Part 1
THE POEMS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
_The Endymion Series_
POEMS BY JOHN KEATS. Illustrated and decorated by Robert Anning Bell. With an Introduction by Professor Walter Raleigh, M.A. Second Edition, revised, with several New Illustrations. Post 8vo. 7_s._ 6_d._ Also a limited Edition on Japanese Vellum (_all sold_).
POEMS BY ROBERT BROWNING. Illustrated and decorated by Byam Shaw. With an Introduction by Richard Garnett, LL.D., C.B. Second Edition. Post 8vo. 7_s._ 6_d._ Also a limited Edition on Japanese Vellum (_all sold_).
ENGLISH LYRICS FROM SPENSER TO MILTON. Illustrated and decorated by R. Anning Bell. With an Introduction by John Dennis. Post 8vo. 6_s._ Also a limited Edition on Japanese Vellum. 21_s._ net.
MILTON’S MINOR POEMS. Illustrated and decorated by Alfred Garth Jones. Post 8vo. 6_s._ Also a limited Edition on Japanese Vellum. 21_s._ net.
THE POEMS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE. Illustrated and decorated by W. Heath Robinson. With an Introduction by Noel Williams. Post 8vo. 6_s._ Also a limited Edition on Japanese Vellum. 21_s._ net.
LONDON: GEORGE BELL & SONS
THE POEMS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
ILLUSTRATED AND DECORATED BY W·HEATH·ROBINSON WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY H·NOEL·WILLIAMS
LONDON: GEORGE BELL & SONS NEW YORK: THE MACMILLAN CO. 1900
CHISWICK PRESS: CHARLES WHITTINGHAM AND CO. TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY LANE, LONDON.
CONTENTS
PAGE
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS xi
INTRODUCTION xv
PREFACE AND DEDICATION TO THE VOLUME OF 1845 xxxiii
POEMS THE RAVEN 3 THE BELLS 13 ULALUME 23 BRIDAL BALLAD 29 LENORE 30 A VALENTINE 34 AN ENIGMA 37 TO HELEN 38 ANNABEL LEE 41 FOR ANNIE 42 TO F——S S. O——D 46 TO —— —— 46 THE CITY IN THE SEA 48 THE CONQUEROR WORM 50 THE SLEEPER 54 THE COLISEUM 57 DREAMLAND 58 EULALIE 62 TO MY MOTHER 63 ELDORADO 64 TO F—— 67 TO ONE IN PARADISE 68 HYMN 71 A DREAM WITHIN A DREAM 72 TO ZANTE 75 THE HAUNTED PALACE 76 SILENCE 82 ISRAFEL 85 TO M. L. S—— 89 THE VALLEY OF UNREST 90
POEMS WRITTEN IN YOUTH
TO HELEN 93 SONNET: TO SCIENCE 94 SPIRITS OF THE DEAD 95 EVENING STAR 96 FAIRYLAND 99 THE LAKE: TO —— 101 A DREAM 102 A PÆAN 103 “THE HAPPIEST DAY” 105 ALONE 106 STANZAS (“In youth I have known one”) 107 TO —— (“The bowers whereat, in dreams, I see”) 110 TO THE RIVER 111 TO —— (“I heed not that my earthly lot”) 111 SONG 112 DREAMS 113 ROMANCE 114 TAMERLANE 115 AL AARAAF 127 NOTES TO AL AARAAF 144
SCENES FROM “POLITIAN” 149
LETTER TO MR. ——: Introduction to Poems (1831) 171
ESSAY ON THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 185
ESSAY ON THE PHILOSOPHY OF COMPOSITION 211
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
FRONTISPIECE: “AL AARAAF.” PAGE
TITLE-PAGE.
