Poe, Edgar Allen - The Complete Works of Edgar Allen Poe Page 3

  As an example of his style we would refer to one of his tales, "The

  House of Usher," in the first volume of his "Tales of the Grotesque

  and Arabesque." It has a singular charm for us, and we think that no

  one could read it without being strongly moved by its serene and

  sombre beauty. Had its author written nothing else, it would alone

  have been enough to stamp him as a man of genius, and the master of a

  classic style. In this tale occurs, perhaps, the most beautiful of

  his poems.

  The great masters of imagination have seldom resorted to the vague

  and the unreal as sources of effect. They have not used dread and

  horror alone, but only in combination with other qualities, as means

  of subjugating the fancies of their readers. The loftiest muse has

  ever a household and fireside charm about her. Mr. Poe's secret lies

  mainly in the skill with which he has employed the strange

  fascination of mystery and terror. In this his success is so great

  and striking as to deserve the name of art, not artifice. We cannot

  call his materials the noblest or purest, but we must concede to him

  the highest merit of construction.

  As a critic, Mr. Poe was aesthetically deficient. Unerring in his

  analysis of dictions, metres and plots, he seemed wanting in the

  faculty of perceiving the profounder ethics of art. His criticisms

  are, however, distinguished for scientific precision and coherence of

  logic. They have the exactness, and at the same time, the coldness of

  mathematical demonstrations. Yet they stand in strikingly refreshing

  contrast with the vague generalisms and sharp personalities of the

  day. If deficient in warmth, they are also without the heat of

  partisanship. They are especially valuable as illustrating the great

  truth, too generally overlooked, that analytic power is a subordinate

  quality of the critic.

