry was turned down for publication by the Southern Literary Messenger in March 1835, which suggested he return to medicine and the "lancet and pill-box".[6] Though the poems were not printed, unsigned commentary on them was presented in an editorial, referring to verses submitted by "T. H. C., M. D."[10] The Lost Pleiad was self-published in New York in 1845 to initial success, though sales rapidly declined.[11] In 1837, Chivers self-published Nacoochee; or, the Beautiful Star, With Other Poems. The volume was dedicated to his mother, who died a year later.[12]</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Relationship with Edgar Allan Poe</span></strong>
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<strong>Chivers is best known for his association with Edgar Allan Poe and, in fact, it is through this relationship that Chivers and his work was rediscovered in the 20th century.[13] The first interaction between the two was in 1840 though they did not meet until 1845 in New York.[14] The two became friends and Chivers was willing to give Poe lifetime financial support if he moved to the South.[15] Chivers appreciated Poe's ability and wrote that George Rex Graham was seriously underpaying Poe for his work on Graham's Magazine. "He ought to give you ten thousand dollars a year... It is richly worth it... [Graham] is greatly indebted to you. It is not my opinion that you have ever been, or ever will be, paid for your intellectual labours. You need never expect it, until you establish a Magazine of your own", he wrote, referring to Poe's plans to begin The Stylus.[16] Even so, Chivers was concerned about Poe's reputation as a severe literary critic, cautioning him about "when you tomahawk people".[17] Poe, in fact, had been hoping Chivers would lend his wealth as a financial backer for The Stylus and possibly even serve as a co-editor in its early planning stages.[18] Chivers considered Poe's proposal but was not able to accept because of the death of his three-year-old daughter just over a week later.[19]</strong>
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<strong>Poe had written about Chivers in the second part of his "Autography" series, published in Graham's Magazine in December of 1841. Poe said:</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">"His productions affect one as a wild dream — strange, incongruous, full of images of more than arabesque monstrosity, and snatches of sweet unsustained song. Even his worst nonsense (and some of it is horrible) has an indefinite charm of sentiment and melody. We can never be sure that there is any meaning in his words — neither is there any meaning in many of our finest musical airs — but the effect is very similar in both. His figures of speech are metaphor run mad, and his grammar is often none at all. Yet there are as fine individual passages to be found in the poems of Dr. Chivers, as in those of any poet whatsoever."[20]</span></strong>
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<strong>The two had corresponded through letters but finally met in June or July 1845. Chivers visited Poe when Poe was sick and bedridden and when Poe's wife Virginia was in an especially difficult period of her struggle with tuberculosis. Chivers later recalled that Poe's voice was "like the soft tones of an Aeolian Harp when the music that has been sleeping in the strings is awakened by the Breezes of Eden laden with sweet Spices from the mountains of the Lord".[21]</strong>
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<strong>By September 1845, however, Chivers was lecturing Poe on the dangers of alcohol. A Prohibitionist, he said Poe was wasting his God-given talents by indulging in drink. "Why should a Man whom God, by nature, has endowed with such transcendent abilities, so degrade himself into the veriest automaton as to be moved only by the poisonous steam of Hell-fire?" he said. While Poe's wife Virginia was sick, Chivers had to carry Poe home after a night of excess.[17]</strong>
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<strong>Moreover, as attested to in an 1848 pamphlet titled Search After Truth, Chivers disagreed with Poe regarding aesthetics. This small booklet presents a series of dialogues between the Seer [Chivers] and Politian [Poe]. For Chivers, a poet should be a Shelleyan or Swedenborgian visionary intent on capturing mystic realms of experience in language. For Poe, the poet is merely a superior wordsmith. The wise Seer ultimately leads Politan to the truth.[22]</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">After Poe's death</span></strong>
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<strong>After Poe's death, Chivers accused Poe of plagiarizing both "The Raven" and "Ulalume" from his own work[23] though other critics suggested Chivers's Eonchs of Ruby were a "mediocre restatement" of Poe's poems.[24] The first poem of the collection, "The Vigil of Aiden", was an homage to Poe, using names like "Lenore" and the refrain "forever more!"[25] On July 30, 1854, Chivers published an essay called "Origin of Poe's Raven" under the pseudonym Fiat Justitia, claiming that he inspired Poe to use trochaic octameter and the word "nevermore" in "The Raven".[26] Chivers also suggested in the Georgia Citizen that Poe learned to write poetry from him. As literary scholar Randy Nelson wrote: "anybody who's read both Poe and Thomas Holley Chivers can see that one of them 'influenced' the other, but just who took what from whom isn't clear."[27]</strong>
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<strong>Even so, Chivers continued to praise and admire Poe (albeit careful to point out Poe's literary debt to him) and was one of the first to present a picture of the "real Poe" in the face of the sustained attacks on Poe's reputation by the Reverend Rufus Wilmot Griswold, the poet's literary executor. This correction took the form of a memoir now titled Chivers' Life of Poe, not published until 1952.[14] Chivers said of Griswold that he "is not only incompetent to Edit any of [Poe's] works, but totally unconscious of the duties which he and every man who sets himself up as a Literary Executor, owe the dead."[28] Chivers continued to defend Poe's reputation until the end of his life.</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Final years and death</span></strong>
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<strong>From 1845 to 1850, Chivers had been living with his wife in Georgia, then spent the next five years in the North. His poetry collection Eonchs of Ruby, A Gift of Love was published in 1851 with a subtitle meant to capitalize on the gift book trend. Chivers explained the title: "The Word Eonch is the same as Concha Marina—Shell of the Sea. Eonch is used... merely for its euphony."[29] Throughout the collection, Chivers experiments with the sonic effects of words rather than their literal meaning.[30] Atlanta: or the True Blessed Island of Poesy: A Paul Epic in Three Lustra was first published in three installments in the Georgia Citizen beginning in January 1853.[31] Later that year, Memoralia; or, Philas of Amber Full of the Tears of Love was printed in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and generally received unfavorably.[32] Very shortly after, the same publisher brought out Virginalia; or, Songs of My Summer Nights, a collection made up of poems that were generally under 200 lines each, about half of which had previously been published in magazines.[33]</strong>
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<strong>By 1855, Chivers and his wife had moved back to Georgia and he predicted that the slavery issue would soon force his home state to break from the United States.[34] A slaveholder himself, Chivers did not believe that slaves should be abused, though he still defended the institution against abolitionists.[35] Struck with sudden illness, Chivers wrote his will before dying on December 18, 1858, in Decatur, Georgia.[36] His last words were, "All is perfect peace with me."[37] His last published work, a drama titled The Sons of Usna, had been published earlier that year.[34] At the time of his death, Chivers had prepared several manuscripts of his literary theory with the intention of publishing them in several volumes of books and as part of a lecture series.[38] In his will, he left one dollar for his first wife and their daughter.[5]</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Poetic theory and literary reputation</span></strong>
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<strong>In his poetry, Chivers made use of legends and themes from Native American culture, particularly the Cherokee, though often with Christian overtones.[39] He was also heavily influenced by the work of François-René de Chateaubriand[40] and Emanuel Swedenborg.[41] Many of Chivers's poems included themes of death and sorrow, often using images of shrouds, coffins, angels, and reunions with lost loves in the afterlife.[21] Religious conventions at the time made discussion of death popular, as was reflected in poetry. Because of his background as a doctor, Chivers was able to graphically depict the last moments before someone's death.[5]</strong>
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<strong>Chivers believed in a close connection between poetry and God and that true poetry could only be written through divine inspiration. He once wrote: "Poets are the apostles of divine thought, who are clothed with an authority from the Most High, to work miracles in the minds of men".[42] He also wrote: "Poetry is the power given by God to man of manifesting... the wise relations that subsist between him and God", and it "is that crystal river of the soul which runs through all the avenues of life, and after purifying the affections of the heart, empties itself into the Sea of God".[43] In Nacoochee, the preface states: "Poetry is that crystal river of the soul which runs thorugh all the avenues of life, and after purifying the affections of the heart, empties itself into the Sea of God."[12] In his introduction to Atlanta, written in 1842 but not published until 1853, Chivers gives a lengthy discussion of his poetic theory, pre-dating many ideas Poe would suggest in "The Poetic Principle" (1850). Chivers, for example, suggests that poems should be short to be successful: "No poem of any considerable length... can be pleasing to any well-educated person for any length of time".[44] He also experimented with blank verse as early as 1832 and his 1853 collection, Virginalia, included mostly poems using blank verse.[45]</strong>
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<strong>At least for a time, he considered Elizabeth Barrett Browning the best contemporary English poet.[46] Like many from his time, Chivers called for the development of a distinctive American literature and he especially encouraged young writers.[47] Poe called the 1845 poetry collection The Lost Pleiad "the honest and fervent utterance of an exquisitely sensitive heart."[21] Overall, he called Chivers "one of the best and one of the worst poets in America".[48] William Gilmore Simms offered conditional praise of Chivers's poetry as well: "He possesses a poetic ardor sufficiently fervid, and a singularly marked command of language. But he should have been caught young, and well-bitted, and subjected to the severest training... As an artist, Dr. Chivers is yet in his accidence."[6] Simms also commented that his works were too gloomy and melancholy.[11]</strong>
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<strong>Though Chivers built up a mild reputation during his lifetime, counting Algernon Charles Swinburne among his admirers,[36] his fame faded away quickly after his death. Other writers that acknowledged his influence included Dante Gabriel Rossetti, William Michael Rossetti, and Rudyard Kipling.[49] Others, however, were more critical. One anonymous reviewer, possibly Evert Augustus Duyckinck, joked that Chivers was formulaic and suggested the formula included 30% Percy Bysshe Shelley, 20% Poe, 20% "mild idiocy", 10% "gibbering idiocy", 10% "raving mania" and 10% "sweetness and originality".[50] Literary scholar S. Foster Damon wrote that Chivers would have had a stronger reputation if he were born in the North and "the literary coteries there would surely have pruned and preserved him... But the time and space were against him."[13]</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">List of works</span></strong>
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<strong>Eonchs of Ruby (1851)</strong><br />
<strong>The Path of Sorrow; or, the Lament of Youth (1832)
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<strong>Conrad and Eudora; or, the Death of Alonzo (1834)
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<strong>Nacoochee; or, the Beautiful Star With Other Poems (1837)
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<strong>The Lost Pleiad, and Other Poems (1845)
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<strong>Search After Truth; or, A New Revelation of the Psycho-Physiological Nature of Man. (1848)
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<strong>Eonchs of Ruby: a Gift of Love (1851)
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<strong>The Death of the Devil, A Serio-Ludicro, Tragico-Comico, Nigero-Whiteman Extravaganza (1852)
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<strong>Atlanta; or, the True Blessed Island of Poesy, a Paul Epic (1853) [1]
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<strong>Memoralia; or, Phials of Amber Full of the Tears of Love (1853)
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<strong>Virginalia; or, Songs of My Summer Nights (1853)
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<strong>The Sons of Usna: a Tragic Apotheosis in Five Acts (1858)</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Further reading</span></strong>
<br />
<br />
<strong>Bell, Landon C. Poe and Chivers.Columbus: Charles A. Trowbridge Co., 1931.
</strong><br />
<strong>Brown, Ellen Firsching. "The Genius and Tragedy of Georgia's Lost Poet". Georgia Backroads, Vol. 8 No. 3, Autumn 2009.
</strong><br />
<strong>Damon, S. Foster. Thomas Holley Chivers, Friend of Poe. New York, 1930
</strong><br />
<strong>Davis, Richard Beale, editor. Chivers' Life of Poe. New York: E. P. Dutton and Co., Inc., 1952.</strong>
<br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Notes</span></strong>
<br />
<br />
<strong>1.^ Nelson, 47
</strong><br />
<strong>2.^ Ehrlich, Eugene and Gorton Carruth. The Oxford Illustrated Literary Guide to the United States. New York: Oxford University Press, 1982: 260. ISBN 0195031865
</strong><br />
<strong>3.^ Parks, 166
</strong><br />
<strong>4.^ Watts, 113-114
</strong><br />
<strong>5.^ Lombard, 13
</strong><br />
<strong>6.^ Hubbell, 551
</strong><br />
<strong>7.^ Whited, 404–405
</strong><br />
<strong>8.^ Lombard, 14–15
</strong><br />
<strong>9.^ Lombard, 12
</strong><br />
<strong>10.^ Lombard, 14
</strong><br />
<strong>11.^ Lombard, 46
</strong><br />
<strong>12.^ Lombard, 38
</strong><br />
<strong>13.^ Hubbell, 550
</strong><br />
<strong>14.^ Lombard, 99
</strong><br />
<strong>15.^ Kennedy, 54
</strong><br />
<strong>16.^ Thomas and Jackson, 465
</strong><br />
<strong>17.^ Meyers, 140
</strong><br />
<strong>18.^ Silverman, 189-190
</strong><br />
<strong>19.^ Silverman, 190
</strong><br />
<strong>20.^ Poe, Edgar Allan (December 1841). "A Chapter on Autography (Part II)". Graham's Magazine. pp. 273–286. </strong><br />
<strong>21.^ aSilverman, 259
</strong><br />
<strong>22.^ Chivers, Thomas Holley. Search After Truth. New York: Scholar's Facsimiles and Reprints, 1976.
</strong><br />
<strong>23.^ Moss, 101
</strong><br />
<strong>24.^ Lombard, 17
</strong><br />
<strong>25.^ Lombard, 62–63
</strong><br />
<strong>26.^ Parks, 182.
</strong><br />
<strong>27.^ Nelson, 212
</strong><br />
<strong>28.^ Chivers, 70
</strong><br />
<strong>29.^ Lombard, 61
</strong><br />
<strong>30.^ Lombard, 76
</strong><br />
<strong>31.^ Lombard, 77
</strong><br />
<strong>32.^ Lombard, 85
</strong><br />
<strong>33.^ Lombard, 89
</strong><br />
<strong>34.^ Lombard, 97
</strong><br />
<strong>35.^ Lombard, 114
</strong><br />
<strong>36.^ Lombard, 18
</strong><br />
<strong>37.^ Hubbell, 552
</strong><br />
<strong>38.^ Parks, 183
</strong><br />
<strong>39.^ Lombard, 28
</strong><br />
<strong>40.^ Lombard, 24
</strong><br />
<strong>41.^ Lombard, 29
</strong><br />
<strong>42.^ Parks, 158
</strong><br />
<strong>43.^ Hubbell, 553
</strong><br />
<strong>44.^ Lombard, 78
</strong><br />
<strong>45.^ Lombard, 121
</strong><br />
<strong>46.^ Parks, 169
</strong><br />
<strong>47.^ Parks, 174
</strong><br />
<strong>48.^ Thomas & Jackson. 353
</strong><br />
<strong>49.^ Lombard, 132
</strong><br />
<strong>50.^ Moore, Rayburn S. "A New Look at Thomas Holley Chivers", The Southern Literary Journal, vol. 13, no. 1. Fall 1980: University of North Carolina Press: 131.</strong>
<br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Sources</span></strong>
<br />
<br />
<strong>Chivers, Thomas Holley. Chivers' Life of Poe, Richard Beale Davis (editor). New York: E. P. Dutton and Co., Inc., 1952.
</strong><br />
<strong>Hubbell, Jay B. The South in American Literature: 1607-1900. Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press, 1954.
</strong><br />
<strong>Kennedy, J. Gerald. "A Brief Biography", A Historical Guide to Edgar Allan Poe New York: Oxford University Press, 2001. ISBN 0195121503
</strong><br />
<strong>Lombard, Charles M. Thomas Holley Chivers. Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1979. ISBN 0805772588
</strong><br />
<strong>Meyers, Jeffrey. Edgar Allan Poe: His Life and Legacy New York: Cooper Square Press, 1992. ISBN 0815410387
</strong><br />
<strong>Moss, Sidney P. Poe's Literary Battles: The Critic in the Context of His Literary Milieu. Carbondale, Ill: Southern Illinois University Press, 1969.
</strong><br />
<strong>Nelson, Randy F. The Almanac of American Letters. Los Altos, California: William Kaufmann, Inc., 1981. ISBN 086576008X
</strong><br />
<strong>Parks, Edd Winfield. Ante-Bellum Southern Literary Critics. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 1962.
</strong><br />
<strong>Silverman, Kenneth. Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance New York: Harper Perennial, 1991. ISBN 0060923318
</strong><br />
<strong>Thomas, Dwight and David K. Jackson. The Poe Log: A Documentary Life of Edgar Allan Poe 1809-1849. New York: G. K. Hall and Co., 1987. ISBN 0783814011
</strong><br />
<strong>Watts, Charles Henry. Thomas Holley Chivers; His Literary Career and His Poetry. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1956.