CONTENTS (_headpiece_) vii (_Tailpiece_) ix
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS (_headpiece_) xi (_Tailpiece_) xiv
INTRODUCTION (_headpiece_) xv (_Tailpiece_) xxxii
PREFACE AND DEDICATION OF THE VOLUME OF 1845 (_decorated title_) xxxiii
HEADPIECE TO PREFACE xxxv
BORDER TO DEDICATION xxxvii
POEMS (_decorated title_) 1
THE RAVEN (_headpiece_) 3 “THE NIGHT’S PLUTONIAN SHORE” 8, 9
THE BELLS (_decorated title_) 13 (_Headpiece_) 15 “THE SWINGING AND THE RINGING OF THE BELLS” 17 (_Tailpiece_) 20
ULALUME (_frontispiece_) 22 ASTARTE 24 “IN AGONY SOBBED” 25 “IT WAS DOWN BY THE DANK TARN OF AUBER” 27
BRIDAL BALLAD (_headpiece_) 29
LENORE (_headpiece_) 30 LENORE 31
A VALENTINE (_tailpiece_) 34 A VALENTINE 35
AN ENIGMA (_headpiece_) 37
TO HELEN (_headpiece_) 38 (_Tailpiece_) 40
ANNABEL LEE (_headpiece_) 41
FOR ANNIE (_headpiece_) 42 (_Tailpiece_) 45
TO F——S S. O——D (_headpiece_) 46
TO —— —— (_tailpiece_) 47
THE CITY IN THE SEA (_headpiece_) 48 (_Tailpiece_) 50
THE CONQUEROR WORM “WITH ITS PHANTOM CHASED FOR EVERMORE BY A CROWD THAT SEIZE IT NOT” 51 (_Tailpiece_) 53
THE SLEEPER (_headpiece_) 54 “THE LADY SLEEPS” 55 (_Tailpiece_) 56
THE COLISEUM (_headpiece_) 57
“WHERE AN EIDOLON, NAMED NIGHT, ON A BLACK THRONE REIGNS UPRIGHT” 59
EULALIE 62
TO MY MOTHER (_headpiece_) 63
ELDORADO: “HE MET A PILGRIM SHADOW” 64 “IN SEARCH OF ELDORADO” 65
TO F—— (_head- and tailpiece_) 67
TO ONE IN PARADISE 71
HYMN (_head- and tailpiece_) 71
A DREAM WITHIN A DREAM (_headpiece_) 72 “I STAND AMID THE ROAR OF A SURF-TORMENTED SHORE” 73
TO ZANTE (_headpiece_) 75
THE HAUNTED PALACE (_headpiece_) 76 “BUT EVIL THINGS, IN ROBES OF SORROW, ASSAILED THE MONARCH’S HIGH ESTATE” 78, 79 (_Tailpiece_) 81
SILENCE (_head-and tailpiece_) 82 SILENCE 83
ISRAFEL (_headpiece_) 85 ISRAFEL 87
TO M. L. S—— (_headpiece_) 89
THE VALLEY OF UNREST (_headpiece_) 90
POEMS WRITTEN IN YOUTH (_decorated title_) 91
TO HELEN (_decorated border_) 93
SONNET: TO SCIENCE (_headpiece_) 94
SPIRITS OF THE DEAD (_headpiece_) 95
EVENING STAR (_headpiece_) 96 EVENING STAR 97
FAIRYLAND (_headpiece_) 99 (_Tailpiece_) 100
THE LAKE: TO —— (_headpiece_) 101
A DREAM (_headpiece_) 102
A PÆAN (_headpiece_) 103
THE HAPPIEST DAY (_headpiece_) 105
ALONE (_headpiece_) 106 ALONE 107
STANZAS (_headpiece_) 109
TO —— (_headpiece_) 110
TO THE RIVER (_headpiece_) 111
SONG (_head- and tailpiece_) 112
DREAMS (_headpiece_) 113
ROMANCE (_headpiece_) 114
TAMERLANE (_decorated title_) 115 (_Headpiece_) 117 “ON THE MOUNTAIN PEAK ALONE” 121 TIMOUR 126
AL AARAAF (_decorated title_) 127 (_Headpiece to Part I._) 129 “SHE CEASED—AND BURIED THEN HER BURNING CHEEK ABASHED, AMID THE LILIES” 133 (_Headpiece to Part II._) 136 (_Tailpiece_) 143 (_Headpiece to Notes_) 144
Scenes from “Politian” (_decorated title_) 149 (_Headpiece_) 151 “I CANNOT PRAY!— MY SOUL IS AT WAR WITH GOD” 157 (_Tailpiece_) 170
LETTER TO MR. —— (_headpiece_) 173 (_Tailpiece_) 181
THE POETIC PRINCIPLE (_frontispiece_) 184 (_Headpiece_) 185
THE PHILOSOPHY OF COMPOSITION (_headpiece_) 211
FINIS 225
INTRODUCTION
“A lie,” says an American proverb, “will run from Maine to Mexico while Truth is putting on its boots,” and the memories of few celebrated men have been more freely aspersed or more tardily vindicated than has that of Edgar Allan Poe. No sooner was the breath out of his body than his enemies addressed themselves to the congenial task of bespattering his reputation, and continued to do so, unchecked and almost unchallenged, for many years. Amongst other charges so contemptible as to be unworthy of a moment’s consideration, he was held up to public execration as a confirmed inebriate and denounced as a shameless plagiarist. At this distance of time it is hardly necessary to remark that the former charge was a particularly cruel perversion of the truth, while the latter was entirely without foundation. But it is a well-known axiom that, if only a sufficiency of mud is thrown, some of it is sure to stick; and in consequence Poe was for a long time denied that place on the roll of fame to which his remarkable talents, both as a poet and a romancer, fairly entitled him. The present generation, however, has witnessed a signal reaction in his favour. Thanks to the untiring efforts of several prominent men of letters both in his own country and in England, the darker shadows which rested upon his name have been effectually dispersed; the world has gradually come to take a more just view both of his character and his genius; and in this, the closing year of the nineteenth century, we find Poe’s reputation more firmly established than at any time since his untimely death in 1849.