  On the whole, it may be considered certain that Mr. Poe has attained

  an individual eminence in our literature which he will keep. He has

  given proof of power and originality. He has done that which could

  only be done once with success or safety, and the imitation or

  repetition of which would produce weariness.

  ~~~~~~ End of Text ~~~~~~

  ======

  DEATH OF EDGAR A. POE

  BY N. P. WILLIS

  THE ancient fable of two antagonistic spirits imprisoned in one body,

  equally powerful and having the complete mastery by turns-of one man,

  that is to say, inhabited by both a devil and an angel seems to have

  been realized, if all we hear is true, in the character of the

  extraordinary man whose name we have written above. Our own

  impression of the nature of Edgar A. Poe, differs in some important

  degree, however, from that which has been generally conveyed in the

  notices of his death. Let us, before telling what we personally know

  of him, copy a graphic and highly finished portraiture, from the pen

  of Dr. Rufus W. Griswold, which appeared in a recent number of the

  "Tribune:"{*1}

  "Edgar Allen Poe is dead. He died in Baltimore on Sunday, October

  7th. This announcement will startle many, but few will be grieved by

  it. The poet was known, personally or by reputation, in all this

  country; he had readers in England and in several of the states of

  Continental Europe; but he had few or no friends; and the regrets for

  his death will be suggested principally by the consideration that in

  him literary art has lost one of its most brilliant but erratic stars.

  "His conversation was at times almost supramortal in its eloquence.

  His voice was modulated with astonishing skill, and his large and

  variably expressive eyes looked repose or shot fiery tumult into

  theirs who listened, while his own face glowed, or was changeless in

  pallor, as his imagination quickened his blood or drew it back frozen

  to his heart. His imagery was from the worlds which no mortals can

  see but with the vision of genius. Suddenly starting from a

  proposition, exactly and sharply defined, in terms of utmost

  simplicity and clearness, he rejected the forms of customary logic,

  and by a crystalline process of accretion, built up his ocular

  demonstrations in forms of gloomiest and ghastliest grandeur, or in

  those of the most airy and delicious beauty, so minutely and

  distinctly, yet so rapidly, that the attention which was yielded to

  him was chained till it stood among his wonderful creations, till he

  himself dissolved the spell, and brought his hearers back to common

  and base existence, by vulgar fancies or exhibitions of the ignoblest

  passion.

  "He was at all times a dreamer-dwelling in ideal realms-in heaven or

  hell-peopled with the creatures and the accidents of his brain. He

  walked-the streets, in madness or melancholy, with lips moving in

  indistinct curses, or with eyes upturned in passionate prayer (never

  for himself, for he felt, or professed to feel, that he was already

  damned, but) for their happiness who at the moment were objects of

  his idolatry; or with his glances introverted to a heart gnawed with

  anguish, and with a face shrouded in gloom, he would brave the

  wildest storms, and all night, with drenched garments and arms

  beating the winds and rains, would speak as if the spirits that at

  such times only could be evoked by him from the Aidenn, close by

  whose portals his disturbed soul sought to forget the ills to which

  his constitution subjected him---close by the Aidenn where were those

  he loved-the Aidenn which he might never see, but in fitful glimpses,

  as its gates opened to receive the less fiery and more happy natures

  whose destiny to sin did not involve the doom of death.

  "He seemed, except when some fitful pursuit subjugated his will and

  engrossed his faculties, always to bear the memory of some

  controlling sorrow. The remarkable poem of 'The Raven' was probably

  much more nearly than has been supposed, even by those who were very

  intimate with him, a reflection and an echo of his own history. _He

  _was that bird's

  " ' unhappy master whom unmerciful Disaster

  Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore--

  Till the dirges of his Hope that melancholy burden bore

  Of 'Never-never more.'

  "Every genuine author in a greater or less degree leaves in his

  works, whatever their design, traces of his personal character:

  elements of his immortal being, in which the individual survives the

  person. While we read the pages of the 'Fall of the House of Usher,'

  or of 'Mesmeric Revelations,' we see in the solemn and stately gloom

  which invests one, and in the subtle metaphysical analysis of both,

  indications of the idiosyncrasies of what was most remarkable and

  peculiar in the author's intellectual nature. But we see here only

  the better phases of his nature, only the symbols of his juster

  action, for his harsh experience had deprived him of all faith in man

  or woman. He had made up his mind upon the numberless complexities of

  the social world, and the whole system with him was an imposture.

  This conviction gave a
direction to his shrewd and naturally

  unamiable character. Still, though he regarded society as composed

  altogether of villains, the sharpness of his intellect was not of

  that kind which enabled him to cope with villany, while it

  continually caused him by overshots to fail of the success of

  honesty. He was in many respects like Francis Vivian in Bulwer's

  novel of 'The Caxtons.' Passion, in him, comprehended -many of the

  worst emotions which militate against human happiness. You could not

  contradict him, but you raised quick choler; you could not speak of

  wealth, but his cheek paled with gnawing envy. The astonishing

  natural advantages of this poor boy--his beauty, his readiness, the

  daring spirit that breathed around him like a fiery atmosphere--had

  raised his constitutional self-confidence into an arrogance that

  turned his very claims to admiration into prejudices against him.

  Irascible, envious--bad enough, but not the worst, for these salient

  angles were all varnished over with a cold, repellant cynicism, his

  passions vented themselves in sneers. There seemed to him no moral

  susceptibility; and, what was more remarkable in a proud nature,

  little or nothing of the true point of honor. He had, to a morbid

  excess, that, desire to rise which is vulgarly called ambition, but

  no wish for the esteem or the love of his species; only the hard wish

  to succeed-not shine, not serve -succeed, that he might have the

  right to despise a world which galled his self-conceit.

  "We have suggested the influence of his aims and vicissitudes upon

  his literature. It was more conspicuous in his later than in his

  earlier writings. Nearly all that he wrote in the last two or three

  years-including much of his best poetry-was in some sense

  biographical; in draperies of his imagination, those who had taken

  the trouble to trace his steps, could perceive, but slightly