</strong><br />
<strong>Whited, Stephen R. "Kentucky Tragedy", The Companion to Southern Literature: Themes, Genres, Places, People, Joseph M. Flora and Lucinda Hardwick MacKethan (editors). Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2002. ISBN 0807126926. Accessed January 24, 2008.</strong>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-62371395750832231492012-12-17T14:49:00.000-08:002012-12-17T14:49:00.912-08:00Deathday: Poet and Poe Historian Lizette Woodworth Reese 1935<div style="margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_qskaSRkns8A/S0K0z7eBMkI/AAAAAAAAJ2U/B8phqlhDDo0/s1600-h/lizette-w-reese01.jpg"><img alt="Lizette Woodworth Reese" border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_qskaSRkns8A/S0K0z7eBMkI/AAAAAAAAJ2U/B8phqlhDDo0/s400/lizette-w-reese01.jpg" height="640" width="526" /></a> </div>
<strong><span style="color: red;">Lizette Woodworth Reese</span> (January 9, 1856 – December 17, 1935) was an American poet. Born in the Waverly section of Baltimore, Maryland, she was a school teacher from 1873 to 1918. During the 1920s, she became a prominent literary figure, receiving critical praise and recognition, in particular from H. L. Mencken, himself from Baltimore. She has been cited as an influence on younger women poets and has been compared to Emily Dickinson.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>-- wiki</strong><br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Lizette Woodworth Reese</span> was born and raised in Waverly, Maryland, just off the road that ran between Baltimore and York, Pennsylvania. She began her teaching career at age 17 at nearby St. John's Episcopal Church's parish school and in 1901, moved to Baltimore's Western High School, where she taught English until she retired in 1921.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Johns Hopkins University professor and long-time acquaintance David M. Robinson described her this way: "With her sound-minded simplicity, [she] seemed to me like a charming child. But she had a genial humanism equal to that of the ancient Greeks… She was a lovely little lady with a staccato touch in her voice and sometimes a lively, lilting lisp. But she had a wonderful, strong, and fearless personality."</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Poet Amy Lowell said that Reese's poem "Tears" was "as fine a sonnet as any by Elizabeth Barrett Browning." That poem was first published in Scribner's magazine. Reese said that the check from Scribner's arrived just a few hours after her father's death, "as the crape was being hung from the door."</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Reese lived in her childhood home until her mother died, lived the last 20 years of her life with her sister's family, and <span style="color: red;">died at Church Home and Infirmary (as did Edgar Allan Poe 90 years earlier)</span>. She's buried in her old neighborhood—now in the heart of Baltimore—in the graveyard next to St. John's Church.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>-- The Baltimore Literary Heritage Project</strong><br />
<br />
<div style="margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_qskaSRkns8A/S0K0zr1hyjI/AAAAAAAAJ2M/r1CAYGqIRL4/s1600-h/lizette-w-reese02.jpg"><img alt="Lizette Woodworth Reese" border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_qskaSRkns8A/S0K0zr1hyjI/AAAAAAAAJ2M/r1CAYGqIRL4/s400/lizette-w-reese02.jpg" height="640" width="502" /></a> </div>
<div align="center">
<strong><span style="color: red;"><span style="font-size: 130%;">Lizette Woodworth Reese</span> </span></strong></div>
<div align="center">
<span style="color: red;"></span><br /></div>
<div align="center">
<strong><span style="color: red;">1856–-1935</span></strong></div>
<div align="center">
<strong><span style="color: red;">American poet, prose writer, and short story writer</span></strong></div>
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Introduction</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Although relatively unknown today, Reese was a popular American poet during the late Victorian and Edwardian periods. Praised for her concise style, her emotional yet never sentimental voice, and her nostalgic subjects, Reese earned a devoted following among critics and the public throughout her life. However, with the advent of modern poetic styles and her death, Reese faded into relative obscurity. Today she is known primarily as a transitional writer, bridging the gap between the Victorian and modern poets. In addition to her poetry, Reese published three books of recollections of late nineteenth-century small town life.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Biographical Information</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Reese was born in the small Maryland town of Waverly, then known as Huntingdon, on January 9, 1856. One of four sisters, Reese remained in the Baltimore area throughout her lifetime. After attending public schools, which Reese supplemented with a voracious appetite for classic English literature, she secured a position as a teacher at Saint John's Parish School in 1873. In June 1874, she published her first poem “The Deserted House,” in Southern Magazine. Although the poem lacked the skill of her later work, Reese established the themes and style for which she would be known: a solemn tone, the theme of eternal nature juxtaposed against the decay of society, the personification of nature, the simple and efficient use of language, and a brevity of description. During the next thirteen years Reese continued to write and publish in magazines such as the Atlantic Monthly, Harper's Monthly and Scribner's. In 1887 Reese used her own funds to publish her first collection of poems, A Branch of May. She sent copies of the work to such noted critics as Thomas Wentworth Higginson, William Dean Howells, and Edmund Clarence Stedman, who would become an influential figure in her career. Critics responded enthusiastically to her short, straightforward poetry which differed from the heavy, grandiose verse of the Victorians. Reese was able to publish her second volume of poetry with Houghton Mifflin in 1891. Upon the publication of her third collection in 1896, Reese had established herself as a noteworthy poet in America and England. After teaching in the Baltimore public schools for forty-five years while concurrently pursuing a writing career, Reese retired in 1921 and devoted more of her time to writing. Before her death in 1935 she published five more collections of poetry and wrote two works of childhood recollections. After her death a final volume of poetry, The Old House in the Country, was published in 1936.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Major Works</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Reese published eleven works of poetry, spanning from her first self-published collection A Branch of May in 1887 to her posthumously published The Old House in the Country in 1936. Although she acquired greater skill throughout her career and experimented somewhat with form, her work is generally uniform in style, voice, tone, and content. Reese rejected social commentary and observations on modernity and industrialization, instead focusing on aspects of nature and life which she had witnessed in her quiet rural surroundings in Waverly. She chose such subjects as death, religion, and pastoral scenes. In 1909 she published A Wayside Lute, which contained her best known and most highly regarded poem, the sonnet “Tears.” Reese primarily wrote short, rhymed, metered verse, often employing the sonnet form. She was known and admired for her concise voice and unsentimental tone which differed from the earlier Victorian poets and gave her poetry a distinctly modern air. In 1927 she published Little Henrietta, a collection of thirty-nine short poems that narrate the story of her cousin Henrietta Matilda. This work constitutes her only unrhymed poetry.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Critical Reception</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>During her lifetime Reese enjoyed popularity from critics and the public alike, encountering little difficulty publishing her poetry. Although critics agreed that she was among the minor poets of her age, the publication of each of her volumes was met with favorable reviews. However, Reese's popularity did not sustain past her death. Although her works are still included in anthologies and scholars, have conceded her role as a transitional figure in American poetry, little new critical scholarship has been written about Reese in the second half of the twentieth century. During her lifetime such reviewers as Genevieve Taggard, Louis Untermeyer, and Carlin T. Kindilien compared Reese's writing to Emily Dickinson's poetry, although each noted that Reese failed to achieve the sharpness and skill of Dickinson. Kindilien observed, “Like Emily Dickinson, Lizette Reese turned from the American scene and wrote a personal poetry that analyzed universals, but, unlike the Amherst poet, she was not to receive the critical attention that would have made known her achievement.” Other critics have compared her writing with that of Robert Herrick and Edna St. Vincent Millay. Reviewers have praised her brevity, concision, phrasing, and restraint. Though her tone was nostalgic and her subject matter often somber, commentators have noted that through her sincerity and simplicity Reese's poetry never sounded sentimental. However, Mark Van Doren has argued that her poetry “lack[ed] original salt” and Louise Bogan has despaired the absence of intellectuality and range in Reese's work.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>-- enotes</strong><br />
<br />
<div style="margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8VGtmMaK_bZhqBcYAmO3X0zivXaW2pwDUa1WIjHeEkRc5vR8afK8LrULGUDiRe9zIKIu2dSSjDWb3pToMVPM40meD0jg41YAJRAbCdtlYMoXAaNPnz8eIxHqcbj1Pm0DQSF8E8tmtl46e/s1600-h/lizette-w-reese-poe.jpg"><img alt="Lizette Reese Visiting Poe's Grave" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8VGtmMaK_bZhqBcYAmO3X0zivXaW2pwDUa1WIjHeEkRc5vR8afK8LrULGUDiRe9zIKIu2dSSjDWb3pToMVPM40meD0jg41YAJRAbCdtlYMoXAaNPnz8eIxHqcbj1Pm0DQSF8E8tmtl46e/s400/lizette-w-reese-poe.jpg" height="640" width="512" /></a> </div>
Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-79179322612956177972012-12-13T14:49:00.000-08:002012-12-13T14:49:00.184-08:00"The Man of the Crowd" Published 1840<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">"The Man of the Crowd"</span> is a short story written by Edgar Allan Poe about a nameless narrator following a man through a crowded London, first published in 1840.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Plot summary</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>The story is introduced with the epigraph, "Ce grand malheur, de ne pouvoir être seul"—a quote taken from The Characters of Man by Jean de la Bruyère. It translates to Such a great misfortune, not to be able to be alone. This same quote is used in Poe's earliest tale, "Metzengerstein."[1]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>After an unnamed illness, the unnamed narrator sits in an unnamed coffee shop in London. Fascinated by the crowd outside the window, he considers how isolated people think they are, despite "the very denseness of the company around." He takes time to categorize the different types of people he sees. As evening falls, the narrator focuses on "a decrepit old man, some sixty-five or seventy years of age," whose face has a peculiar idiosyncrasy, and whose body "was short in stature, very thin, and apparently very feeble" wearing filthy, ragged clothes of a "beautiful texture." The narrator dashes out of the coffee shop to follow the man from afar. The man leads the narrator through bazaars and shops, buying nothing, and into a poorer part of the city, then back into "the heart of the mighty London." This chase lasts through the evening and into the next day. Finally, exhausted, the narrator stands in front of the man, who still does not notice him. The narrator concludes the man is "the type and genius of deep crime" due to his inscrutability and inability to leave the crowds of London.[2]</strong><br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTHApx2iPOIeo_QlB_iVDI4Bs0mfWx1qZeDloeiFjVKUKxiwtUPrWmk7gY9YlN0L08USZCabVjlIY37aU3U3YcnbTWBzQdwoHnGeSzCtNY1vmM7UTmZiVJrlUoQNmdm6pQyRUzvuB2YAYA/s1600/harry-clarke-man-of-the-crowd.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTHApx2iPOIeo_QlB_iVDI4Bs0mfWx1qZeDloeiFjVKUKxiwtUPrWmk7gY9YlN0L08USZCabVjlIY37aU3U3YcnbTWBzQdwoHnGeSzCtNY1vmM7UTmZiVJrlUoQNmdm6pQyRUzvuB2YAYA/s320/harry-clarke-man-of-the-crowd.jpg" height="640" width="470" /></a></div>
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Analysis</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>According to the text of the tale, the reason for the narrator's monomaniacal obsession with the man stems from "the absolute idiosyncrasy of [the man's] expression." He is the only person walking down the street the narrator can't categorize.[2] Why the narrator is so haunted by him is not entirely clear, though it is implied that the two men are two sides of the same person, with the old man representing a secret side of the narrator,[3] though the narrator is unable to see this.[4] The old man may be wandering through the crowd in search of a lost friend or to escape the memory of a crime.[5] The possible evil nature of the man is implied by the dagger that is possibly seen under his cloak[4] - whatever crime he has committed condemns him to wander.[1] This lack of disclosure has been compared to similar vague motivations in "The Cask of Amontillado."[6] Poe purposely presents the story as a sort of mystification, inviting readers to surmise the old man's secret themselves.[4]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>At the beginning of the tale, the narrator surveys and categorizes the people around him in a similar way as Walt Whitman in "Song of Myself." Poe's narrator, however, lacks Whitman's celebratory spirit.[7] While viewing these people, the narrator is able to ascertain a great deal of information about them based on their appearance and by noting small details. For example, he notices that a man's ear sticks out a small amount, indicating he must be a clerk who stores his pen behind his ear. Poe would later incorporate this ability to observe small details in his character C. Auguste Dupin.[8]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>The setting of London, one of the few specific details revealed in the tale, is important. By 1840, London was the largest city in the world with a population of 750,000.[9] Poe would have known London from the time he spent there as a boy with his foster family, the Allans,[1] although he may have relied on the writings of Charles Dickens for details of London's streets.[2] In this story and others, Poe associates modern cities with the growth of impersonal crime.[10]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Publication history</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>The story was first published simultaneously in the December 1840 issues of Atkinson's Casket and Burton's Gentleman's Magazine. The latter was the final issue of that periodical.[1] It was later included in Wiley and Putnam's collection simply titled Tales by Edgar A. Poe.[11]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">References</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>1.^ Sova, Dawn B. Edgar Allan Poe: A to Z. New York City: Checkmark Books, 2001: 147. ISBN 081604161X</strong><br />
<strong>2.^ Sweeney, Susan Elizabeth (2003). "The Magnifying Glass: Spectacular Distance in Poe's "Man of the Crowd" and Beyond". Poe Studies/Dark Romanticism 36 (1-2): 3. </strong><br />
<strong>3.^ Sova, Dawn B. Edgar Allan Poe: A to Z. New York City: Checkmark Books, 2001: 148. ISBN 081604161X</strong><br />
<strong>4.^ Kennedy, J. Gerald. Poe, Death, and the Life of Writing. Yale University Press, 1987: 118. ISBN 0300037732</strong><br />
<strong>5.^ Quinn, Arthur Hobson. Edgar Allan Poe: A Critical Biography. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998: 310. ISBN 0801857309</strong><br />
<strong>6.^ Hoffman, Daniel. Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe. Louisiana State University Press, 1972: 245. ISBN 0807123218</strong><br />
<strong>7.^ Person, Leland S. "Poe and Nineteenth-Century Gender Constructions," collected in A Historical Guide to Edgar Allan Poe, edited by J. Gerald Kennedy. Oxford University Press, 2001: 158. ISBN 0195121503</strong><br />
<strong>8.^ Stashower, Daniel. The Beautiful Cigar Girl: Mary Rogers, Edgar Allan Poe, and the Invention of Murder. New York: Dutton, 2006: 113. ISBN 052594981X</strong><br />
<strong>9.^ Meyers, Jeffrey: Edgar Allan Poe: His Life and Legacy. New York: Cooper Square Press, 2000: 115. ISBN 0815410387</strong><br />
<strong>10.^ Kennedy, J. Gerald. "Introduction: Poe in Our Time" collected in A Historical Guide to Edgar Allan Poe. Oxford University Press, 2001: 9. ISBN 0195121503</strong><br />
<strong>11.^ Quinn, Arthur Hobson. Edgar Allan Poe: A Critical Biography. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998: 464–466. ISBN 0801857309</strong>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-47393927181710265522012-12-09T14:49:00.000-08:002012-12-09T14:49:00.590-08:00"To MLS---" Published 1847<div style="text-align: center;">
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<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">To M. L. S——</span></strong></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<strong>by Edgar Allan Poe</strong> </div>
<br />
<strong>This poem was dedicated to Mrs. Marie Louise Shew:</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Of all who hail thy presence as the morning-</strong><br />
<strong>Of all to whom thine absence is the night-</strong><br />
<strong>The blotting utterly from out high heaven</strong><br />
<strong>The sacred sun- of all who, weeping, bless thee</strong><br />
<strong>Hourly for hope- for life- ah! above all,</strong><br />
<strong>For the resurrection of deep-buried faith</strong><br />
<strong>In Truth- in Virtue- in Humanity-</strong><br />
<strong>Of all who, on Despair's unhallowed bed</strong><br />
<strong>Lying down to die, have suddenly arisen</strong><br />
<strong>At thy soft-murmured words, "Let there be light!"</strong><br />
<strong>At the soft-murmured words that were fulfilled</strong><br />
<strong>In the seraphic glancing of thine eyes-</strong><br />
<strong>Of all who owe thee most- whose gratitude</strong><br />
<strong>Nearest resembles worship- oh, remember</strong><br />
<strong>The truest- the most fervently devoted,</strong><br />
<strong>And think that these weak lines are written by him-</strong><br />
<strong>By him who, as he pens them, thrills to think</strong><br />
<strong>His spirit is communing with an angel's.</strong><br />
<br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">To M. L. S—— (1847)</span></strong><br />
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<strong>Poe wrote this poem to Marie Louise Shew, who helped Poe's wife Virginia as she was dying. The original manuscript was sent directly to her, dated February 14, 1847. A revised version was printed in Home Journal's March 13, 1847, issue.</strong>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-16951949745292900542012-12-08T14:50:00.000-08:002012-12-08T14:50:00.566-08:00Deathday: Poe's Mother Elizabeth Arnold Poe 1811<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<b><span style="color: red;">Elizabeth Arnold Hopkins Poe</span> (1787 – December 8, 1811) was an English-born American actress and the mother of the American author Edgar Allan Poe.</b>
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<br />
<b><span style="color: red;">Life and career</span></b><br />
<br />
<b>Eliza Arnold was born to Henry and Elizabeth Arnold in London in the spring of 1787.[1] Her mother was a stage actress in London from 1791 to 1795. Henry died in 1789 and, in November 1795, only mother and daughter sailed from England to the United States, arriving in Boston, Massachusetts on January 3, 1796.[1]</b><br />
<br />
<strong>Eliza debuted on the Boston stage at the age of nine, only three months after her arrival in the United States.[2] She played a character named Biddy Blair in a farce called Miss in Her Teens by David Garrick and was praised in the Portland Herald:[1] "Miss Arnold, in Miss Biddy, exceeded all praise.. Although a miss of only nine years old, her powers as an Actress will do credit to any of her sex of maturer age".[2] Later that year, Elizabeth married a musician named Charles Tubbs, a man who had sailed with the Arnolds from England. The small family joined with a manager named Mr. Edgar to form a theater troupe called the Charleston Comedians. Elizabeth, Eliza's mother, died sometime while this troupe was traveling through North Carolina.[3] Little is known about her death but she disappears from theatrical records in 1798 and it is presumed she died shortly after.[2]</strong>
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<br />
<strong>After her mother's death, Eliza stayed with the theater troupe. She followed the tradition at the time for actors to travel from city to city to perform for as long as several months before moving on. The actors, theaters, and audiences had a wide range of sophistication. One of the most impressive venues at which Eliza performed was the Chestnut Street Theater near Independence Hall in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, which seated two thousand.[3] Over the course of her career, Eliza played some 300 parts, as well as choral and dancing roles, including William Shakespeare characters Juliet Capulet and Ophelia.[2]</strong>
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<br />
<strong>In the summer of 1802, at the age of fifteen, Eliza married Charles Hopkins.[2] Hopkins died three years later in October 1805, possibly due to yellow fever, leaving Eliza an eighteen-year old widow.[4] The Baltimore-born David Poe, Jr. saw Eliza performing in Norfolk, Virginia and decided to join her acting troupe, abandoning his family's plans for him to study law.[5] Poe married Eliza only six months after Hopkins's death in 1806.[6]</strong>
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<br />
<strong>The couple traveled throughout New England and the rest of the northeast, playing in various towns such as Richmond, Philadelphia, and at an outdoor summer theater in New York City before finally settling in Boston. They stayed in Boston for three consecutive seasons of thirty weeks each in a theater that fit an audience of about one thousand.[4] Reviews at the time often remarked on Eliza's "interesting figure" and "sweetly melodious voice".[5] Though times were difficult, the couple had two sons; William Henry Leonard was born in January 1807 (nine months after their wedding)[6] and Edgar was born on January 19, 1809, at a boarding-house near Boston Common, close from where their troupe was performing.[7] Eliza performed until 10 days before Edgar's birth and may have named her second son after the Mr. Edgar who led the Charleston Comedians.[8]</strong>
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<strong>The family relocated to New York in the summer of 1809. Eliza had often been praised for her acting ability while David's performances were routinely criticized harshly, possibly due to his own stage fright.[4] David, hot-headed and an alcoholic,[6] abandoned the stage and his family about six weeks after moving to New York.[9] Though David's fate is unknown, there is some evidence to suggest he died in Norfolk on December 11, 1811.[10] In his absence, Eliza gave birth to a third child, a daughter she called Rosalie, in December 1810. Rosalie was later described as "backward" and she may have been mentally retarded. Eliza continued traveling as she performed.</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Death</span></strong>
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<strong>In 1811, while staying at a boarding house in Richmond, Virginia for a performance, Eliza began spitting blood.[11] Her performances became less frequent until October 1811 when she stopped appearing altogether.[12] Her last performance was on October 11, 1811, as Countess Wintersen in a play called The Stranger.[13]</strong>
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<strong>Friends and fellow actors Mr. and Mrs. Luke Usher (the name may have inspired Poe's tale "The Fall of the House of Usher"[14]) took care of the children during Eliza's illness and many in the Richmond area took an interest in her health. On November 29 of that year, the Richmond Theater announced a benefit performance on her behalf. A local publication, the Enquirer, reported her need for help: "On this night, Mrs. Poe, lingering on the bed of disease and surrounded by her children, asks your assistance and asks it perhaps for the last time".[10]</strong>
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<strong>Eliza finally died on Sunday morning, December 8, 1811, at the age of twenty-four[12] surrounded by her children.[7] It is generally assumed that Eliza Poe died of tuberculosis.[1][15] She is buried at St. John's Episcopal Church in Richmond. Though her actual burying place is unknown, a memorial marks the general area.</strong>
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<br />
<strong>After her death, her three children were split up. William Henry Leonard Poe lived with his paternal grandparents in Baltimore, Edgar Poe was taken in by John and Frances Allan in Richmond, and Rosalie Poe was adopted by William and Jane Scott Mackenzie in Richmond.
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<br />
<span style="color: red;">Influence
</span>
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<br />
Though he was young when she died, Edgar Poe was heavily impacted by Eliza Poe's death and many of his works reflect her influence. His first published work "Metzengerstein" features a fire burning down a large home, possibly reflecting the fire that destroyed the Richmond Theatre, where she had performed. The fire occurred in December 1811, only three weeks after her death.[16] The early loss of his mother and other women, including his wife Virginia, may also have inspired Edgar Poe's often-used literary theme of dying women.[17] This theme is readily present in works like "The Raven".[18]</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Notes</span></strong>
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<br />
<strong>1.^ Sova, 192
</strong><br />
<strong>2.^ Meyers, 2
</strong><br />
<strong>3.^ Silverman, 2
</strong><br />
<strong>4.^ Silverman, 3
</strong><br />
<strong>5.^ Stashower, 34
</strong><br />
<strong>6.^ Meyers, 3
</strong><br />
<strong>7.^ Stashower, 35
</strong><br />
<strong>8.^ Silverman, 5–6
</strong><br />
<strong>9.^ Silverman, 7
</strong><br />
<strong>10.^ Meyers, 6
</strong><br />
<strong>11.^ Hoffman, Daniel. Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1972: 25. ISBN 0807123218
</strong><br />
<strong>12.^ Silverman, 8
</strong><br />
<strong>13.^ Thomas, Dwight and David K. Jackson. The Poe Log: A Documentary Life of Edgar Allan Poe 1809-1849. New York: G. K. Hall and Co., 1987: 12. ISBN 0783814011
</strong><br />
<strong>14.^ Allen, Hervey. Israfel: The Life and Times of Edgar Allan Poe. New York: Farrar & Rinehart, Inc., 1934: 683.
</strong><br />
<strong>15.^ Stashower, 7
</strong><br />
<strong>16.^ Hutchisson, James M. Poe. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2005: 38. ISBN 1-57806-721-9
</strong><br />
<strong>17.^ Weekes, Karen. "Poe's feminine ideal", collected in The Cambridge Companion to Edgar Allan Poe, edited by Kevin J. Hayes. Cambridge University Press, 2002: 149. ISBN 0521797276
</strong><br />
<strong>18.^ Kopley, Richard and Kevin J. Hayes. "Two verse masterworks: 'The Raven' and 'Ulalume'", collected in The Cambridge Companion to Edgar Allan Poe, edited by Kevin J. Hayes. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002: 194. ISBN 0521797276</strong>
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<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Sources</span></strong>
<br />
<br />
<strong>Meyers, Jeffrey. Edgar Allan Poe: His Life and Legacy. New York City: Cooper Square Press, 1992. ISBN 0-8154-1038-7.
</strong><br />
<strong>Silverman, Kenneth. Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance. New York City: Harper Perennial, 1991. ISBN 0-06-092331-8.
</strong><br />
<strong>Sova, Dawn B. Edgar Allan Poe: A to Z. New York: Checkmark Books, 2001. ISBN 0-8160-4161-X.
</strong><br />
<strong>Stashower, Daniel. The Beautiful Cigar Girl: Mary Rogers, Edgar Allan Poe, and the Invention of Murder. New York: Dutton, 2006. ISBN 0-525-94981-X.</strong>
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<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Further reading</span></strong>
<br />
<br />
<strong>Smith, Geddeth. The Brief Career of Eliza Poe. Fairleigh Dickinson University Press: April 1988.</strong>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-8781483288314641352012-12-01T20:11:00.000-08:002012-12-04T21:46:03.005-08:00"The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar" Published 1845<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<strong><span style="color: red;">"The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar"</span> is a short story by American author Edgar Allan Poe about a mesmerist who puts a man in a suspended hypnotic state at the moment of death. An example of a tale of suspense and horror, it is also, to a certain degree, a hoax as it was published without claiming to be fictional, and many at the time of publication (1845) took it to be a factual account. Poe toyed with this for a while before admitting it was a work of pure fiction in his "Marginalia."</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Plot summary</span></strong>
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<strong>The narrator presents the facts of the extraordinary case of Valdemar which have incited public discussion. He is interested in Mesmerism, a pseudoscience involving bringing a patient into a hypnogogic state by the influence of magnetism, a process which later developed into hypnotism. He points out that, as far as he knows, no one has ever been mesmerized at the point of death, and he is curious to see what effects mesmerism would have on a dying person. He considers experimenting on his friend Ernest Valdemar, an author whom he had previously mesmerized, and who has recently been diagnosed with phthisis (tuberculosis).</strong>
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<br />
<strong>Valdemar consents to the experiment and informs the narrator by letter that he will probably die in twenty-four hours. Valdemar's two physicians inform the narrator of their patient's poor condition. After confirming again that Valdemar is willing to be part of the experiment, the narrator comes back the next night with two nurses and a medical student as witnesses. Again, Valdemar insists he is willing to take part and asks the narrator to hurry, for fear he has "deferred it for too long". Valdemar is quickly mesmerized, just as the two physicians return and serve as additional witnesses. In a trance, he reports first that he is dying - then that he is dead. The narrator leaves him in a mesmeric state for seven months, checking on him daily. During this time Valdemar is without pulse, heartbeat or perceptible breathing, his skin cold and pale.</strong>
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<br />
<strong>Finally, the narrator makes attempts to awaken Valdemar, asking questions which are answered with difficulty, his voice seemingly coming from his swollen, blackened tongue. In between trance and wakefulness, Valdemar's tongue begs to quickly either put him back to sleep or to wake him. As Valdemar's voice shouts "dead! dead!" repeatedly, the narrator takes Valdemar out of his trance; in the process, Valdemar's entire body immediately decays into a "nearly liquid mass of loathsome—of detestable putrescence."</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Analysis</span></strong>
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<strong>Poe uses particularly detailed descriptions and relatively high levels of gore in "The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar," suggesting Poe deeply studied medical texts.[1] Valdemar's eyes at one point leak a "profuse outflowing of a yellowish ichor," for example, though Poe's imagery in the story is best summed up in its final lines: "...his whole frame at once — within the space of a single minute, or even less, shrunk—crumbled—absolutely rotted away beneath my hands. Upon the bed, before that whole company, there lay a nearly liquid mass of loathsome—of detestable putrescence." The disgusting imagery almost certainly inspired later fiction including that of H. P. Lovecraft.[2] Those final lines make up one of the most powerfully effective moments in Poe's work, incorporating shock, disgust, and uneasiness into one moment.[3] This ending shows that attempts to appropriate power over death will have hideous results[4] and, therefore, ultimately be unsuccessful.[5]
</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>In Spanish, "Valdemar" roughly translates to "valley of the sea." The name suggests both solid and liquid states; this meaning is emphasized in the imagery in the story as Valdemar's body goes from its normal solid state to liquid in the final climactic lines.[6] Poe also uses teeth as a symbol; he typically uses teeth in his works to symbolize mortality. Other uses include the "sepulchral and disgusting" horse's teeth in "Metzengerstein," obsessing over teeth in "Berenice," and the sound of grating teeth in "Hop-Frog."[7]</strong>
<br />
<br />
<strong>Valdemar's death by tuberculosis, and attempts to postpone his death, may have been influenced by Poe's wife, Virginia.[2] At the time of this story's publication, she had been suffering from tuberculosis for four years.[1] Poe's extreme detail in "The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar" may have been based on Virginia's actual suffering.[6] Additionally, Poe may have been inspired by Andrew Jackson Davis, whose lectures on mesmerism he had attended.[8] Valdemar's death, however, is not portrayed sentimentally as Poe's typical theme of "the death of a beautiful woman" portrayed in other works such as "Ligeia" and "Morella." The death of this male character contrasts as brutal and sensational.[9]</strong>
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<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Reception and critical response</span></strong>
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<br />
<strong>Many readers thought the story to be a scientific report. Robert Collyer, an English magnetic healer visiting Boston, wrote to Poe saying that he himself had performed a similar act to revive a man who had been pronounced dead (in truth, the man was actually a drunk sailor who was revived by a hot bath). Another Englishman, Thomas South, used the story as a case study in his book Early Magnetism in its Higher Relations to Humanity in 1846.[10] Medical student George C. Eveleth wrote to Poe: "I have strenuously held that it was true. But I tell you that I strongly suspect it for a hoax."[11] A Scottish reader named Archibald Ramsay wrote to Poe "as a believer in Mesmerism" asking about the story. "It details... most extraordinary circumstances", he wrote, concerned that it had been labeled a hoax. "For the sake of... Science and of truth", he requested an answer from Poe himself. Poe's response: "Hoax is precisely the word suited... Some few persons believe it—but I do not—and don't you."[12] He received many similar letters, replying to one such letter from a friend, he added the succinct postscript: "P.S. The 'Valdemar Case' was a hoax, of course."[13] In the Daily Tribune, editor Horace Greeley noted "that several good matter-of-fact citizens" were tricked by it but "whoever thought it a veracious recital must have the bump of Faith large, very large indeed."[14]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Elizabeth Barrett Browning wrote to Poe about the story to commend him on his ability of "making horrible improbabilities seem near and familiar."[15] Virginia poet Philip Pendleton Cooke also wrote to Poe, calling the story "the most damnable, vraisemblable, horrible, hair-lifting, shocking, ingenious chapter of fiction that any brain ever conceived or hand traced. That gelatinous, viscous sound of man's voice! there never was such an idea before."[16] Literary critic and professor George Edward Woodberry said that the story "for mere physical disgust and foul horror, has no rival in literature."[17] Scholar James M. Hutchisson refers to the story as "probably Poe's most gruesome tale."[18]</strong>
<br />
<br />
<strong>Rudyard Kipling, an admirer of Poe, references "The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar" in his story "In the House of Suddhoo." The story suggests the disastrous results of sorcery in trying to save his sick son's life. One spell requires the head of a dead baby, which seems to speak. The narrator says, "Read Poe's account of the voice that came from the mesmerised dying man, and you will realise less than one half of the horror of that head's voice."[19]</strong>
<br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Publication history</span></strong>
<br />
<br />
<strong>While editor of The Broadway Journal, Poe printed a letter from a New York physician named Dr. A. Sidney Doane which recounted a surgical operation performed while a patient was "in a magnetic sleep"; the letter served as inspiration for Poe's tale.[20] "The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar" was published simultaneously in the December 20, 1845, issue of the Broadway Journal and the December 1845 issue of American Review: A Whig Journal[8]—the latter journal used the title "The Facts in M. Valdemar's Case."[21] It was also republished in England, first as a pamphlet edition as "Mesmerism in Articulo Mortis" and later as "The Last Days of M. Valdemar."[22]</strong>
<br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Adaptations</span></strong>
<br />
<br />
<strong>"The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar" was adapted into film in Argentina in 1960 as a segment of Masterpieces of Horror, first shown in the United States in 1965. It was also one of three Poe-inspired segments in the 1962 film Roger Corman-directed Tales of Terror.[8] It was later adapted by George A. Romero in Two Evil Eyes (1990). The radio drama series Radio Tales produced an adaptation of the story entitled "Edgar Allan Poe's Valdemar" (2000) for National Public Radio. The story was also loosely adapted into the black comedy The Mesmerist (2002).</strong>
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<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">References</span></strong>
<br />
<br />
<strong>1.^ Stashower, Daniel. The Beautiful Cigar Girl: Mary Rogers, Edgar Allan Poe, and the Invention of Murder. New York: Dutton, 2006: 275. ISBN 052594981X</strong><br />
<strong>2.^ Silverman, Kenneth. Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance. New York City: Harper Perennial, 1991: 294. ISBN 0060923318</strong><br />
<strong>3.^ Elmer, Jonathan. "Terminate or Liquidate? Poe Sensationalism, and the Sentimental Tradition" collected in The American Face of Edgar Allan Poe, edited by Shawn Rosenheim and Stephen Rachman. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995: 116. ISBN 0801850258</strong><br />
<strong>4.^ Selley, April. "Poe and the Will" as collected in Poe and His Times: The Artist and His Milieu, edited by Benjamin Franklin Fisher IV. Baltimore: The Edgar Allan Poe Society, Inc., 1990: 97. ISBN 0961644923</strong><br />
<strong>5.^ Hutchisson, James M. Poe. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2005: 158. ISBN 1-57806-721-9</strong><br />
<strong>6.^ Meyers, Jeffrey. Edgar Allan Poe: His Life and Legacy. New York City: Cooper Square Press, 1992: 179. ISBN 0815410387</strong><br />
<strong>7.^ Kennedy, J. Gerald. Poe, Death, and the Life of Writing. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1987: 79. ISBN 0300037732</strong><br />
<strong>8.^ Sova, Dawn B. Edgar Allan Poe: A to Z. New York City: Checkmark Books, 2001: 85. ISBN 081604161X</strong><br />
<strong>9.^ Elmer, Jonathan. "Terminate or Liquidate? Poe Sensationalism, and the Sentimental Tradition" collected in The American Face of Edgar Allan Poe, edited by Shawn Rosenheim and Stephen Rachman. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995: 108. ISBN 0801850258</strong><br />
<strong>10.^ Silverman, Kenneth. Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance. New York City: Harper Perennial, 1991. ISBN 0060923318 p. 294–295</strong><br />
<strong>11.^ Phillips, Mary E. Edgar Allan Poe: The Man. Chicago: The John C. Winston Company, 1926: 1189.</strong><br />
<strong>12.^ Phillips, Mary E. Edgar Allan Poe: The Man. Chicago: The John C. Winston Company, 1926: 1188–1189.</strong><br />
<strong>13.^ Quinn, Arthur Hobson. Edgar Allan Poe: A Critical Biography. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998: 529. ISBN 0801857309</strong><br />
<strong>14.^ Thomas, Dwight and David K. Jackson. The Poe Log: A Documentary Life of Edgar Allan Poe, 1809–1849. Boston: G. K. Hall and Co., 1987: 603. ISBN 0816187347</strong><br />
<strong>15.^ Quinn, Arthur Hobson. Edgar Allan Poe: A Critical Biography. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998. p. 484. ISBN 0801857309</strong><br />
<strong>16.^ Meyers, Jeffrey. Edgar Allan Poe: His Life and Legacy. New York City: Cooper Square Press, 1992: 179-180. ISBN 0815410387</strong><br />
<strong>17.^ Phillips, Mary E. Edgar Allan Poe: The Man. Chicago: The John C. Winston Company, 1926: 1075.</strong><br />
<strong>18.^ Hutchisson, James M. Poe. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2005: 157. ISBN 1-57806-721-9</strong><br />
<strong>19.^ Meyers, Jeffrey. Edgar Allan Poe: His Life and Legacy. Cooper Square Press, 1992: 291. ISBN 0815410387</strong><br />
<strong>20.^ Thomas, Dwight and David K. Jackson. The Poe Log: A Documentary Life of Edgar Allan Poe, 1809–1849. Boston: G. K. Hall and Co., 1987: 498. ISBN 0816187347</strong><br />
<strong>21.^ Quinn, Arthur Hobson. Edgar Allan Poe: A Critical Biography. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998: 470. ISBN 0801857309</strong><br />
<strong>22.^ Quinn, Arthur Hobson. Edgar Allan Poe: A Critical Biography. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998: 516. ISBN 0801857309</strong><br />
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Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-81777778444057268542012-11-30T15:00:00.000-08:002012-11-30T15:00:07.664-08:00Maria Tucker Reads "The Bells" at Poe Funeral<div style="text-align: center;">
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<strong>Maria Tucker reads "The Bells" at Poe Forward's POE FUNERAL.</strong></div>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-3773675214267264982012-11-29T15:00:00.000-08:002012-11-29T15:00:08.059-08:00"The Bells" Published 1849<div style="text-align: center;">
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<strong><span style="color: red;">The Bells (1849)</span> </strong></div>
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<strong>by Edgar Allan Poe</strong> </div>
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<strong>"The Bells" is a heavily onomatopoeic poem by Edgar Allan Poe which was not published until after his death in 1849. It is perhaps best known for the diacopic repetition of the word "bells." The poem has four parts to it; each part becomes darker and darker as the poem progresses from "the jingling and the tinkling" of the bells in part 1 to the "moaning and the groaning" of the bells in part 4.</strong><br />
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<strong>I</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Hear the sledges with the bells —</strong><br />
<strong>Silver bells!</strong><br />
<strong>What a world of merriment their melody foretells!</strong><br />
<strong>How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,</strong><br />
<strong>In the icy air of night!</strong><br />
<strong>While the stars that oversprinkle</strong><br />
<strong>All the heavens seem to twinkle</strong><br />
<strong>With a crystalline delight;</strong><br />
<strong>Keeping time, time, time,</strong><br />
<strong>In a sort of Runic rhyme,</strong><br />
<strong>To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells</strong><br />
<strong>From the bells, bells, bells, bells,</strong><br />
<strong>Bells, bells, bells —</strong><br />
<strong>From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.</strong><br />
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<strong>II</strong><br />
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<strong>Hear the mellow wedding bells —</strong><br />
<strong>Golden bells!</strong><br />
<strong>What a world of happiness their harmony foretells!</strong><br />
<strong>Through the balmy air of night</strong><br />
<strong>How they ring out their delight!</strong><br />
<strong>From the molten-golden notes,</strong><br />
<strong>And all in tune,</strong><br />
<strong>What a liquid ditty floats</strong><br />
<strong>To the turtle-dove that listens, while she gloats</strong><br />
<strong>On the moon!</strong><br />
<strong>Oh, from out the sounding cells</strong><br />
<strong>What a gush of euphony voluminously wells!</strong><br />
<strong>How it swells!</strong><br />
<strong>How it dwells</strong><br />
<strong>On the Future! — how it tells</strong><br />
<strong>Of the rapture that impels</strong><br />
<strong>To the swinging and the ringing</strong><br />
<strong>Of the bells, bells, bells,</strong><br />
<strong>Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,</strong><br />
<strong>Bells, bells, bells —</strong><br />
<strong>To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells!</strong><br />
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<strong>III</strong><br />
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<strong>Hear the loud alarum bells —</strong><br />
<strong>Brazen bells!</strong><br />
<strong>What a tale of terror, now, their turbulency tells!</strong><br />
<strong>In the startled ear of night</strong><br />
<strong>How they scream out their affright!</strong><br />
<strong>Too much horrified to speak,</strong><br />
<strong>They can only shriek, shriek,</strong><br />
<strong>Out of tune,</strong><br />
<strong>In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire,</strong><br />
<strong>In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire,</strong><br />
<strong>Leaping higher, higher, higher,</strong><br />
<strong>With a desperate desire,</strong><br />
<strong>And a resolute endeavor</strong><br />
<strong>Now — now to sit or never,</strong><br />
<strong>By the side of the pale-faced moon.</strong><br />
<strong>Oh, the bells, bells, bells!</strong><br />
<strong>What a tale their terror tells</strong><br />
<strong>Of Despair!</strong><br />
<strong>How they clang, and clash, and roar!</strong><br />
<strong>What a horror they outpour</strong><br />
<strong>On the bosom of the palpitating air!</strong><br />
<strong>Yet the ear it fully knows,</strong><br />
<strong>By the twanging</strong><br />
<strong>And the clanging,</strong><br />
<strong>How the danger ebbs and flows;</strong><br />
<strong>Yet the ear distinctly tells,</strong><br />
<strong>In the jangling</strong><br />
<strong>And the wrangling,</strong><br />
<strong>How the danger sinks and swells,</strong><br />
<strong>By the sinking or the swelling in the anger of the bells —</strong><br />
<strong>Of the bells,</strong><br />
<strong>Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,</strong><br />
<strong>Bells, bells, bells —</strong><br />
<strong>In the clamor and the clangor of the bells!</strong><br />
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<strong>IV</strong><br />
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<strong>Hear the tolling of the bells —</strong><br />
<strong>Iron bells!</strong><br />
<strong>What a world of solemn thought their monody compels!</strong><br />
<strong>In the silence of the night,</strong><br />
<strong>How we shiver with affright</strong><br />
<strong>At the melancholy menace of their tone!</strong><br />
<strong>For every sound that floats</strong><br />
<strong>From the rust within their throats</strong><br />
<strong>Is a groan.</strong><br />
<strong>And the people — ah, the people —</strong><br />
<strong>They that dwell up in the steeple,</strong><br />
<strong>All alone,</strong><br />
<strong>And who tolling, tolling, tolling,</strong><br />
<strong>In that muffled monotone,</strong><br />
<strong>Feel a glory in so rolling</strong><br />
<strong>On the human heart a stone —</strong><br />
<strong>They are neither man nor woman —</strong><br />
<strong>They are neither brute nor human —</strong><br />
<strong>They are Ghouls:</strong><br />
<strong>And their king it is who tolls;</strong><br />
<strong>And he rolls, rolls, rolls,</strong><br />
<strong>Rolls</strong><br />
<strong>A paean from the bells!</strong><br />
<strong>And his merry bosom swells</strong><br />
<strong>With the paean of the bells!</strong><br />
<strong>And he dances, and he yells;</strong><br />
<strong>Keeping time, time, time,</strong><br />
<strong>In a sort of Runic rhyme,</strong><br />
<strong>To the paean of the bells,</strong><br />
<strong>Of the bells —</strong><br />
<strong>Keeping time, time, time,</strong><br />
<strong>In a sort of Runic rhyme,</strong><br />
<strong>To the throbbing of the bells,</strong><br />
<strong>Of the bells, bells, bells —</strong><br />
<strong>To the sobbing of the bells;</strong><br />
<strong>Keeping time, time, time,</strong><br />
<strong>As he knells, knells, knells,</strong><br />
<strong>In a happy Runic rhyme,</strong><br />
<strong>To the rolling of the bells,</strong><br />
<strong>Of the bells, bells, bells —</strong><br />
<strong>To the tolling of the bells,</strong><br />
<strong>Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,</strong><br />
<strong>Bells, bells, bells —</strong><br />
<strong>To the moaning and the groaning of the bells.</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Analysis</span></strong><br />
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<strong>This poem can be interpreted in many different ways, the most basic of which is simply a reflection of the sounds that bells can make, and the emotions evoked from that sound. For example, "From the bells bells bells bells/Bells bells bells!" brings to mind the clamoring of myriad church bells. Several deeper interpretations exist as well. One is that the poem is a representation of life from the nimbleness of youth to the pain of age. Growing despair is emphasized alongside the growing frenzy in the tone of the poem.[1] Another is the passing of the seasons, from spring to winter. The passing of the seasons is often used as a metaphor for life itself. The poem also suggests a Poe theme of mourning over a lost wife, courted in sledge, married and then killed in a fire as the husband looks on. The tolling of the iron bells reflects the final madness of the grief-stricken husband.</strong><br />
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<strong>The sounds of the verses, specifically the repetitive "bells, bells, bells, bells, bells, bells, bells," lie on a narrow line between sense and nonsense, causing a feeling of instability.[2] Poe uses the word "tintinnabulation", which many critics believe is merely an onomatopoeic nonsense term. Poe biographer Hervey Allen suggests the word is based on an ancient bell-based instrument called "tintinabula."[3] The series of "bells" echo the imagined sounds of the various bells, from the silver bells following the klip-klop of the horses, to the "dong, ding-dong" of the swinging golden and iron bells, to screeching "whee-aaah" of the brazen bells. The series are always four, followed by three, always beginning and ending on a stressed syllable. The meter changes to iambic in the lines with repeated "bells," bringing the reader into their rhythm. Most of the poem is a more hurried anapestic (**/) meter.</strong><br />