  concealed, the figure of himself."

  Apropos of the disparaging portion of the above well-written sketch,

  let us truthfully say:

  Some four or five years since, when editing a daily paper in this

  city, Mr. Poe was employed by us, for several months, as critic and

  sub-editor. This was our first personal acquaintance with him. He

  resided with his wife and mother at Fordham, a few miles out of town,

  but was at his desk in the office, from nine in the morning till the

  evening paper went to press. With the highest admiration for his

  genius, and a willingness to let it atone for more than ordinary

  irregularity, we were led by common report to expect a very

  capricious attention to his duties, and occasionally a scene of

  violence and difficulty. Time went on, however, and he was invariably

  punctual and industrious. With his pale, beautiful, and intellectual

  face, as a reminder of what genius was in him, it was impossible, of

  course, not to treat him always with deferential courtesy, and, to

  our occasional request that he would not probe too deep in a

  criticism, or that he would erase a passage colored too highly with

  his resentments against society and mankind, he readily and

  courteously assented-far more yielding than most men, we thought, on

  points so excusably sensitive. With a prospect of taking the lead in

  another periodical, he, at last, voluntarily gave up his employment

  with us, and, through all this considerable period, we had seen but

  one presentment of the man-a quiet, patient, industrious, and most

  gentlemanly person, commanding the utmost respect and good feeling by

  his unvarying deportment and ability.

  Residing as he did in the country, we never met Mr. Poe in hours of

  leisure; but he frequently called on us afterward at our place of

  business, and we met him often in the street-invariably the same sad

  mannered, winning and refined gentleman , such as we had always known

  him. It was by rumor only, up to the day of his death, that we knew

  of any other development of manner or character. We heard, from one

  who knew him well (what should be stated in all mention of his

  lamentable irregularities), that, with a single glass of wine, his

  whole nature was reversed, the demon became uppermost, and, though

  none of the usual signs of intoxication were visible, his will was

  palpably insane. Possessing his reasoning faculties in excited

  activity, at such times, and seeking his acquaintances with his

  wonted look and memory, he easily seemed personating only another

  phase of his natural character, and was accused, accordingly, of

  insulting arrogance and bad-heartedness. In this reversed character,

  we repeat, it was never our chance to see him. We know it from

  hearsay, and we mention it in connection with this sad infirmity of

  physical constitution; which puts it upon very nearly the ground of a

  temporary and almost irresponsible insanity.

  The arrogance, vanity, and depravity of heart, of which Mr. Poe was

  generally accused, seem to us referable altogether to this reversed

  phase of his character. Under that degree of intoxication which only

  acted upon him by demonizing his sense of truth and right, he

  doubtless said and did much that was wholly irreconcilable with his

  better nature; but, when himself, and as we knew him only, his

  modesty and unaffected humility, as to his own deservings, were a

  constant charm to his character. His letters, of which the constant

  application for autographs has taken from us, we are sorry to

  confess, the greater portion, exhibited this quality very strongly.

  In one of the carelessly written notes of which we chance still to

  retain possession, for instance, he speaks of "The Raven"--that

  extraordinary poem which electrified the world of imaginative

  readers, and has become the type of a school of poetry of its

  own-and, in evident earnest, attributes its success to the few words

  of commendation with which we had prefaced it in this paper. -It will

  throw light on his sane character to give a literal copy of the note:

  "FORDHAM, April 20, 1849

  "My DEAR WILLIS--The poem which I inclose, and which I am so vain as

  to hope you will like, in some respects, has been just published in a

  paper for which sheer necessity compels me to write, now and then. It

  pays well as times go-but unquestionably it ought to pay ten prices;

  for whatever I send it I feel I am consigning to the tomb of the

  Capulets. The verses accompanying this, may I beg you to take out of

  the tomb, and bring them to light in the 'Home journal?' If you can

  oblige me so far as to copy them, I do not think it will be necessary

  to say 'From the ----, that would be too bad; and, perhaps, 'From a

  late ---- paper,' would do.

  "I have not forgotten how a 'good word in season' from you made 'The

  Raven,' and made 'Ulalume' (which by-the-way, people have done me the

  honor of attributing to you), therefore, I would ask you (if I dared)

  to say something of these lines if they please you.

  "Truly yours ever,

  "EDGAR A. POE."

  In double proof of his earnest disposition to do the best for

  himself, and of the tru
stful and grateful nature which has been

  denied him, we give another of the only three of his notes which we

  chance to retain :

  "FORDHAM, January 22, 1848.

  "My DEAR MR. WILLiS-I am about to make an effort at re-establishing

  myself in the literary world, and _feel _that I may depend upon your

  aid.

  "My general aim is to start a Magazine, to be called 'The Stylus,'

  but it would be useless to me, even when established, if not entirely

  out of the control of a publisher. I mean, therefore, to get up a

  journal which shall be _my own_ at all points. With this end in view,

  I must get a list of at least five hundred subscribers to begin with;

  nearly two hundred I have already. I propose, however, to go South

  and West, among my personal and literary friends--old college and

  West Point acquaintances -and see what I can do. In order to get the

  means of taking the first step, I propose to lecture at the Society

  Library, on Thursday, the 3d of February, and, that there may be no

  cause of _squabbling_, my subject shall _not be literary _at all. I

  have chosen a broad text: 'The Universe.'

  "Having thus given you _the facts _of the case, I leave all the rest

  to the suggestions of your own tact and generosity. Gratefully, _most

  gratefully,

  _"Your friend always,

  "EDGAR A. POE.''

  Brief and chance-taken as these letters are, we think they

  sufficiently prove the existence of the very qualities denied to Mr.

  Poe-humility, willingness to persevere, belief in another's

  friendship, and capability of cordial and grateful friendship! Such

  he assuredly was when sane. Such only he has invariably seemed to us,

  in all we have happened personally to know of him, through a

  friendship of five or six years. And so much easier is it to believe

  what we have seen and known, than what we hear of only, that we