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<strong>The bells of which he writes are thought to be those he heard from Fordham University's bell tower, since Poe resided in the same Bronx neighborhood as that university. He also frequently strolled about Fordham's campus conversing with both the students and the Jesuits.</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Critical response</span></strong><br />
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<strong>"The Bells" is often criticized for being mechanical and forced.[4]</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Publication history</span></strong><br />
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<strong>Poe is believed to have written "The Bells" in May 1848 and submitted it three times to Sartrain's Union Magazine, a magazine run by John Sartain, until it was finally accepted.[5] He was paid fifteen dollars for his work, though it was not published until after his death in November 1849.</strong><br />
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<strong>Inspiration for the poem is often granted to <span style="color: red;">Marie Louise Shew</span> (above), a woman who had helped care for Poe's wife Virginia as she lay dying.[5] One day, as Shew was visiting Poe at his cottage in Fordham, New York, Poe needed to write a poem but had no inspiration. Shew allegedly heard ringing bells from afar and playfully suggested to start there, possibly even writing the first line of each stanza.[6]</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Adaptations</span></strong><br />
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<strong>Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873–1943) composed a choral symphony The Bells, Op. 35, based on a Russian adaptation of the poem by Konstantin Balmont. The symphony follows classical sonata form: first movement, slow movement, scherzo, and finale, thus honoring the poem's four sections.[7] (The work is sometimes performed in English, using not Poe's original, but a translation of Balmont's adaptation by Fanny S. Copeland.) The Scottish composer Hugh S. Roberton (1874–1947) published "Hear the Tolling of the Bells" (1909), "The Sledge Bells" (1909), and "Hear the Sledges with the Bells" (1919) based on Poe's poem.[8] Josef Holbrooke composed his "The Bells, Prelude, Op. 50" on Poe's poem and Phil Ochs composed a tune to the poem recorded his album All the News That's Fit to Sing. Eric Woolfson, musical partner to Alan Parsons in the Alan Parsons Project, has written two albums based on the writings of Poe. His second, Poe: More Tales of Mystery and Imagination includes a song entitled "The Bells", for which he set Poe's words to music. This album was also the basis for a musical stage production that was performed in England, Austria, and other European countries.</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">References</span></strong><br />
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<strong>1.^ Silverman, Kenneth. Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance. New York City: Harper Perennial, 1991. ISBN 0060923318 p. 403</strong><br />
<strong>2.^ Rosenheim, Shawn James. The Cryptographic Imagination: Secret Writing from Edgar Poe to the Internet. The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997. p. 125. ISBN 9780801853326</strong><br />
<strong>3.^ Nelson, Randy F. The Almanac of American Letters. Los Altos, California: William Kaufmann, Inc., 1981: 25. ISBN 086576008X</strong><br />
<strong>4.^ Meyers, Jeffrey. Edgar Allan Poe: His Life and Legacy. Cooper Square Press, 1992. p. 223. ISBN 0815410387</strong><br />
<strong>5.^ Sova, Dawn B. Edgar Allan Poe: A to Z. New York: Checkmark Books, 2001. p. 25. ISBN 081604161X</strong><br />
<strong>6.^ E. A. Poe Society of Baltimore</strong><br />
<strong>7.^ AmericanSymphony.org</strong><br />
<strong>8.^ Sova, Dawn B. Edgar Allan Poe: A to Z. New York: Checkmark Books, 2001. p. 212. ISBN 081604161X</strong>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-45114656014769227152012-11-25T15:00:00.000-08:002012-11-25T15:00:02.035-08:00Jan Svankmajer's "Lunacy"<div style="text-align: center;">
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<strong>Jan Svankmajer's LUNACY, </strong><br />
<strong>loosely adapted from </strong><br />
<strong>"The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether" </strong><br />
<strong>by Edgar Allan Poe.</strong><br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="301" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/NBCxUvBai7U" width="400"></iframe><br /></div>
Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-60022432994322290432012-11-24T15:00:00.000-08:002012-11-24T15:00:05.918-08:00"The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether" Published 1845<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<strong><span style="color: red;">"The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether"</span> is a comedic short story written by American author Edgar Allan Poe.</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Plot summary</span></strong><br />
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<strong>The story follows an unnamed narrator who visits a mental institution in southern France (more accurately, a "Maison de Santé") known for a revolutionary new method of treating mental illnesses called the "system of soothing." A companion with whom he is travelling knows Monsieur Maillard, the originator of the system, and makes introductions before leaving the narrator. The narrator is shocked to learn that the "system of soothing" has been abandoned recently. He questions this, as he has heard of its success and popularity. Maillard tells him to "believe nothing you hear, and only one half that you see."</strong><br />
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<strong>The narrator tours the grounds of the hospital and is invited to dinner. There, he is joined by twenty-five to thirty other people and a large, lavish spread of food. The other guests, he notices, are dressed somewhat oddly; though their clothes are well-made, they do not seem to fit the people very well. Most of them are female and were "bedecked with a profusion of jewelry, such as rings, bracelets and ear-rings, and wore their bosoms and arms shamefully bare." The table and the room were decorated with an excess of lit candles wherever it was possible to find a place for them. Dinner is also accompanied by musicians, playing "fiddles, fifes, trombones, and a drum" and, though they seem to entertain all others present, the narrator likens it to horrible noises. Upon the whole, the narrator says, there was much of the "bizarre" about everything at the dinner.</strong><br />
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<strong>Conversation as they eat focuses on the patients that they have been treating. They demonstrate for the narrator the strange behavior they have witnessed, including patients who thought themselves a teapot, a donkey, cheese, champagne, a frog, snuff, a pumpkin, and others. Maillard occasionally tries to calm them down, and the narrator seems very concerned by their behavior and passionate imitations.</strong><br />
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<strong>He then learns that this staff has replaced the system of soothing with a much more strict system, which Maillard says is based on the work of a "Doctor Tarr" and a "Professor Fether." The narrator says he is not familiar with their work, to the astonishment of the others. It is finally explained at this point why the previous system was abandoned. One "singular" incident, Maillard says, was when the patients, granted a large amount of liberty around the house, actually overthrew their doctors and nurses and usurped their positions, locking them up as lunatics. These lunatics were led by a man who claimed to have invented a better method of treating mental illness, and who allowed no visitors except for "a very stupid-looking young gentleman of whom he had no reason to be afraid." The narrator asks how the hospital staff rebelled and returned things to order. Just then, loud noises are heard and the actual hospital staff breaks from their confines. It is revealed that the dinner guests were, in fact, the patients who had just recently taken over. As part of their uprising, the inmates had treated the staff to "tarring and feathering." The keepers now put the real patients, including Monsieur Maillard, back in their cells, while the narrator, who is the "stupid-looking young gentleman" mentioned by Monsieur Maillard, admits he has yet to find any of the works of Dr. "Tarr" and Professor "Fether."</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">The "system of soothing"</span></strong><br />
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<strong>Monsieur Maillard's system avoided all punishments and did not confine its patients. They were granted much freedom and were not forced to wear hospital gowns but instead "were permitted to roam about the house and grounds in the ordinary apparel of persons in right mind." Doctors "humored" their patients by never contradicting their fantasies or hallucinations. For example, if a man thought he was a chicken, doctors would treat him as a chicken, giving him corn to eat, etc.</strong><br />
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<strong>The system was apparently very popular. Monsieur Maillard says that all the "Maisons de Santé" of France have adopted it. The narrator remarks that after the patient revolt is crushed, that system is reinstated at the asylum he visits--though modified in certain ways that are intended to reform it.</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Historical background</span></strong><br />
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<strong>At the time this story was written, care for the insane was a highly political issue. People were calling for asylum reform at a time when the mentally ill were treated like prisoners. It is also during a time when increased acquittals due to the insanity defense was being criticized for allowing criminals to avoid punishment.[1]</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Publication history</span></strong><br />
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<strong>"The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether" was held by editors for several months before finally being published in the November 1845 issue of Graham's Magazine.[2]</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Adaptations</span></strong><br />
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<strong>One of the plays given at the Theatre du Grand Guignol in Paris was "Le Systéme du Dr Goudron et Pr Plume" (1903), adapted by André de Lorde.</strong><br />
<strong>The surreal Mexican film La Mansión de la Locura (1973), in English The Mansion of Madness, by Juan López Moctezuma.</strong><br />
<strong>Director S.F. Brownrigg's movie The Forgotten (1973), also known as Death Ward #13 and Don't Look in the Basement.</strong><br />
<strong>"(The System of) Dr. Tarr and Professor Fether" is the fifth track on Tales of Mystery and Imagination, an album by The Alan Parsons Project of music inspired by the works of Edgar Allan Poe.</strong><br />
<strong>Czech filmmaker Jan Švankmajer based part of his film Lunacy on this story. The film was also inspired by Poe's 1844 short story, "The Premature Burial," and the works of the Marquis de Sade.</strong><br />
<strong>A one-act opera called A Method for Madness (1999), composed by David S. Bernstein, American composer, and libretto by Charles Kondek.</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">References</span></strong><br />
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<strong>1.^ Cleman, John. "Irresistible Impulses: Edgar Allan Poe and the Insanity Defense," collected in Bloom's BioCritiques: Edgar Allan Poe, edited by Harold Bloom. Philadelphia: Chelsea House Publishers, 2001. p. 66-7 ISBN 0-7910-6173-6</strong><br />
<strong>2.^ Quinn, Arthur Hobson. Edgar Allan Poe: A Critical Biography. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998. p. 469. ISBN 0801857309</strong>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-12205081906000613292012-11-19T17:00:00.000-08:002012-11-19T17:00:04.706-08:00Deathday: Fitz-Greene Halleck 1867 Poet & Poe Associate<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Fitz-Greene Halleck</span> (July 8, 1790 – November 19, 1867) was an American poet, born and died at Guilford, Connecticut.</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Biography</span></strong>
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<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Early life</span></strong>
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<strong>Fitz-Greene Halleck was born on July 8, 1790,[1] in Guilford, Connecticut at what was the corner of Whitfield and Water Streets.[2] At two years old, he was the victim of a prank when two soldiers fired off their guns next to his left ear; he was partially deaf for the remainder of his life.[3] He left school at 15 to work in his family's shop in Guilford.</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Early career</span></strong>
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<strong>In May 1811, Halleck moved to New York City to find work. After a month of searching, he had all but given up and made plans to move to Richmond, Virginia instead when he was hired by a banker named Jacob Barker.[4] He remained in Barker's employ for the next 20 years.</strong>
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<strong>Halleck's first literary works of note were written with Joseph Rodman Drake. They penned the anonymous "Croaker Papers" which were satires of New York Society. The Croakers were perhaps the first popular literary satire of New York, and New York society (then far from a world cultural center) was overcome with excitement at being considered worthy of erudite derision.</strong>
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<strong>Halleck then penned Fanny, his longest poem, was another satire on the literature, fashions, and politics of the time. Published anonymously in December 1819, it proved so popular that the initial 50 cent edition was fetching up to $10. Two years later, its continuing popularity inspired Halleck to amend an additional 50 stanzas.[5]</strong>
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<strong>Drake had advised Halleck to pursue becoming a nationally-known poet and to sit on "Appalachia's brow" to take in the immense power of nature and use it to inspire his imagination.[6] A medical student, Drake died of consumption at 25 and Halleck commemorated his friend's death with a mournful poem that is considered by many as his most heartfelt, beginning "Green be the turf above thee" (1820). Drake's widow, Sarah Eckford Drake, attempted to make Halleck her second husband, despite Halleck's occasional satires of her, including one where he referred to her as a witch. She died eight years later.[7]</strong>
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<strong>In 1822, Halleck visited Europe, and the traces of this are found in most of his subsequent poetry, e.g. his lines on Robert Burns, and on Alnwick Castle.</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Professional and later life</span></strong>
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<strong>On May 15, 1832, Halleck became the private secretary to John Jacob Astor and was appointed by him one of the original trustees of the Astor Library of New York. He also functioned as Astor's cultural tutor, advising him on what pieces of art to purchase. The immensely wealthy—and tightfisted—Astor in his will left to Halleck an annuity of only $200, a meager sum which Astor's son William increased to $1,500. In 1849 he retired to his hometown of Guilford where he spent the rest of his life living with his older unmarried sister.</strong>
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<strong>As a writer, Halleck became associated with the New York-based Knickerbocker Group, as did his collaborator Drake.</strong>
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<strong>In April 1860, a lingering illness caused enough concern for Halleck that he gave instructions for his funeral and burial.[8] Increasingly irritable in his later years, he often turned down requests for public appearances and complained about being pestered by "frequent appeals for letters to hard-hearted editors."[9] People even named their children after the poet, much to Halleck's annoyance. He wrote, "I am favored by affectionate fathers with epistles announcing that their eldest-born has been named after me, a calamity that costs me a letter of profound gratefulness."[9] Halleck's last major poem, "Young America," was published in 1867 in the New York Ledger.[3] On November 19, 1867, around 11:00 at night, he called out to his sister, "Marie, hand me my pantaloons, if you please." He died without making another sound before she could turn around.[10] He is buried at Alderbrook Cemetery in Guilford.[11]</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Sexuality</span></strong>
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<strong>It has been posited that Halleck was in love with Joseph Rodman Drake. This presumption is not without reason; Halleck describes serving as best man at Drake's wedding:</strong>
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<strong>"[Drake] has married, and, as his wife's father is rich, I imagine he will write no more. He was poor, as poets, of course, always are, and offered himself a sacrifice at the shrine of Hymen to shun the 'pains and penalties' of poverty. I officiated as groomsman, though much against my will. His wife was good natured, and loves him to distraction. He is perhaps the handsomest man in New York, - a face like an angel, a form like an Apollo; and, as I well knew that his person was the true index of his mind, I felt myself during the ceremony as committing a crime in aiding and assisting such a sacrifice."[12]</strong>
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<strong>In his will, he asked for the body of his friend Drake to be dug up and reburied with him.[13] His wish almost came true in 1903, when plans were set to move the bodies of Drake, his wife, daughter, sister, and nephew to Halleck's plot in Guilford.[14] A biographer noted that Halleck's last major work, "Young America," was both "a jaded critique of marriage and a pederastic boy-worship reminiscent of classical homosexuality."[3]</strong>
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<strong>Halleck's first infatuation with another man was much earlier. At nineteen, he became enamored with a young Cuban named Carlos Menie. A few early poems were dedicated to Menie.[15]</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Critical response</span></strong>
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<strong>In the mid to late 19th century, Halleck was regarded as one of America's leading poets, dubbed "the American Byron"..Amongst his most well-known was "Marco Bozzaris," which Halleck noted was "puffed in a thousand (more or less) magazines and newspapers" in the United States, England, Scotland, and Ireland.[16] Charles Dickens spoke very fondly of the "accomplished writer" in a January 1868 letter to William Makepeace Thackeray (as recounted in "Thackeray in the United States"). It is not clear how much of Dickens's fondness is based on Halleck's poetical ability and how much on his wit and charm, which is often lauded by his contemporaries. Abraham Lincoln occasionally read Halleck's poetry aloud to friends in the White House.</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">American writer and critic Edgar Allan Poe reviewed Halleck's poetry collection Alnwick Castle. Regarding Halleck's poem "Fanny," he said, "to uncultivated ears... [it is] endurable, but to the practiced versifier it is little less than torture."[17] In the September 1843 issue of Graham's Magazine, Poe wrote that the Halleck "has nearly abandoned the Muses, much to the regret of his friends and to the neglect of his reputation."[17]</span> </strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;"><em>(Poe Forward note: When Poe's BROADWAY JOURNAL was in danger of going under, he appealed to Halleck for money and received a signed note of endorsement. Poe never got the money. How this affected his review of Halleck's work is up for speculation.)</em></span></strong><br />
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<strong>Halleck spent several years without producing any literary works. After his death, poet William Cullen Bryant addressed the New York Historical Society on February 2, 1869, and spoke about this blank period in Halleck's career. He ultimately concluded: "Whatever the reason that Halleck ceased so early to write, let us congratulate ourselves that he wrote at all."[18]</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Legacy</span></strong>
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<strong>In July 1869 a granite monument was erected to him in Guilford, Connecticut, the first monument ever erected in celebration of an American Poet. Poet Bayard Taylor, author of America's first homosexual novel Joseph and His Friend (1870), spoke at the commemoration.[19]</strong>
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<strong>In 1877 a statue was erected to him, the first statue to commemorate an American poet. It still stands on the Literary Walk on the Mall in New York City's Central Park.</strong>
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<strong>In 2006 The Fitz-Greene Halleck Society was founded to raise awareness of this forgotten historical figure. The Society sees Halleck's value as a lesson of the fleeting nature of fame, but in no way seeks to mock the now almost completely forgotten poet.</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Further reading</span></strong>
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<strong>Wilson, The Life and Letters of Fitz-Greene Halleck (New York, 1869)
</strong><br />
<strong>Wilson, The Poetical Writings of Fitz-Greene Halleck (New York, 1869)
</strong><br />
<strong>Hallock, John Wesley Matthew. "The First Statue: Fitz-Greene Halleck and Homotextual Representation in Nineteenth-Century America." [Temple U, 1997], DAI, Vol. 58-06A (1997): 2209.</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Notes</span></strong>
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<strong>1.^ Nelson, Randy F. The Almanac of American Letters. Los Altos, California: William Kaufmann, Inc., 1981: 44. ISBN 086576008X
</strong><br />
<strong>2.^ Ehrlich and Carruth, 76
</strong><br />
<strong>3.^ Hallock, 9
</strong><br />
<strong>4.^ Hallock, 43
</strong><br />
<strong>5.^ Burt, Daniel S. The Chronology of American Literature: America's Literary Achievements From the Colonial Era to Modern Times. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2004: 126. ISBN 9780618168217
</strong><br />
<strong>6.^ Callow, James T. Kindred Spirits: Knickerbocker Writers and American Artists, 1807–1855. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1967: 147.
</strong><br />
<strong>7.^ Hallock, 90–92
</strong><br />
<strong>8.^ Hallock, 142
</strong><br />
<strong>9.^ Hallock, 143
</strong><br />
<strong>10.^ Hallock, 150
</strong><br />
<strong>11.^ Ehrlich and Carruth, 77
</strong><br />
<strong>12.^ James Grant Wilson, The Life and Letters of Fitz-Greene Halleck, pg. 184. New York: Appleton and Company, 1869.
</strong><br />
<strong>13.^ "To Exhume Drake's Body", The New York Times. September 19, 1903: p. 2
</strong><br />
<strong>14.^ Hallock, 91
</strong><br />
<strong>15.^ Hallock, 32
</strong><br />
<strong>16.^ Hallock, 97
</strong><br />
<strong>17.^ Sova, Dawn B. Edgar Allan Poe: A to Z. New York: Checkmark Books, 2001: 103. ISBN 081604161X
</strong><br />
<strong>18.^ Chubb, Edwin Watts. Stories of Authors, British & American. Echo Library, 2008: 152. ISBN 9781406892536
</strong><br />
<strong>19.^ Hallock, 151</strong>
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<strong><span style="color: red;">References</span></strong>
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<strong>Ehrlich, Eugene and Gorton Carruth. The Oxford Illustrated Literary Guide to the United States. New York: Oxford University Press, 1982. ISBN 0195031865
</strong><br />
<strong>Hallock, John W. M. The American Byron: Homosexuality and the Fall of Fitz-Greene Halleck. University of Wisconsin Press, 2000. ISBN 0299168042</strong>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-29576508089532723152012-11-10T15:00:00.000-08:002012-11-10T15:00:03.566-08:00"Loss of Breath" Published 1832<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<strong>Loss of Breath (1832) </strong></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<strong>by Edgar Allan Poe</strong> </div>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<strong><span style="color: red;">"O Breathe not, etc."</span></strong></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<strong>- Moore's Melodies</strong></div>
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<strong>The most notorious ill-fortune must in the end yield to the untiring courage of philosophy—as the most stubborn city to the ceaseless vigilance of an enemy. Shalmanezer, as we have it in holy writings, lay three years before Samaria; yet it fell. Sardanapalus—see Diodorus—maintained himself seven in Nineveh; but to no purpose. Troy expired at the close of the second lustrum; and Azoth, as Aristaeus declares upon his honour as a gentleman, opened at last her gates to Psammetichus, after having barred them for the fifth part of a century....</strong><br />
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<strong>"Thou wretch!—thou vixen!—thou shrew!" said I to my wife on the morning after our wedding; "thou witch!—thou hag!—thou whippersnapper—thou sink of iniquity!—thou fiery-faced quintessence of all that is abominable!—thou—thou—" here standing upon tiptoe, seizing her by the throat, and placing my mouth close to her ear, I was preparing to launch forth a new and more decided epithet of opprobrium, which should not fail, if ejaculated, to convince her of her insignificance, when to my extreme horror and astonishment I discovered that I had lost my breath.</strong><br />
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<strong>The phrases "I am out of breath," "I have lost my breath," etc., are often enough repeated in common conversation; but it had never occurred to me that the terrible accident of which I speak could bona fide and actually happen! Imagine—that is if you have a fanciful turn—imagine, I say, my wonder—my consternation—my despair!</strong><br />
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<strong>There is a good genius, however, which has never entirely deserted me. In my most ungovernable moods I still retain a sense of propriety, et le chemin des passions me conduit—as Lord Edouard in the "Julie" says it did him—a la philosophie veritable.</strong><br />
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<strong>Although I could not at first precisely ascertain to what degree the occurence had affected me, I determined at all events to conceal the matter from my wife, until further experience should discover to me the extent of this my unheard of calamity. Altering my countenance, therefore, in a moment, from its bepuffed and distorted appearance, to an expression of arch and coquettish benignity, I gave my lady a pat on the one cheek, and a kiss on the other, and without saying one syllable (Furies! I could not), left her astonished at my drollery, as I pirouetted out of the room in a Pas de Zephyr.</strong><br />
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<strong>Behold me then safely ensconced in my private boudoir, a fearful instance of the ill consequences attending upon irascibility—alive, with the qualifications of the dead—dead, with the propensities of the living—an anomaly on the face of the earth—being very calm, yet breathless.</strong><br />
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<strong>Yes! breathless. I am serious in asserting that my breath was entirely gone. I could not have stirred with it a feather if my life had been at issue, or sullied even the delicacy of a mirror. Hard fate!—yet there was some alleviation to the first overwhelming paroxysm of my sorrow. I found, upon trial, that the powers of utterance which, upon my inability to proceed in the conversation with my wife, I then concluded to be totally destroyed, were in fact only partially impeded, and I discovered that had I, at that interesting crisis, dropped my voice to a singularly deep guttural, I might still have continued to her the communication of my sentiments; this pitch of voice (the guttural) depending, I find, not upon the current of the breath, but upon a certain spasmodic action of the muscles of the throat.</strong><br />
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<strong>Throwing myself upon a chair, I remained for some time absorbed in meditation. My reflections, be sure, were of no consolatory kind. A thousand vague and lachrymatory fancies took possesion of my soul- and even the idea of suicide flitted across my brain; but it is a trait in the perversity of human nature to reject the obvious and the ready, for the far-distant and equivocal. Thus I shuddered at self-murder as the most decided of atrocities while the tabby cat purred strenuously upon the rug, and the very water dog wheezed assiduously under the table, each taking to itself much merit for the strength of its lungs, and all obviously done in derision of my own pulmonary incapacity.</strong><br />
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<strong>Oppressed with a tumult of vague hopes and fears, I at length heard the footsteps of my wife descending the staircase. Being now assured of her absence, I returned with a palpitating heart to the scene of my disaster.</strong><br />
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<strong>Carefully locking the door on the inside, I commenced a vigorous search. It was possible, I thought, that, concealed in some obscure corner, or lurking in some closet or drawer, might be found the lost object of my inquiry. It might have a vapory—it might even have a tangible form. Most philosophers, upon many points of philosophy, are still very unphilosophical. William Godwin, however, says in his "Mandeville," that "invisible things are the only realities," and this, all will allow, is a case in point. I would have the judicious reader pause before accusing such asseverations of an undue quantum of absurdity. Anaxagoras, it will be remembered, maintained that snow is black, and this I have since found to be the case.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Long and earnestly did I continue the investigation: but the contemptible reward of my industry and perseverance proved to be only a set of false teeth, two pair of hips, an eye, and a bundle of billets-doux from Mr. Windenough to my wife. I might as well here observe that this confirmation of my lady's partiality for Mr. W. occasioned me little uneasiness. That Mrs. Lackobreath should admire anything so dissimilar to myself was a natural and necessary evil. I am, it is well known, of a robust and corpulent appearance, and at the same time somewhat diminutive in stature. What wonder, then, that the lath-like tenuity of my acquaintance, and his altitude, which has grown into a proverb, should have met with all due estimation in the eyes of Mrs. Lackobreath. But to return.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>My exertions, as I have before said, proved fruitless. Closet after closet—drawer after drawer—corner after corner—were scrutinized to no purpose. At one time, however, I thought myself sure of my prize, having, in rummaging a dressing-case, accidentally demolished a bottle of Grandjean's Oil of Archangels—which, as an agreeable perfume, I here take the liberty of recommending.</strong><br />
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<strong>With a heavy heart I returned to my boudoir—there to ponder upon some method of eluding my wife's penetration, until I could make arrangements prior to my leaving the country, for to this I had already made up my mind. In a foreign climate, being unknown, I might, with some probability of success, endeavor to conceal my unhappy calamity—a calamity calculated, even more than beggary, to estrange the affections of the multitude, and to draw down upon the wretch the well-merited indignation of the virtuous and the happy. I was not long in hesitation. Being naturally quick, I committed to memory the entire tragedy of "Metamora." I had the good fortune to recollect that in the accentuation of this drama, or at least of such portion of it as is allotted to the hero, the tones of voice in which I found myself deficient were altogether unnecessary, and the deep guttural was expected to reign monotonously throughout.</strong><br />
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<strong>I practised for some time by the borders of a well frequented marsh;—herein, however, having no reference to a similar proceeding of Demosthenes, but from a design peculiarly and conscientiously my own. Thus armed at all points, I determined to make my wife believe that I was suddenly smitten with a passion for the stage. In this, I succeeded to a miracle; and to every question or suggestion found myself at liberty to reply in my most frog-like and sepulchral tones with some passage from the tragedy—any portion of which, as I soon took great pleasure in observing, would apply equally well to any particular subject. It is not to be supposed, however, that in the delivery of such passages I was found at all deficient in the looking asquint—the showing my teeth—the working my knees—the shuffling my feet—or in any of those unmentionable graces which are now justly considered the characteristics of a popular performer. To be sure they spoke of confining me in a strait-jacket—but, good God! they never suspected me of having lost my breath.</strong><br />
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<strong>Having at length put my affairs in order, I took my seat very early one morning in the mail stage for --, giving it to be understood, among my acquaintances, that business of the last importance required my immediate personal attendance in that city.</strong><br />
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<strong>The coach was crammed to repletion; but in the uncertain twilight the features of my companions could not be distinguished. Without making any effectual resistance, I suffered myself to be placed between two gentlemen of colossal dimensions; while a third, of a size larger, requesting pardon for the liberty he was about to take, threw himself upon my body at full length, and falling asleep in an instant, drowned all my guttural ejaculations for relief, in a snore which would have put to blush the roarings of the bull of Phalaris. Happily the state of my respiratory faculties rendered suffocation an accident entirely out of the question.</strong><br />
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<strong>As, however, the day broke more distinctly in our approach to the outskirts of the city, my tormentor, arising and adjusting his shirt-collar, thanked me in a very friendly manner for my civility. Seeing that I remained motionless (all my limbs were dislocated and my head twisted on one side), his apprehensions began to be excited; and arousing the rest of the passengers, he communicated, in a very decided manner, his opinion that a dead man had been palmed upon them during the night for a living and responsible fellow-traveller; here giving me a thump on the right eye, by way of demonstrating the truth of his suggestion.</strong><br />
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<strong>Hereupon all, one after another (there were nine in company), believed it their duty to pull me by the ear. A young practising physician, too, having applied a pocket-mirror to my mouth, and found me without breath, the assertion of my persecutor was pronounced a true bill; and the whole party expressed a determination to endure tamely no such impositions for the future, and to proceed no farther with any such carcasses for the present.</strong><br />
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<strong>I was here, accordingly, thrown out at the sign of the "Crow" (by which tavern the coach happened to be passing), without meeting with any farther accident than the breaking of both my arms, under the left hind wheel of the vehicle. I must besides do the driver the justice to state that he did not forget to throw after me the largest of my trunks, which, unfortunately falling on my head, fractured my skull in a manner at once interesting and extraordinary.</strong><br />
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<strong>The landlord of the "Crow," who is a hospitable man, finding that my trunk contained sufficient to indemnify him for any little trouble he might take in my behalf, sent forthwith for a surgeon of his acquaintance, and delivered me to his care with a bill and receipt for ten dollars.</strong><br />
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<strong>The purchaser took me to his apartments and commenced operations immediately. Having cut off my ears, however, he discovered signs of animation. He now rang the bell, and sent for a neighboring apothecary with whom to consult in the emergency. In case of his suspicions with regard to my existence proving ultimately correct, he, in the meantime, made an incision in my stomach, and removed several of my viscera for private dissection.</strong><br />
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<strong>The apothecary had an idea that I was actually dead. This idea I endeavored to confute, kicking and plunging with all my might, and making the most furious contortions—for the operations of the surgeon had, in a measure, restored me to the possession of my faculties. All, however, was attributed to the effects of a new galvanic battery, wherewith the apothecary, who is really a man of information, performed several curious experiments, in which, from my personal share in their fulfillment, I could not help feeling deeply interested. It was a course of mortification to me, nevertheless, that although I made several attempts at conversation, my powers of speech were so entirely in abeyance, that I could not even open my mouth; much less, then, make reply to some ingenious but fanciful theories of which, under other circumstances, my minute acquaintance with the Hippocratian pathology would have afforded me a ready confutation.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Not being able to arrive at a conclusion, the practitioners remanded me for farther examination. I was taken up into a garret; and the surgeon's lady having accommodated me with drawers and stockings, the surgeon himself fastened my hands, and tied up my jaws with a pocket-handkerchief—then bolted the door on the outside as he hurried to his dinner, leaving me alone to silence and to meditation.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>I now discovered to my extreme delight that I could have spoken had not my mouth been tied up with the pocket-handkerchief. Consoling myself with this reflection, I was mentally repeating some passages of the "Omnipresence of the Deity," as is my custom before resigning myself to sleep, when two cats, of a greedy and vituperative turn, entering at a hole in the wall, leaped up with a flourish a la Catalani, and alighting opposite one another on my visage, betook themselves to indecorous contention for the paltry consideration of my nose.</strong><br />
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<strong>But, as the loss of his ears proved the means of elevating to the throne of Cyrus, the Magian or Mige-Gush of Persia, and as the cutting off his nose gave Zopyrus possession of Babylon, so the loss of a few ounces of my countenance proved the salvation of my body. Aroused by the pain, and burning with indignation, I burst, at a single effort, the fastenings and the bandage. Stalking across the room I cast a glance of contempt at the belligerents, and throwing open the sash to their extreme horror and disappointment, precipitated myself, very dexterously, from the window. this moment passing from the city jail to the scaffold erected for his execution in the suburbs. His extreme infirmity and long continued ill health had obtained him the privilege of remaining unmanacled; and habited in his gallows costume—one very similar to my own,—he lay at full length in the bottom of the hangman's cart (which happened to be under the windows of the surgeon at the moment of my precipitation) without any other guard than the driver, who was asleep, and two recruits of the sixth infantry, who were drunk.</strong><br />
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<strong>As ill-luck would have it, I alit upon my feet within the vehicle. immediately, he bolted out behind, and turning down an alley, was out of sight in the twinkling of an eye. The recruits, aroused by the bustle, could not exactly comprehend the merits of the transaction. Seeing, however, a man, the precise counterpart of the felon, standing upright in the cart before their eyes, they were of (so they expressed themselves,) and, having communicated this opinion to one another, they took each a dram, and then knocked me down with the butt-ends of their muskets.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>It was not long ere we arrived at the place of destination. Of course nothing could be said in my defence. Hanging was my inevitable fate. I resigned myself thereto with a feeling half stupid, half acrimonious. Being little of a cynic, I had all the sentiments of a dog. The hangman, however, adjusted the noose about my neck. The drop fell.</strong><br />
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<strong>I forbear to depict my sensations upon the gallows; although here, undoubtedly, I could speak to the point, and it is a topic upon which nothing has been well said. In fact, to write upon such a theme it is necessary to have been hanged. Every author should confine himself to matters of experience. Thus Mark Antony composed a treatise upon getting drunk.</strong><br />
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<strong>I may just mention, however, that die I did not. My body was, but I had no breath to be, suspended; and but for the knot under my left ear (which had the feel of a military stock) I dare say that I should have experienced very little inconvenience. As for the jerk given to my neck upon the falling of the drop, it merely proved a corrective to the twist afforded me by the fat gentleman in the coach.</strong><br />
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<strong>For good reasons, however, I did my best to give the crowd the worth of their trouble. My convulsions were said to be extraordinary. My spasms it would have been difficult to beat. The populace encored. Several gentlemen swooned; and a multitude of ladies were carried home in hysterics. Pinxit availed himself of the opportunity to retouch, from a sketch taken upon the spot, his admirable painting of the "Marsyas flayed alive."</strong><br />
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<strong>When I had afforded sufficient amusement, it was thought proper to remove my body from the gallows;—this the more especially as the real culprit had in the meantime been retaken and recognized, a fact which I was so unlucky as not to know.</strong><br />
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<strong>Much sympathy was, of course, exercised in my behalf, and as no one made claim to my corpse, it was ordered that I should be interred in a public vault.</strong><br />
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<strong>Here, after due interval, I was deposited. The sexton departed, and I was left alone. A line of Marston's "Malcontent"-</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Death's a good fellow and keeps open house-</span></strong><br />
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<strong>struck me at that moment as a palpable lie.</strong><br />
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<strong>I knocked off, however, the lid of my coffin, and stepped out. The place was dreadfully dreary and damp, and I became troubled with ennui. By way of amusement, I felt my way among the numerous coffins ranged in order around. I lifted them down, one by one, and breaking open their lids, busied myself in speculations about the mortality within.</strong><br />
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<strong>"This," I soliloquized, tumbling over a carcass, puffy, bloated, and rotund—"this has been, no doubt, in every sense of the word, an unhappy—an unfortunate man. It has been his terrible lot not to walk but to waddle—to pass through life not like a human being, but like an elephant—not like a man, but like a rhinoceros.</strong><br />
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<strong>"His attempts at getting on have been mere abortions, and his circumgyratory proceedings a palpable failure. Taking a step forward, it has been his misfortune to take two toward the right, and three toward the left. His studies have been confined to the poetry of Crabbe. He can have no idea of the wonder of a pirouette. To him a pas de papillon has been an abstract conception. He has never ascended the summit of a hill. He has never viewed from any steeple the glories of a metropolis. Heat has been his mortal enemy. In the dog-days his days have been the days of a dog. Therein, he has dreamed of flames and suffocation—of mountains upon mountains—of Pelion upon Ossa. He was short of breath—to say all in a word, he was short of breath. He thought it extravagant to play upon wind instruments. He was the inventor of self-moving fans, wind-sails, and ventilators. He patronized Du Pont the bellows-maker, and he died miserably in attempting to smoke a cigar. His was a case in which I feel a deep interest—a lot in which I sincerely sympathize.</strong><br />
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<strong>"But here,"—said I—"here"—and I dragged spitefully from its receptacle a gaunt, tall and peculiar-looking form, whose remarkable appearance struck me with a sense of unwelcome familiarity—"here is a wretch entitled to no earthly commiseration." Thus saying, in order to obtain a more distinct view of my subject, I applied my thumb and forefinger to its nose, and causing it to assume a sitting position upon the ground, held it thus, at the length of my arm, while I continued my soliloquy.</strong><br />
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<strong>-"Entitled," I repeated, "to no earthly commiseration. Who indeed would think of compassioning a shadow? Besides, has he not had his full share of the blessings of mortality? He was the originator of tall monuments—shot-towers—lightning-rods—Lombardy poplars. His treatise upon "Shades and Shadows" has immortalized him. He edited with distinguished ability the last edition of "South on the Bones." He went early to college and studied pneumatics. He then came home, talked eternally, and played upon the French-horn. He patronized the bagpipes. Captain Barclay, who walked against Time, would not walk against him. Windham and Allbreath were his favorite writers,—his favorite artist, Phiz. He died gloriously while inhaling gas—levique flatu corrupitur, like the fama pudicitae in Hieronymus.* He was indubitably a"-</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Tenera res in feminis fama pudicitiae, et quasi flos pulcherrimus, cito ad levem marcessit auram, levique flatu corrumpitur, maxime, c.—Hieronymus ad Salvinam.</span></strong><br />
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<strong>"How can you?—how—can—you?"—interrupted the object of my animadversions, gasping for breath, and tearing off, with a desperate exertion, the bandage around its jaws—"how can you, Mr. Lackobreath, be so infernally cruel as to pinch me in that manner by the nose? Did you not see how they had fastened up my mouth—and you must know—if you know any thing—how vast a superfluity of breath I have to dispose of! If you do not know, however, sit down and you shall see. In my situation it is really a great relief to be able to open ones mouth—to be able to expatiate—to be able to communicate with a person like yourself, who do not think yourself called upon at every period to interrupt the thread of a gentleman's discourse. Interruptions are annoying and should undoubtedly be abolished—don't you think so?—no reply, I beg you,—one person is enough to be speaking at a time.—I shall be done by and by, and then you may begin.—How the devil sir, did you get into this place?—not a word I beseech you—been here some time myself—terrible accident!—heard of it, I suppose?—awful calamity!—walking under your windows—some short while ago—about the time you were stage-struck—horrible occurrence!—heard of "catching one's breath," eh?—hold your tongue I tell you!—I caught somebody elses!—had always too much of my own—met Blab at the corner of the street—wouldn't give me a chance for a word—couldn't get in a syllable edgeways—attacked, consequently, with epilepsis—Blab made his escape—damn all fools!—they took me up for dead, and put me in this place—pretty doings all of them!—heard all you said about me—every word a lie—horrible!—wonderful—outrageous!—hideous!—incomprehensible!—et cetera—et cetera—et cetera—et cetera—"</strong><br />
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<strong>It is impossible to conceive my astonishment at so unexpected a discourse, or the joy with which I became gradually convinced that the breath so fortunately caught by the gentleman (whom I soon recognized as my neighbor Windenough) was, in fact, the identical expiration mislaid by myself in the conversation with my wife. Time, place, and circumstances rendered it a matter beyond question. I did not at least during the long period in which the inventor of Lombardy poplars continued to favor me with his explanations.</strong><br />
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<strong>In this respect I was actuated by that habitual prudence which has ever been my predominating trait. I reflected that many difficulties might still lie in the path of my preservation which only extreme exertion on my part would be able to surmount. Many persons, I considered, are prone to estimate commodities in their possession—however valueless to the then proprietor—however troublesome, or distressing—in direct ratio with the advantages to be derived by others from their attainment, or by themselves from their abandonment. Might not this be the case with Mr. Windenough? In displaying anxiety for the breath of which he was at present so willing to get rid, might I not lay myself open to the exactions of his avarice? There are scoundrels in this world, I remembered with a sigh, who will not scruple to take unfair opportunities with even a next door neighbor, and (this remark is from Epictetus) it is precisely at that time when men are most anxious to throw off the burden of their own calamities that they feel the least desirous of relieving them in others.</strong><br />
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<strong>Upon considerations similar to these, and still retaining my grasp upon the nose of Mr. W., I accordingly thought proper to model my reply.</strong><br />
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<strong>"Monster!" I began in a tone of the deepest indignation—"monster and double-winded idiot!—dost thou, whom for thine iniquities it has pleased heaven to accurse with a two-fold respimtion—dost thou, I say, presume to address me in the familiar language of an old acquaintance?—'I lie,' forsooth! and 'hold my tongue,' to be sure!—pretty conversation indeed, to a gentleman with a single breath!—all this, too, when I have it in my power to relieve the calamity under which thou dost so justly suffer—to curtail the superfluities of thine unhappy respiration."</strong><br />
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<strong>Like Brutus, I paused for a reply—with which, like a tornado, Mr. Windenough immediately overwhelmed me. Protestation followed upon protestation, and apology upon apology. There were no terms with which he was unwilling to comply, and there were none of which I failed to take the fullest advantage.</strong><br />
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<strong>Preliminaries being at length arranged, my acquaintance delivered me the respiration; for which (having carefully examined it) I gave him afterward a receipt.</strong><br />
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<strong>I am aware that by many I shall be held to blame for speaking in a manner so cursory, of a transaction so impalpable. It will be thought that I should have entered more minutely, into the details of an occurrence by which—and this is very true—much new light might be thrown upon a highly interesting branch of physical philosophy.</strong><br />
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<strong>To all this I am sorry that I cannot reply. A hint is the only answer which I am permitted to make. There were circumstances—but I think it much safer upon consideration to say as little as possible about an affair so delicate—so delicate, I repeat, and at the time involving the interests of a third party whose sulphurous resentment I have not the least desire, at this moment, of incurring.</strong><br />
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<strong>We were not long after this necessary arrangement in effecting an escape from the dungeons of the sepulchre. The united strength of our resuscitated voices was soon sufficiently apparent. Scissors, the Whig editor, republished a treatise upon "the nature and origin of subterranean noises." A reply—rejoinder—confutation—and justification—followed in the columns of a Democratic Gazette. It was not until the opening of the vault to decide the controversy, that the appearance of Mr. Windenough and myself proved both parties to have been decidedly in the wrong.</strong><br />
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<strong>I cannot conclude these details of some very singular passages in a life at all times sufficiently eventful, without again recalling to the attention of the reader the merits of that indiscriminate philosophy which is a sure and ready shield against those shafts of calamity which can neither be seen, felt nor fully understood. It was in the spirit of this wisdom that, among the ancient Hebrews, it was believed the gates of Heaven would be inevitably opened to that sinner, or saint, who, with good lungs and implicit confidence, should vociferate the word "Amen!" It was in the spirit of this wisdom that, when a great plague raged at Athens, and every means had been in vain attempted for its removal, Epimenides, as Laertius relates, in his second book, of that philosopher, advised the erection of a shrine and temple "to the proper God."</strong><br />
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<strong>LYTTLETON BARRY.</strong><br />
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<strong>"Loss of Breath" November 10, 1832 Philadelphia Saturday Courier Humor Originally "A Decided Loss"[63]</strong>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-75241291524820579652012-11-01T15:00:00.000-07:002012-11-05T21:17:05.833-08:00"The Cask of Amontillado" Published 1846<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<strong><span style="color: red;">"The Cask of Amontillado"</span> (sometimes spelled "The Casque of Amontillado") is a short story, written by Edgar Allan Poe, first published in the November 1846 issue of Godey's Lady's Book.</strong><br />
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<strong>The story is set in a nameless Italian city in an unspecified year (possibly in the 18th century) and concerns the deadly revenge taken by the narrator on a friend who he claims has insulted him. Like several of Poe's stories, and in keeping with the 19th-century fascination with the subject, the narrative revolves around a person being buried alive — in this case, by immurement.</strong><br />
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<strong>As in "The Black Cat" and "The Tell-Tale Heart," Poe conveys the story through the murderer's perspective.</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Plot summary</span></strong><br />
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<strong>Montresor tells the story of the night that he took his revenge on Fortunato, a fellow nobleman. Angry over some unspecified insult, he plots to murder his friend during Carnival when the man is drunk, dizzy, and wearing a jester's motley.</strong><br />
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<strong>He baits Fortunato by telling him he has obtained what he believes to be a pipe (about 130 gallons,[1] 492 litres) of Amontillado, a rare and valuable sherry wine. He claims he wants his friend's expert opinion on the subject. Fortunato goes with Montresor to the wine cellars of the latter's palazzo, where they wander in the catacombs. Montresor offers wine (first Medoc, then De Grave) to Fortunato; at one point, Fortunato makes an elaborate, grotesque gesture with an upraised wine bottle. When Montresor appears not to recognize the gesture, Fortunato asks, "You are not of the masons?" Montresor says he is, and when Fortunato, disbelieving, requests a sign, Montresor displays a trowel he had been hiding.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Montresor warns Fortunato, who has a bad cough, of the damp, and suggests they go back; Fortunato insists on continuing, claiming that "[he] shall not die of a cough." During their walk, Montresor mentions his family coat of arms: a foot in a blue background crushing a snake whose fangs are embedded in the foot's heel, with the motto Nemo me impune lacessit ("No one insults me with impunity"). When they come to a niche, Montresor tells his victim that the Amontillado is within. Fortunato enters and, drunk and unsuspecting, does not resist as Montresor quickly chains him to the wall. Montresor then declares that, since Fortunato won't go back, he must "positively leave [him]."</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Montresor walls up the niche, entombing his friend alive. At first, Fortunato, who sobers up faster than Montresor anticipated he would, shakes the chains, trying to escape. The narrator stops working for a while so he can enjoy the sound. Fortunato then screams for help, but Montresor mocks his cries, knowing nobody can hear them. Fortunato laughs weakly and tries to pretend that he is the subject of a joke and that people will be waiting for him (including the Lady Fortunato). As the murderer finishes the topmost row of stones, Fortunato wails "For the love of God, Montresor!" Montresor replies, "Yes, for the love of God!" He listens for a reply but hears only the jester's bells ringing. Before placing the last stone, he drops a burning torch through the gap. He claims that he feels sick at heart, but dismisses this reaction as an effect of the dampness of the catacombs.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>In the last few sentences, Montresor reveals that it has been 50 years since that night, he has never been caught, and Fortunato's body still hangs from its chains in the niche where he left it. The murderer, seemingly unrepentant, ends the story by remarking: In pace requiescat! ("May he rest in peace!").</strong><br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Publication history</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>"The Cask of Amontillado" was first published in the November 1846 issue of Godey's Lady's Book[2] which was, at the time, the most popular periodical in America.[3] The story was only published one additional time during Poe's life.[4]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Analysis</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Although the subject matter of Poe's story is a murder, "The Cask of Amontillado" is not a tale of detection like "The Murders in the Rue Morgue" or "The Purloined Letter"; there is no investigation of Montresor's crime and the criminal himself explains how he committed the murder. The mystery in "The Cask of Amontillado" is in Montresor's motive for murder. Without a detective in the story, it is up to the reader to solve the mystery.[5]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Montresor never specifies his motive beyond than the vague "thousand injuries" to which he refers. Many commentators conclude that, lacking significant reason, Montresor must be insane, though even this is questionable because of the intricate details of the plot.[5]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Though Fortunato is presented as a connoisseur of fine wine, his actions in the story make it questionable. For example, he comments on another nobleman being unable to distinguish Amontillado from Sherry when Amontillado is in fact a type of Sherry to begin with and treats De Grave, an expensive French wine, with very little regard by drinking it in a single gulp.[1]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Poe may have known bricklaying through personal experience. Many periods in Poe's life lack significant biographical details, including what he did after leaving the Southern Literary Messenger in 1837.[6] Poe biographer John H. Ingram wrote to Sarah Helen Whitman that someone named "Allen" said that Poe worked "in the brickyard 'late in the fall of 1834.' This source has been identified as Robert T. P. Allen, a fellow West Point student during Poe's time there.[7]</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Inspiration</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>An apocryphal legend holds that the inspiration for "The Cask of Amontillado" came from a story Poe had heard at Castle Island (South Boston), Massachusetts, when he was a private there in 1827.[8] According to this legend, while stationed at Castle Island in 1827 he saw a monument to Lieutenant Robert Massie. Massie had been killed in a sword duel on Christmas Day 1817 by Lieutenant Gustavus Drane, following a dispute during a card game.[9] According to the legend, other soldiers then took revenge on Drane by getting him drunk, luring him into the dungeon, chaining him to a wall, and sealing him in a vault.[10] (though the last part is untrue, as Drane was courtmartialled and acquitted,[11] living until 1846[12]). A report of a skeleton discovered on the island may be a confused remembering of Poe's major source, Joel Headley's "A Man Built in a Wall" (1844), which recounts the author's seeing an immured skeleton in the wall of a church in Italy.[13] Headley's story includes details very similar to "The Cask of Amontillado"; in addition to walling an enemy into a hidden niche, the story details the careful placement of the bricks, the motive of revenge, and the victim's agonized moaning. Poe may have also seen similar themes in Honoré de Balzac's "Le Grande Bretêche" (Democratic Review, November 1843) or his friend George Lippard's The Quaker City; or The Monks of Monk Hall (1845).[14] Poe may have borrowed Montresor's family motto Nemo me impune lacessit from James Fenimore Cooper, who used the line in The Last of the Mohicans (1826).[15]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Poe wrote his tale, however, as a response to his personal rival Thomas Dunn English. Poe and English had several confrontations, usually revolving around literary caricatures of one another. Poe thought that one of English's writings went a bit too far, and successfully sued the other man's editors at The New York Mirror for libel in 1846.[16] That year English published a revenge-based novel called 1844, or, The Power of the S.F. Its plot was convoluted and difficult to follow, but made references to secret societies and ultimately had a main theme of revenge. It included a character named Marmaduke Hammerhead, the famous author of "The Black Crow," who uses phrases like "Nevermore" and "lost Lenore," referring to Poe's poem "The Raven." This parody of Poe was depicted as a drunkard, liar, and an abusive lover.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Poe responded with "The Cask of Amontillado," using very specific references to English's novel. In Poe's story, for example, Fortunato makes reference to the secret society of Masons, similar to the secret society in 1844, and even makes a gesture similar to one portrayed in 1844 (it was a signal of distress). English had also used an image of a token with a hawk grasping a snake in its claws, similar to Montresor's coat of arms bearing a foot stomping on a snake — though in this image, the snake is biting the heel. In fact, much of the scene of "The Cask of Amontillado" comes from a scene in 1844 that takes place in a subterranean vault. In the end, then, it is Poe who "punishes with impunity" by not taking credit for his own literary revenge and by crafting a concise tale (as opposed to a novel) with a singular effect, as he had suggested in his essay "The Philosophy of Composition."[17]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Poe may have also been inspired, at least in part, by the Washingtonian movement, a fellowship that promoted temperance. The group was made up of reformed drinkers who tried to scare people into abstaining from alcohol. Poe may have made a promise to join the movement in 1843 after a bout of drinking with the hopes of gaining a political appointment. "The Cask of Amontillado" then may be a "dark temperance tale," meant to shock people into realizing the dangers of drinking.[18]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Poe scholar Richard P. Benton has stated his belief that "Poe's protagonist is an Englished version of the French Montrésor" and has argued forcefully that Poe's model for Montresor "was Claude de Bourdeille, Count of Montrésor, the 17th-century political conspirator in the entourage of King Louis XIII's weak-willed brother, Gaston d'Orléans".[19] The "noted intriguer and memoir-writer" was first linked to "The Cask of Amontillado" by Poe scholar Burton R. Pollin.[19][20]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">References</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>1.^ Cecil, L. Moffitt. "Poe's Wine List", from Poe Studies, Vol. V, no. 2. December 1972. p. 41.</strong><br />
<strong>2.^ Sova, Dawn B. Edgar Allan Poe: A to Z. Checkmark Books, 2001. ISBN 081604161X p. 45</strong><br />
<strong>3.^ Reynolds, David F. "Poe's Art of Transformation: 'The Cask of Amontillado' in Its Cultural Context", as collected in The American Novel: New Essays on Poe's Major Tales, Kenneth Silverman, ed. Cambridge University Press, 1993. ISBN 0521422433 p. 101</strong><br />
<strong>4.^ Edgar Allan Poe — "The Cask of Amontillado" at the Edgar Allan Poe Society online</strong><br />
<strong>5.^ Baraban, Elena V. "The Motive for Murder in 'The Cask of Amontillado' by Edgar Allan Poe", Rocky Mountain E-Review of Language and Literature. Volume 58, Number 2. Fall 2004.</strong><br />
<strong>6.^ Silverman, Kenneth. Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance. New York: Harper Perennial, 1991: 129–130. ISBN 0-06-092331-8</strong><br />
<strong>7.^ Thomas, Dwight and David K. Jackson. The Poe Log: A Documentary Life of Edgar Allan Poe, 1809–1849. New York: G. K. Hall and Co., 1987: 141. ISBN0-7838-1401-1.</strong><br />
<strong>8.^ Bergen, Philip. Old Boston in Early Photographs. Boston: Bostonian Society, 1990. p. 106</strong><br />
<strong>9.^ Vrabel, Jim. When in Boston: a time line and almanac. Northeastern University, 2004. ISBN 1-55553-620-4 / ISBN 1-15553-621-2 p. 105</strong><br />
<strong>10.^ Wilson, Susan. Literary Trail of Greater Boston. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2000: 37. ISBN 0-618-05013-2</strong><br />
<strong>11.^ Vrabel, p. 105</strong><br />
<strong>12.^ Battery B, 4th U.S. Light Artillery - First Lieutenants of the 4th U.S. Artillery</strong><br />
<strong>13.^ Mabbott, Thomas Ollive, editor. Tales and Sketches: Volume II. Urbana, Ill.: University of Illinois Press, 2000. p. 1254</strong><br />
<strong>14.^ Reynolds, David F. "Poe's Art of Transformation: 'The Cask of Amontillado' in Its Cultural Context", as collected in The American Novel: New Essays on Poe's Major Tales, Kenneth Silverman, ed. Cambridge University Press, 1993. ISBN 0521422433 pp. 94–5</strong><br />
<strong>15.^ Jacobs, Edward Craney. "Marginalia – A Possible Debt to Cooper," collected in Poe Studies, vol. VIII, no. 1. June 1976.</strong><br />
<strong>16.^ Silverman, Kenneth. Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance. New York: Harper Perennial, 1991: 312–313. ISBN 0-06-092331-8</strong><br />
<strong>17.^ Rust, Richard D. "Punish with Impunity: Poe, Thomas Dunn English and 'The Cask of Amontillado'" in The Edgar Allan Poe Review, Vol. II, Issue 2 – Fall, 2001, St. Joseph's University.</strong><br />
<strong>18.^ Reynolds, David F. "Poe's Art of Transformation: 'The Cask of Amontillado' in Its Cultural Context", as collected in The American Novel: New Essays on Poe's Major Tales, Kenneth Silverman, ed. Cambridge University Press, 1993. ISBN 0521422433 pp. 96–7</strong><br />
<strong>19.^ Benton, Richard P. (June 1996). "Poe's 'The Cask of Amontillado': Its Cultural and Historical Backgrounds". Poe Studies 29: 19–27. </strong><br />
<strong>20.^ Burton R. Pollin (1970). "Notre-Dame de Paris in Two of the Tales". Discoveries in Poe. Notre Dame, Indiana: University of Notre Dame Press. pp. 24–37.</strong><br />
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Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-18585140775343582512012-10-26T14:50:00.000-07:002012-10-26T14:50:00.584-07:00"The Coliseum" Published 1833<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<strong><span style="color: red;">The Coliseum (1833)</span> </strong></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<strong>by Edgar Allan Poe</strong> </div>
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<strong>Type of the antique Rome! Rich reliquary</strong><br />
<strong>Of lofty contemplation left to Time</strong><br />
<strong>By buried centuries of pomp and power!</strong><br />
<strong>At length- at length- after so many days</strong><br />
<strong>Of weary pilgrimage and burning thirst,</strong><br />
<strong>(Thirst for the springs of lore that in thee lie,)</strong><br />
<strong>I kneel, an altered and an humble man,</strong><br />
<strong>Amid thy shadows, and so drink within</strong><br />
<strong>My very soul thy grandeur, gloom, and glory!</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Vastness! and Age! and Memories of Eld!</strong><br />
<strong>Silence! and Desolation! and dim Night!</strong><br />
<strong>I feel ye now- I feel ye in your strength-</strong><br />
<strong>O spells more sure than e'er Judaean king</strong><br />
<strong>Taught in the gardens of Gethsemane!</strong><br />
<strong>O charms more potent than the rapt Chaldee</strong><br />
<strong>Ever drew down from out the quiet stars!</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Here, where a hero fell, a column falls!</strong><br />
<strong>Here, where the mimic eagle glared in gold,</strong><br />
<strong>A midnight vigil holds the swarthy bat!</strong><br />
<strong>Here, where the dames of Rome their gilded hair</strong><br />
<strong>Waved to the wind, now wave the reed and thistle!</strong><br />
<strong>Here, where on golden throne the monarch lolled,</strong><br />
<strong>Glides, spectre-like, unto his marble home,</strong><br />
<strong>Lit by the wan light of the horned moon,</strong><br />
<strong>The swift and silent lizard of the stones!</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>But stay! these walls- these ivy-clad arcades-</strong><br />
<strong>These moldering plinths- these sad and blackened shafts-</strong><br />
<strong>These vague entablatures- this crumbling frieze-</strong><br />
<strong>These shattered cornices- this wreck- this ruin-</strong><br />
<strong>These stones- alas! these grey stones- are they all-</strong><br />
<strong>All of the famed, and the colossal left</strong><br />
<strong>By the corrosive Hours to Fate and me?</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>"Not all"- the Echoes answer me- "not all!</strong><br />
<strong>Prophetic sounds and loud, arise forever</strong><br />
<strong>From us, and from all Ruin, unto the wise,</strong><br />
<strong>As melody from Memnon to the Sun.</strong><br />
<strong>We rule the hearts of mightiest men- we rule</strong><br />
<strong>With a despotic sway all giant minds.</strong><br />
<strong>We are not impotent- we pallid stones.</strong><br />
<strong>Not all our power is gone- not all our fame-</strong><br />
<strong>Not all the magic of our high renown-</strong><br />
<strong>Not all the wonder that encircles us-</strong><br />
<strong>Not all the mysteries that in us lie-</strong><br />
<strong>Not all the memories that hang upon</strong><br />
<strong>And cling around about us as a garment,</strong><br />
<strong>Clothing us in a robe of more than glory."</strong><br />
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<strong>"The Coliseum" explores Rome as a past glory that still exists in imagination. Poe submitted the poem to a contest sponsored by the Baltimore Saturday Visiter, which offered a prize of $25 to the winner. The judges chose a poem submitted by editor John Hill Hewitt under the pseudonym "Henry Wilton." Poe was outraged by what he considered nepotism. Hewitt later claimed that the two had a fistfight in the streets of Baltimore, though no evidence proves the event.</strong><br />
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<strong>Despite the controversy, "The Coliseum" was published by the Visiter in its October 26, 1833, issue. It was later incorporated into Poe's unfinished drama Politian.</strong><br />
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<strong>In a July 1844 letter to fellow author James Russell Lowell, Poe put "The Coliseum" as one of his six best poems.</strong>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-43009115571445946022012-10-25T14:49:00.000-07:002012-10-25T14:49:00.162-07:00Deathday: John Sartain 1897 Poe Friend & Publisher<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<strong><span style="color: red;">John Sartain</span> (October 24, 1808 - October 25, 1897) was an editor, publisher, and an artist who pioneered mezzotint engraving in the United States.</strong> <br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Biography</span></strong> <br />
<br />
<strong>John Sartain was born in London, England on October 24, 1808. At the age of twenty-two he emigrated to the United States and settled in Philadelphia. Early in his career he painted portraits in oil and made miniatures. He engraved plates in 1841-1848 for Graham's Magazine, published by George Rex Graham (1813-1894), and believed his work was responsible for the publication's sudden success.[1] Sartain became editor and proprietor of Campbell's Foreign Semi-Monthly Magazine in 1843 and from 1849-1852 published with Graham Sartain's Union Magazine.</strong> <br />
<br />
<strong>Sartain was a colleague and friend of <span style="color: red;">Edgar Allan Poe</span>. Around July 2, 1849, about four months before Poe's death, the author unexpectedly visited Sartain's house in Philadelphia. Looking "pale and haggard" with "a wild and frightened expression in his eyes", Poe told Sartain that he was being pursued and needed protection; Sartain worried he was suicidal.[2] Poe asked for a razor so that he could shave off his moustache to become less recognizable. Sartain offered to cut it off himself using scissors.[3] Poe had said he had overheard people while on the train who were conspiring to murder him. Sartain asked why anyone would want to kill him, Poe answered it was "a woman trouble."[2] Poe gave Sartain a new poem, "The Bells", which was published in Sartain's Union Magazine in November 1849, a month after Poe's death.[4] Sartain's also included the first authorized printing of "Annabel Lee", also posthumous.[5]</strong> <br />
<br />
<br />
<strong>Sartain had charge of the art department of the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia, in 1876; took a prominent part in the work of the committee on the Washington Memorial, by Rudolf Siemering, in Fairmount Park, Philadelphia; designed medallions for the monument to George Washington and Lafayette erected in 1869 in Monument Cemetery, Philadelphia. He was a member of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and a cavaliere of the Royal Equestrian Order of the Crown of Italy.</strong> <br />
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<strong>His Reminiscences of a Very Old Man (New York, 1899) are of unusual interest. Of his children William Sartain (1843-1924), landscape and figure painter, was born at Philadelphia on the 21st of November 1843, studied under his father and under Leon Bonnat, Paris, was one of the founders of the Society of American Artists, and became an associate of the National Academy of Design. Another son, Samuel Sartain (1830-1906), and a daughter, Emily Sartain (1841-1927), who in 1886 became principal of the Philadelphia School of Design for Women, were also American artists.</strong> <br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">References</span></strong> <br />
<br />
<strong>1.^ Quinn, Arthur Hobson. Edgar Allan Poe: A Critical Biography. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998: 330. ISBN 0801857309. </strong><br />
<strong>2.^ Silverman, Kenneth. Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance. New York: Harper Perennial, 1991: 416. ISBN 0060923318. </strong><br />
<strong>3.^ Meyers, Jeffrey. Edgar Allan Poe: His Life and Legacy. New York: Cooper Square Press, 1992: 246. ISBN 0815410387. </strong><br />
<strong>4.^ Sova, Dawn B. Edgar Allan Poe: A to Z. New York: Checkmark Books, 2001: 25. ISBN 081604161X. </strong><br />
<strong>5.^ Meyers, Jeffrey. Edgar Allan Poe: His Life and Legacy. New York: Cooper Square Press, 1992: 244. ISBN 0815410387 </strong><br />
<strong>This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (Eleventh ed.). Cambridge University Press.</strong>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-32240893889137833332012-10-19T14:49:00.000-07:002012-10-19T14:49:00.165-07:00"MS Found in a Bottle" Published 1833<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<strong><span style="color: red;">"MS. Found in a Bottle"</span> is a short story by American writer Edgar Allan Poe. The plot follows an unnamed narrator at sea who finds himself in a series of harrowing circumstances. As he nears his own disastrous death while his ship drives ever southward, he writes an "MS." or manuscript telling of his adventures which he casts into the sea. Some critics believe the story was meant as a satire of typical sea tales.</strong><br />
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<strong>Poe submitted "MS. Found in a Bottle" as one of many entries to a writing contest offered by the weekly Baltimore Saturday Visiter. Each of the stories were well-liked by the judges but they unanimously chose "MS. Found in a Bottle" as the contest's winner, earning Poe a $50 prize. The story was then published in the October 19, 1833, issue of the Visiter.</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Plot summary</span></strong><br />
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<strong>In Poe's tale, an unnamed narrator, estranged from his family and country, sets sail as a passenger aboard a cargo ship from Batavia (now known as Jakarta, Indonesia). Some days into the voyage, the ship is first becalmed then hit by a Simoon—which, in Poe's story, is a combination of a sand storm, typhoon, and hurricane—that capsizes the ship and sends everyone, except the narrator and an old Swede, overboard. Driven southward by the magical Simoon towards the South Pole, the narrator's ship eventually collides with a gigantic black galleon, and only the narrator manages to scramble aboard. Once the new ship arrives, the narrator finds outdated maps and useless navigational tools throughout the ship. Also, he finds it to be manned by elderly crewmen who are unable to see him; he steals writing materials from the captain's cabin to keep a journal (the "manuscript" of the title) which he resolves to cast into the sea. This ship too continues to be driven southward, and he notices the crew appears to show signs of hope at the prospect of their destruction as it reaches Antarctica. The ship enters a clearing in the ice where it is caught in a vast whirlpool and begins to sink into the sea.</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Analysis</span></strong><br />
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<strong>"MS. Found in a Bottle" is one of Poe's sea tales, which also include "A Descent into the Maelström" and "The Oblong Box". The story's horror comes from its scientific imaginings and its description of a physical world beyond the limits of human exploration. It emphasizes ideas, calling the reader back to the introduction of the story, in which the narrator announces his allegiance to realism. That realism is lost with the descent into the whirlpool, as, presumably, is the narrator's life.</strong><br />
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<strong>Poe biographer Kenneth Silverman says that the story is "a sustained crescendo of ever-building dread in the face of ever-stranger and ever-more-imminent catastrophe".[1] This prospect of unknown catastrophe both horrifies and stimulates the narrator.[2] Like Poe's narrator in another early work, "Berenice", the narrator in "MS. Found in a Bottle" lives predominantly through his books, more accurately, his manuscripts.[3]</strong><br />
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<strong>Some scholars suggest that "MS. Found in a Bottle" was meant to be a parody or satire of sea stories, especially because of the absurdity of the plot and the fact that the narrator unrealistically kept a diary through it all.[4] The other tales that Poe wrote during this time period, including "Bon-Bon", were meant to be humorous or, as Poe wrote, "burlesques upon criticism generally".[5] William Bittner, for example, wrote that it was poking fun specifically at Jane Porter's novel Sir Edward Seaward's Narrative (1831) or Smyzonia (1820) by the pseudonymous "Captain Adam Seaborn" (possibly John Cleves Symmes, Jr.).[4]</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Critical reception</span></strong><br />
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<strong>The editors who first published "MS. Found in a Bottle" called it "eminently distinguished by a wild, vigorous and poetical imagination, a rich style, a fertile invention, and varied and curious learning."[6] Writer Joseph Conrad considered the story "about as fine as anything of that kind can be—so authentic in detail that it might have been told by a sailor of sombre and poetical genius in the invention of the fantastic".[6] Poe scholar Scott Peeples summarizes the importance of "MS. Found in a Bottle" as "the story that launched Poe's career".[</strong>7]<br />
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<strong>The story was likely an influence on Herman Melville and bears a similarity to his novel Moby-Dick. As scholar Jack Scherting noted:</strong><br />
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<strong>Two well-known works of American fiction fit the following description. Composed in the 19th century each is an account of an observant, first-person narrator who, prompted by a nervous restlessness, went to sea only to find himself aboard an ill-fated ship. The ship, manned by a strange crew and under the command of a strange, awesome captain, is destroyed in an improbable catastrophe; and were it not for the fortuitous recovery of a floating vessel and its freight, the narrative of the disastrous voyage would never have reached the public. The two works are, of course, Melville's Moby-Dick (1851) and Poe's "MS. Found in a Bottle" (1833), and the correspondences are in some respects so close as to suggest a causal rather than a coincidental relationship between the two tales.[8]</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Publication history</span></strong><br />
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<strong>In the June 15, 183</strong><strong>3, issue of the Baltimore Saturday Visiter, its publishers Charles F. Cloud and William L. Pouder announced prizes of "50 dollars for the best Tale and 25 dollars for the best poem, not exceeding one hundred lines," submitted by October 1, 1833. Poe submitted "MS. Found in a Bottle" along with five others. The judges—John Pendleton Kennedy, Dr. James Henry Miller and John H. B. Latrobe—met at the house of Latrobe on October 7[9] and unanimously selected Poe's tale for the prize. The award was announced in the October 12 issue, and the tale was printed in the following issue on October 19, with the remark: "The following is the Tale to which the Premium of Fifty Dollars has been awarded by the Committee. It will be found highly graphic in its style of Composition."[10] Poe's poetry submission, "The Coliseum", was published a few days later, but did not win the prize.[11] The poetry winner turned out to be the editor of the Visiter, John H. Hewitt, using the pseudonym "Henry Wilton". Poe was outraged and suggested the contest was rigged. Hewitt claimed, decades later in 1885, that Poe and Hewitt brawled in the streets because of the contest, though the fight is not verified.[12] Poe believed his own poem was the actual winner, a fact which Latrobe later substantiated.[13]</strong><br />
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<strong>Kennedy was particularly supportive of Poe's fledgling career and gave him work for the Visiter after the contest.[14] He assisting in getting "MS. Found in a Bottle" reprinted in an annual gift book called the Gift in its 1836 issue.[15] Kennedy also urged Poe to collect the stories he submitted to the contest, including "MS. Found in a Bottle", into one edition and contacted publisher Carey & Lea on his behalf.[16] A plan was made to publish the stories as a volume called Tales of the Folio Club and the Saturday Visiter promoted it by issuing a call for subscribers to purchase the book in October 1833 for $1 apiece.[17] The "Folio Club" was intended to be a fictitious literary society the author called a group of "dunderheads" out to "abolish literature".[18] The idea was similar in some respects to The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer. At each monthly meeting, a member would present a story. A week after the Visiter issued its advertisement, however, the newspaper announced that the author had withdrawn the pieces with the expectation they would be printed in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.[19] Publishers Harper and Brothers were offered the collection but rejected it, saying that readers wanted long narratives and novels, inspiring Poe to write The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket, another sea tale.[20]</strong><br />
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<strong>After its first publication, "MS. Found in a Bottle" was almost immediately pirated by the People's Advocate of Newburyport, Massachusetts, which published it without permission on October 26, 1833.[14]</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">References</span></strong><br />
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<strong>1.^ Silverman, Kenneth. Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance. New York City: Harper Perennial, 1991: 91. ISBN 0-06-092331-8</strong><br />
<strong>2.^ Stashower, Daniel. The Beautiful Cigar Girl: Mary Rogers, Edgar Allan Poe, and the Invention of Murder. New York: Dutton, 2006: 65. ISBN 0-525-94981-X</strong><br />
<strong>3.^ Peeples, Scott. Edgar Allan Poe Revisited. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1998: 50. ISBN 0-8057-4572-6</strong><br />
<strong>4.^ Bittner, William. Poe: A Biography. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1962: 90.</strong><br />
<strong>5.^ Peeples, Scott. Edgar Allan Poe Revisited. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1998: 32. ISBN 0-8057-4572-6</strong><br />
<strong>6.^ Sova, Dawn B. Edgar Allan Poe: A to Z. New York City: Checkmark Books, 2001: 162. ISBN 081604161X</strong><br />
<strong>7.^ Peeples, Scott. Edgar Allan Poe Revisited. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1998: 46. ISBN 0-8057-4572-6</strong><br />
<strong>8.^ Scherting, Jack. "The Bottle and the Coffin: Further Speculation on Poe and Moby-Dick", Poe Newsletter, vol. I, no. 2, October 1968: 22.</strong><br />
<strong>9.^ Thomas, Dwight and David K. Jackson. The Poe Log: A Documentary Life of Edgar Allan Poe, 1809–1849. Boston: G. K. Hall & Co., 1987: 130. ISBN 0816187347</strong><br />
<strong>10.^ Thomas, Dwight and David K. Jackson. The Poe Log: A Documentary Life of Edgar Allan Poe, 1809–1849. Boston: G. K. Hall & Co., 1987: 133. ISBN 0816187347</strong><br />
<strong>11.^ Sova, Dawn B. Edgar Allan Poe: A to Z. Checkmark Books, 2001.</strong><br />
<strong>12.^ Poe, Harry Lee. Edgar Allan Poe: An Illustrated Companion to His Tell-Tale Stories. New York: Metro Books, 2008: 55. ISBN 978-1-4351-0469-3</strong><br />
<strong>13.^ Meyers, Jeffrey. Edgar Allan Poe: His Life and Legacy. New York: Cooper Square Press, 1992: 65. ISBN 0-8154-1038-7</strong><br />
<strong>14.^ Thomas, Dwight and David K. Jackson. The Poe Log: A Documentary Life of Edgar Allan Poe, 1809–1849. Boston: G. K. Hall & Co., 1987: 135. ISBN 0816187347</strong><br />
<strong>15.^ Benton, Richard P. "The Tales: 1831–1835", A Companion to Poe Studies, Eric W. Carlson, ed. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1996: 111. ISBN 0-313-26506-2</strong><br />
<strong>16.^ Silverman, Kenneth. Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance. New York City: Harper Perennial, 1991: 93. ISBN 0-06-092331-8</strong><br />
<strong>17.^ Thomas, Dwight and David K. Jackson. The Poe Log: A Documentary Life of Edgar Allan Poe, 1809–1849. Boston: G. K. Hall and Co., 1987: 134. ISBN 0816187347</strong><br />
<strong>18.^ Sova, Dawn B. Edgar Allan Poe: A to Z. New York City: Checkmark Books, 2001: 88. ISBN 081604161X</strong><br />
<strong>19.^ Silverman, Kenneth. Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance. New York City: Harper Perennial, 1991: 92–93. ISBN 0-06-092331-8</strong><br />
<strong>20.^ Peeples, Scott. Edgar Allan Poe Revisited. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1998: 56. ISBN 0-8057-4572-6</strong>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-59122849572912250692012-10-18T11:00:00.000-07:002012-10-18T11:00:00.726-07:00Google Celebrates Moby Dick 161st Anniversary<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<strong>"Moby-Dick; or, The Whale: Publishing history" - Melville Society. "First British edition (entitled The Whale), expurgated to avoid offending delicate political and moral sensibilities, published in three volumes on October 18, 1851 by Richard Bentley, London. First American edition published November 14, 1851 by Harper & Brothers, New York."</strong>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-15968225402388341092012-10-10T14:49:00.000-07:002012-10-10T14:49:00.304-07:00"To Helen" Published 1848<div style="text-align: center;">
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<strong><span style="color: red;">To Helen </span></strong></div>
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<strong>by Edgar Allan Poe</strong> </div>
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<strong>This poem was written for Sarah Helen Whitman.</strong> <br />
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<strong>I saw thee once- once only- years ago;</strong><br />
<strong>I must not say how many- but not many.</strong><br />
<strong>It was a July midnight; and from out</strong><br />
<strong>A full-orbed moon, that, like thine own soul, soaring,</strong><br />
<strong>Sought a precipitate pathway up through heaven,</strong><br />
<strong>There fell a silvery-silken veil of light,</strong><br />
<strong>With quietude, and sultriness, and slumber,</strong><br />
<strong>Upon the upturned faces of a thousand</strong><br />
<strong>Roses that grew in an enchanted garden,</strong><br />
<strong>Where no wind dared to stir, unless on tiptoe-</strong><br />
<strong>Fell on the upturn'd faces of these roses</strong><br />
<strong>That gave out, in return for the love-light,</strong><br />
<strong>Their odorous souls in an ecstatic death-</strong><br />
<strong>Fell on the upturn'd faces of these roses</strong><br />
<strong>That smiled and died in this parterre, enchanted</strong><br />
<strong>By thee, and by the poetry of thy presence.</strong><br />
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<strong>Clad all in white, upon a violet bank</strong><br />
<strong>I saw thee half reclining; while the moon</strong><br />
<strong>Fell on the upturn'd faces of the roses,</strong><br />
<strong>And on thine own, upturn'd- alas, in sorrow!</strong><br />
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<strong>Was it not Fate, that, on this July midnight-</strong><br />
<strong>Was it not Fate, (whose name is also Sorrow,)</strong><br />
<strong>That bade me pause before that garden-gate,</strong><br />
<strong>To breathe the incense of those slumbering roses?</strong><br />
<strong>No footstep stirred: the hated world all slept,</strong><br />
<strong>Save only thee and me. (Oh, Heaven!- oh, God!</strong><br />
<strong>How my heart beats in coupling those two words!)</strong><br />
<strong>Save only thee and me. I paused- I looked-</strong><br />
<strong>And in an instant all things disappeared.</strong><br />
<strong>(Ah, bear in mind this garden was enchanted!)</strong><br />
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<strong>The pearly lustre of the moon went out:</strong><br />
<strong>The mossy banks and the meandering paths,</strong><br />
<strong>The happy flowers and the repining trees,</strong><br />
<strong>Were seen no more: the very roses' odors</strong><br />
<strong>Died in the arms of the adoring airs.</strong><br />
<strong>All- all expired save thee- save less than thou:</strong><br />
<strong>Save only the divine light in thine eyes-</strong><br />
<strong>Save but the soul in thine uplifted eyes.</strong><br />
<strong>I saw but them- they were the world to me!</strong><br />
<strong>I saw but them- saw only them for hours,</strong><br />
<strong>Saw only them until the moon went down.</strong><br />
<strong>What wild heart-histories seemed to lie enwritten</strong><br />
<strong>Upon those crystalline, celestial spheres!</strong><br />
<strong>How dark a woe, yet how sublime a hope!</strong><br />
<strong>How silently serene a sea of pride!</strong><br />
<strong>How daring an ambition; yet how deep-</strong><br />
<strong>How fathomless a capacity for love!</strong><br />
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<strong>But now, at length, dear Dian sank from sight,</strong><br />
<strong>Into a western couch of thunder-cloud;</strong><br />
<strong>And thou, a ghost, amid the entombing trees</strong><br />
<strong>Didst glide away. Only thine eyes remained;</strong><br />
<strong>They would not go- they never yet have gone;</strong><br />
<strong>Lighting my lonely pathway home that night,</strong><br />
<strong>They have not left me (as my hopes have) since;</strong><br />
<strong>They follow me- they lead me through the years.</strong><br />
<strong>They are my ministers- yet I their slave.</strong><br />
<strong>Their office is to illumine and enkindle-</strong><br />
<strong>My duty, to be saved by their bright light,</strong><br />
<strong>And purified in their electric fire,</strong><br />
<strong>And sanctified in their elysian fire.</strong><br />
<strong>They fill my soul with Beauty (which is Hope),</strong><br />
<strong>And are far up in Heaven- the stars I kneel to</strong><br />
<strong>In the sad, silent watches of my night;</strong><br />
<strong>While even in the meridian glare of day</strong><br />
<strong>I see them still- two sweetly scintillant</strong><br />
<strong>Venuses, unextinguished by the sun!</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">To Helen (1848)</span></strong><br />
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<strong>The original manuscript was sent to Sarah Helen Whitman in 1848. It was published as "To —— —— ——" in the Union Magazine's November issue that year. It became the second of Poe's "To Helen" poems when published as "To Helen" in the October 10, 1849 issue of the New York Daily Tribune.</strong>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-11831010438898372412012-10-09T14:50:00.000-07:002012-10-09T14:50:00.386-07:00"Annabelle Lee" Published 1849<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<strong><span style="color: red;">"Annabel Lee"</span> is the last complete poem[1] composed by American author Edgar Allan Poe. Like many of Poe's poems, it explores the theme of the death of a beautiful woman.[2] The narrator, who fell in love with Annabel Lee when they were young, has a love for her so strong that even angels are jealous. He retains his love for her even after her death. There has been debate over who, if anyone, was the inspiration for "Annabel Lee." Though many women have been suggested, Poe's wife <span style="color: red;">Virginia Eliza Clemm Poe</span> is one of the more credible candidates. Written in 1849, it was not published until shortly after Poe's death that same year.</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Synopsis</span></strong><br />
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<strong>The poem's narrator describes his love for Annabel Lee, which began many years ago in an unnamed "kingdom by the sea." Though they were young, their love for one another burned with such an intensity that angels became jealous. For that reason, the narrator believes, the angels caused her death. Even so, their love is strong enough that it extends beyond the grave and the narrator believes their two souls are still entwined. Every night, he dreams of Annabel Lee and sees the brightness of her eyes in the stars. He admits that every night he lies down by her side in her tomb by the sea.</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Analysis</span></strong><br />
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<strong>Like many other Poe poems including "The Raven", "Ulalume", and "To One in Paradise", "Annabel Lee" follows Poe's favorite theme: the death of a beautiful woman,[2] which Poe called "the most poetical topic in the world".[3] Also like women in many other works by Poe, she is struck with illness and marries young.[4] The poem focuses on an ideal love which is unusually strong. In fact, the narrator's actions show that he not only loves Annabel Lee, but he worships her, something he can only do after her death.[5] The narrator admits that he and Annabel Lee were both children when they fell in love, but his explanation that angels murdered her is in itself childish, suggesting he has not grown up much since then.[6] His repetition of this assertion suggests he is trying to rationalize his own excessive feelings of loss.[6]</strong><br />
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<strong>Unlike "The Raven", in which the narrator believes he will "nevermore" be reunited with his love, "Annabel Lee" says the two will be together again, as not even demons "can ever dissever" their souls.</strong><br />
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<strong>The poem has been described containing "shades of necrophilia."[7]</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Poetic structure</span></strong><br />
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<strong>"Annabel Lee" consists of six stanzas, three with six lines, one with seven, and two with eight, with the rhyme pattern differing slightly in each one.[2] Though it is not technically a ballad, Poe referred to it as one.[8] Like a ballad, the poem utilizes repetition of words and phrases purposely to create its mournful effect.[2] The name Annabel Lee emphasizes the letter "L", a frequent device in Poe's female characters such as "Eulalie", "Lenore", and "Ulalume".[9]</strong><br />
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<strong>There is debate on the last line of the poem. The Edgar Allan Poe Society of Baltimore, Maryland has identified 11 different versions of the poem that were published between 1849 and 1850.[10] However, the biggest variation is in the final line:</strong><br />
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<strong>Original manuscript – In her tomb by the side of the sea</strong><br />
<strong>Alternative version – In her tomb by the sounding sea</strong><br />
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<strong><span style="color: red;">Inspiration</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Poe's wife Virginia is often assumed to be the inspiration for "Annabel Lee".It is unclear to whom the eponymous character Annabel Lee is referring.[11] Biographers and critics often suggest Poe's frequent use of the "death of a beautiful woman" theme stems from the repeated loss of women throughout his own life, including his mother Eliza Poe and his foster mother Frances Allan.[12] Biographers often interpret that "Annabel Lee" was written for Poe's wife Virginia, who had died two years prior, as was suggested by poet Frances Sargent Osgood, though Osgood is herself a candidate for the poem's inspiration.[11] A strong case can be made for Poe's wife Virginia: she was the one he loved as a child, and the only one that had been his bride, and the only one that had died.[13] Autobiographical readings of the poem have also been used to support the theory that Virginia and Poe never consummated their marriage, as "Annabel Lee" was a "maiden".[14] Critics, including T.O. Mabbott, believed that Annabel Lee was merely the product of Poe's gloomy imagination and that Annabel Lee was no real person in particular. A childhood sweetheart of Poe's named Sarah Elmira Royster believed the poem was written with her in mind[15] and that Poe himself said so.[16] Sarah Helen Whitman and Sarah Anna Lewis also claimed to have inspired the poem.[17]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Local legend in Charleston, South Carolina tells the story of a sailor who met a woman named Annabel Lee. Her father disapproved of the pairing and the two met privately in a graveyard before the sailor's time stationed in Charleston was up. While away, he heard of Annabel's death from yellow fever, but her father would not allow him at the funeral. Because he did not know her exact burial location, he instead kept vigil in the cemetery where they had often secretly met. There is no evidence that Edgar Allan Poe had heard of this legend, but locals insist it was his inspiration, especially considering Poe was briefly stationed in Charleston while in the army in 1827.[18]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Publication history and reception</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>"Annabel Lee" was likely composed in May 1849.[17] Poe took steps to ensure the poem would be seen in print. He gave a copy to Rufus Wilmot Griswold, his literary executor and personal rival, gave another copy to John Thompson to repay a $5 debt, and sold a copy to Sartain's Union Magazine for publication.[13] Though Sartain's was the first authorized printing in January 1850, Griswold was the first to publish it on October 9, 1849, two days after Poe's death as part of his obituary of Poe in the New York Daily Tribune. Thompson had it published in the Southern Literary Messenger in November 1849.[13]</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>"Annabel Lee" was an inspiration for Vladimir Nabokov, especially for his novel Lolita (1955), in which the narrator, as a child, falls in love with the terminally ill Annabel Leigh "in a princedom by the sea". Originally, Nabokov titled the novel The Kingdom by the Sea.[19] Nabokov would later use this as the title of the Lolita "doppelganger novel" in Look at the Harlequins!</strong><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<strong><span style="color: red;">Annabelle Lee (1849)</span></strong></div>
<br />
<strong>It was many and many a year ago,</strong><br />
<strong>In a kingdom by the sea,</strong><br />
<strong>That a maiden there lived whom you may know</strong><br />
<strong>By the name of Annabel Lee;</strong><br />
<strong>And this maiden she lived with no other thought</strong><br />
<strong>Than to love and be loved by me.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>I was a child and she was a child,</strong><br />
<strong>In this kingdom by the sea:</strong><br />
<strong>But we loved with a love that was more than love —</strong><br />
<strong>I and my Annabel Lee;</strong><br />
<strong>With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven</strong><br />
<strong>Coveted her and me.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>And this was the reason that, long ago,</strong><br />
<strong>In this kingdom by the sea,</strong><br />
<strong>A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling</strong><br />
<strong>My beautiful Annabel Lee;</strong><br />
<strong>So that her highborn kinsmen came</strong><br />
<strong>And bore her away from me,</strong><br />
<strong>To shut her up in a sepulchre</strong><br />
<strong>In this kingdom by the sea.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>The angels, not half so happy in heaven,</strong><br />
<strong>Went envying her and me —</strong><br />
<strong>Yes! — that was the reason (as all men know,</strong><br />
<strong>In this kingdom by the sea)</strong><br />
<strong>That the wind came out of the cloud by night,</strong><br />
<strong>Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>But our love it was stronger by far than the love</strong><br />
<strong>Of those who were older than we —</strong><br />
<strong>Of many far wiser than we —</strong><br />
<strong>And neither the angels in heaven above,</strong><br />
<strong>Nor the demons down under the sea,</strong><br />
<strong>Can ever dissever my soul from the soul</strong><br />
<strong>Of the beautiful Annabel Lee:</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams</strong><br />
<strong>Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;</strong><br />
<strong>And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes</strong><br />
<strong>Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;</strong><br />
<strong>And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side</strong><br />
<strong>Of my darling — my darling — my life and my bride,</strong><br />
<strong>In her sepulchre there by the sea,</strong><br />
<strong>In her tomb by the sounding sea.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">References</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>1.^ www.eapoe.org</strong><br />
<strong>2.^ Meyers, Jeffrey. Edgar Allan Poe: His Life and Legacy. New York: Cooper Square Press, 1992. p. 243. ISBN 0815410387</strong><br />
<strong>3.^ Poe, Edgar A. "The Philosophy of Composition" (1846).</strong><br />
<strong>4.^ Weekes, Karen. "Poe's feminine ideal", collected in The Cambridge Companion to Edgar Allan Poe, edited by Kevin J. Hayes. Cambridge University Press, 2002. p. 152. ISBN 0521797276</strong><br />
<strong>5.^ Hoffman, Daniel. Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1972. p. 68. ISBN 0807123218</strong><br />
<strong>6.^ Empric, Julienne H. "A Note on 'Annabel Lee'", collected in Poe Studies. Volume VI, Number 1 (June 1973). p. 26.</strong><br />
<strong>7.^ Michael Coren, The man in the mask; Books, The Sunday Times ; Nov 1, 1992</strong><br />
<strong>8.^ Quinn, Arthur Hobson. Edgar Allan Poe: A Critical Biography. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998: 606. ISBN 0801857309</strong><br />
<strong>9.^ Kopley, Richard and Kevin J. Hayes. "Two verse masterworks: 'The Raven' and 'Ulalume'", as collected in The Cambridge Companion to Edgar Allan Poe, edited by Kevin J. Hayes. Cambridge University Press, 2002: 200. ISBN 0521797276</strong><br />
<strong>10.^ "Annabel Lee" - List of texts and variant texts at the Edgar Allan Poe Society online</strong><br />
<strong>11.^ Silverman, Kenneth. Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance. New York: Harper Perennial, 1991. p. 401. ISBN 0060923318</strong><br />
<strong>12.^ Weekes, Karen. "Poe's feminine ideal", collected in The Cambridge Companion to Edgar Allan Poe, edited by Kevin J. Hayes. Cambridge University Press, 2002. p. 149. ISBN 0521797276</strong><br />
<strong>13.^ Meyers, Jeffrey. Edgar Allan Poe: His Life and Legacy. New York: Cooper Square Press, 1992. p. 244. ISBN 0815410387</strong><br />
<strong>14.^ Hoffman, Daniel. Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1972. p. 27. ISBN 0807123218</strong><br />
<strong>15.^ www.pambytes.com</strong><br />
<strong>16.^ Silverman, Kenneth. Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance. New York: Harper Perennial, 1991. p. 426. ISBN 0060923318</strong><br />
<strong>17.^ Sova, Dawn B. Edgar Allan Poe: A to Z. Checkmark Books, 2001. p. 12. ISBN 081604161X</strong><br />
<strong>18.^ Crawford, Tom. "The Ghost by the Sea". Retrieved May 14, 2008.</strong><br />
<strong>19.^ Meyers, Jeffrey. Edgar Allan Poe: His Life and Legacy. New York: Cooper Square Press, 1992. p. 302. ISBN 0815410387</strong>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-34976521963656613912012-10-08T17:00:00.000-07:002012-10-08T17:00:07.939-07:00Poe Forward's POE FUNERAL Commemoration 1999<div style="text-align: center;"><object height="344" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/eHthsLBzy1w?fs=1&hl=en_US"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/eHthsLBzy1w?fs=1&hl=en_US" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object></div><br />
<strong>To commemorate the 150th anniversary of the Death of Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) Poe Forward presented <span style="color: red;">POE FUNERAL</span> at the Midnight Special Bookstore in Santa Monica on Halloween 1999. The FUNERAL DIRECTOR was Brian Aldrich and the FUNERAL PRODUCER was David Delgado. The audience was SRO. The full program listing is on our website at www.poeforward.com. This is the funeral Poe never had. </strong>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-22369338223407269602012-10-08T15:00:00.000-07:002012-10-08T15:00:06.971-07:00Edgar A. Poe's Funeral 1849<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQmPKflI2kApR5Wz_UCuzdCGupb4afUS7sasaI2_42QdVc45Ia7copqZRyTfSOyTN0U9GCRa5oAPfgUJnpU4THfnAuG-7CkGJu4InNP448_9iDr-Rlrlh4F9rpwZhPLndyJBFOYBG7Du7f/s1600/Image150.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="346" px="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQmPKflI2kApR5Wz_UCuzdCGupb4afUS7sasaI2_42QdVc45Ia7copqZRyTfSOyTN0U9GCRa5oAPfgUJnpU4THfnAuG-7CkGJu4InNP448_9iDr-Rlrlh4F9rpwZhPLndyJBFOYBG7Du7f/s640/Image150.gif" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
<strong>Poe's funeral was a simple one, held at 4 p.m. on <span style="color: red;">Monday, October 8, 1849</span>. Few people attended the ceremony. Poe's uncle, Henry Herring, provided a simple mahogany coffin, and a cousin, Neilson Poe, supplied the hearse. Moran's wife made his shroud. The funeral was presided over by the Reverend W. T. D. Clemm, cousin of Poe's wife, Virginia. Also in attendance were Dr. Snodgrass, Baltimore lawyer and former University of Virginia classmate Zaccheus Collins Lee, Poe's first cousin Elizabeth Herring and her husband, and former schoolmaster Joseph Clarke. The entire ceremony lasted only three minutes in the cold, damp weather. Reverend Clemm decided not to bother with a sermon because the crowd was too small. Sexton George W. Spence wrote of the weather: "It was a dark and gloomy day, not raining but just kind of raw and threatening." Poe was buried in a cheap coffin that lacked handles, a nameplate, cloth lining, or a cushion for his head.</strong>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-14868909984941097862012-10-07T14:50:00.000-07:002012-10-07T14:50:00.154-07:00Edgar A. Poe Dies in Baltimore Hospital 1849<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
<b><span style="color: red;">The death of Edgar Allan Poe on October 7, 1849</span>, has remained mysterious: the circumstances leading up to it are uncertain and the cause of death is disputed. On October 3, Poe was found delirious on the streets of Baltimore, Maryland, "in great distress, and ... in need of immediate assistance," according to the man who found him, Joseph W. Walker. He was taken to the Washington College Hospital, where he died at 5 a.m. on Sunday, October 7. Poe was never coherent enough to explain how he came to be in this condition.</b><br />
<br />
<strong>Much of the extant information about the last few days of Poe's life comes from his attending physician, Dr. John Joseph Moran, though his credibility is questionable. Poe was buried after a small funeral at the back of Westminster Hall and Burying Ground, but his remains were moved to a new grave with a larger monument in 1875. It has been questioned whether the correct corpse was moved. The 1875 monument also marks the burial place of Poe's wife, Virginia, and his mother-in-law, Maria. Theories as to what caused Poe's death include suicide, murder, cholera, rabies, syphilis, influenza, and that Poe was a victim of cooping. Evidence of the influence of alcohol is strongly disputed.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>After Poe's death, Rufus Wilmot Griswold wrote his obituary under the pseudonym "Ludwig." Griswold, who became the literary executor of Poe's estate, was actually a rival of Poe and later published his first full biography, depicting him as a depraved, drunk, drug-addled madman. Much of the evidence for this image of Poe is believed to have been forged by Griswold, and though friends of Poe denounced it, this interpretation had lasting impact.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>All medical records and documents, including Poe's death certificate, have been lost, if they ever existed. The precise cause of Poe's death is disputed, but many theories exist. Many biographers have addressed the issue and reached different conclusions, ranging from Jeffrey Meyers's assertion that it was hypoglycemia to John Evangelist Walsh's conspiratorial murder plot theory. It has also been suggested that Poe's death might have resulted from suicide related to depression. In 1848, he nearly died from an overdose of laudanum, readily available as a tranquilizer and pain killer. Though it is unclear if this was a true suicide attempt or just a miscalculation on Poe's part, it did not lead to Poe's death a year later.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Snodgrass was convinced that Poe died from alcoholism and did a great deal to popularize this idea. He was a supporter of the temperance movement and found Poe a useful example in his temperance work. However, Snodgrass's writings on the topic have been proven untrustworthy. Moran contradicted Snodgrass by stating in his own 1885 account that Poe did not die under the effect of any intoxicant. Moran claimed that Poe "had not the slightest odor of liquor upon his breath or person." Even so, some newspapers at the time reported Poe's death as "congestion of the brain" or "cerebral inflammation," euphemisms for deaths from disgraceful causes such as alcoholism. In a study of Poe, a psychologist suggested that Poe had dipsomania, a condition that causes frequent seizures that lead to excesses, often alcoholic, during which the victim cannot remember what has happened to him or her.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>However, Poe's characterization as an uncontrollable alcoholic is disputed. His drinking companion for a time, Thomas Mayne Reid, admitted that the two engaged in wild "frolics" but that Poe "never went beyond the innocent mirth in which we all indulge... While acknowledging this as one of Poe's failings, I can speak truly of its not being habitual." Some believe Poe had a severe susceptibility to alcohol and became drunk after one glass of wine. He only drank during difficult periods of his life and sometimes went several months at a time without alcohol. Adding further confusion about the frequency of Poe's use of alcohol was his membership in the Sons of Temperance at the time of his death. William Glenn, who administered Poe's pledge, wrote years later that the temperance community had no reason to believe Poe had violated his pledge while in Richmond. Suggestions of a drug overdose have also been proven to be untrue, though it is still often reported. Thomas Dunn English, an admitted enemy of Poe and a trained doctor, insisted that Poe was not a drug user. He wrote: "Had Poe the opium habit when I knew him (before 1846) I should both as a physician and a man of observation, have discovered it during his frequent visits to my rooms, my visits at his house, and our meetings elsewhere – I saw no signs of it and believe the charge to be a baseless slander."</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Numerous other causes of death have been proposed over the years, including several forms of rare brain disease or a brain tumor, diabetes, various types of enzyme deficiency, syphilis, apoplexy, delirium tremens, epilepsy and meningeal inflammation. A doctor named John W. Francis examined Poe in May 1848 and believed Poe had heart disease, which Poe later denied. A 2006 test of a sample of Poe's hair provides evidence against the possibility of lead poisoning, mercury poisoning, and similar toxic heavy-metal exposures. Cholera has also been suggested. Poe had passed through Philadelphia in early 1849 during a cholera epidemic. He got sick during his time in the city and wrote a letter to his aunt, Maria Clemm, saying that he may "have had the cholera, or spasms quite as bad."</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Because Poe was found on the day of an election, it was suggested as early as 1872 that he was the victim of cooping. This was a ballot-box-stuffing scam in which victims were shanghaied, drugged, and used as a pawn to vote for a political party at multiple locations. Cooping had become the standard explanation for Poe's death in most of his biographies for several decades, though his status in Baltimore may have made him too recognizable for this scam to have worked. More recently, credible evidence that Poe's death resulted from rabies has been presented.</strong>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7309919512232918647.post-32277940769265539012012-10-03T14:50:00.000-07:002012-10-03T14:50:00.286-07:00Edgar A. Poe Found Delirious 1849<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
<strong>On September 27, 1849, Poe left Richmond, Virginia, on his way home to New York. No reliable evidence exists about Poe's whereabouts until a week later on October 3, when he was found delirious on the streets of Baltimore, outside Ryan's Tavern (sometimes referred to as Gunner's Hall). A printer named Joseph W. Walker sent a letter requesting help from an acquaintance of Poe, Dr. Joseph E. Snodgrass. His letter reads:</strong><br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">“Dear Sir—There is a gentleman, rather the worse for wear, at Ryan's 4th ward polls, who goes under the cognomen of Edgar A. Poe, and who appears in great distress, and he says he is acquainted with you, and I assure you, he is in need of immediate assistance. </span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: red;">Yours, in haste, Jos. W. Walker”</span></strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Snodgrass later claimed the note said that Poe was "in a state of beastly intoxication," but the original letter proves otherwise.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Snodgrass's first-hand account describes Poe's appearance as "repulsive," with unkempt hair, a haggard, unwashed face and "lusterless and vacant" eyes. His clothing, Snodgrass said, which included a dirty shirt but no vest and unpolished shoes, was worn and did not fit well. Dr. John Joseph Moran, who was Poe's attending physician, gives his own detailed account of Poe's appearance that day: "a stained faded, old bombazine coat, pantaloons of a similar character, a pair of worn-out shoes run down at the heels, and an old straw hat." Poe was never coherent long enough to explain how he came to be in this condition, and it is believed the clothes he was wearing were not his own, not least because wearing shabby clothes was out of character for Poe.</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>Moran cared for Poe at the for-profit Washington College Hospital on Broadway and Fayette Street. He was denied any visitors and was confined in a prison-like room with barred windows in a section of the building reserved for drunk people. Poe is said to have repeatedly called out the name "Reynolds" on the night before his death, though no one has ever been able to identify the person to whom he referred. One possibility is that he was recalling an encounter with Jeremiah N. Reynolds, a newspaper editor and explorer who may have inspired the novel The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket. Another possibility is Henry R. Reynolds, one of the judges overseeing the Fourth Ward Polls at Ryan's Tavern, who may have met Poe on Election Day. Poe may have instead been calling for "Herring," as the author had an uncle-in-law in Baltimore named Henry Herring. In fact, in later testimonies Moran avoided reference to Reynolds but mentioned a visit by a "Misses Herring." He also claimed he attempted to cheer Poe up during one of the few times Poe was awake. When Moran told his patient that he would soon be enjoying the company of friends, Poe allegedly replied that "the best thing his friend could do would be to blow out his brains with a pistol."</strong><br />
<br />
<strong>In Poe's distressed state, he made reference to a wife in Richmond. He may have been hallucinating, thinking that his wife, Virginia, was still alive, or he may have been referring to Sarah Elmira Royster, to whom he had recently proposed. He did not know what had happened to his trunk of belongings which, it transpired, had been left behind at the Swan Tavern in Richmond. Moran reported that Poe's final words were "Lord, help my poor soul" before dying on October 7, 1849.</strong>Poe Forwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17255062395645542233noreply@blogger.com0