To a right understanding of the works of any author some knowledge of his life is essential, for a man’s writings are always to a greater or less extent the reflection of his character and his surroundings. Of course there are exceptions to this as to other rules. There are authors whose forte lies in describing the passions and the impossibility of controlling them, and who in private life are confirmed misogynists; while there are others, whose most entertaining books have been dictated upon a bed of suffering from which there was little chance of their ever rising again. But Poe was not one of these exceptions: in his writings—and more especially in his poetry—his character is mirrored for all men to behold it.
Naturally of a morbid temperament, Poe’s innate propensity to look upon the dark side of things was strengthened by the circumstances in which he was placed. His life was one of continuous disappointment. He laboured incessantly, and hardly earned enough to keep body and soul together; he was, perhaps, the most original genius of his time, and was accused of pilfering from the work of vastly inferior minds; he was intensely ambitious, and remained a literary hack to the end of his days; he was of a most affectionate disposition, and was compelled to witness the one whom he loved best upon earth in the grip of a cruel and lingering disease, without possessing the means of procuring her the comforts which might have alleviated her sufferings. Knowing all this, can we wonder at the tone of settled melancholy which pervades his poetry—the regret for what might have been, the yearning for what can never be? Here and there, it is true, he strikes a different note, as in “Eulalie” and the charming little lyric “To Helen,” which latter poem, however, was written when he was still a boy; but these variations, like glimpses of blue sky on a dark and lowering horizon, only serve to intensify the general gloom. And yet, in spite of their sadness, there is a pathetic sweetness in his verses, which appeals irresistibly to the heart, and makes the reader fain to admit that in his particular strain Poe is indeed a master.
Born at Boston on January 19th, 1809—the son of one David Poe, a man of good family, who had married an actress and subsequently adopted his wife’s profession—Edgar Allan Poe had the misfortune to lose both his parents in infancy, after which he was adopted by his godfather, Mr. John Allan, a wealthy and childless Richmond merchant, with the intention, it is thought, of making him his heir. The boy was handsome, witty, and precocious, and was petted and indulged by his adopted father to his heart’s content; indeed, it is to the injudicious treatment which he then received that Poe himself ascribes many of the difficulties which beset his path in after life.
When eight years old he was brought to England and placed at a school at Stoke Newington kept by a Dr. Bransby, who is amusingly depicted in “William Wilson,” one of Poe’s finest stories. Here he remained five years, when he returned to America, and after studying until he was seventeen at a Richmond academy, matriculated at the University of Virginia, at Charlottesville. At the University he seems to have acquired some reputation as a scholar; but at the end of his first session a difference of opinion with his godfather in respect of some gambling debts, which the old gentlemen very properly refused to pay, led to an open quarrel, and Poe, instead of returning to Charlottesville, set out for Europe, with the intention of assisting the Greeks, then struggling to free themselves from the intolerable yoke of Turkey. It does not appear, however, that he took any part in the war, nor even beheld, except in his mind’s eye, the remains of “the glory that _was_ Greece.” After wandering about the Continent for a couple of years he returned home, became reconciled to Mr. Allan, and, having expressed a wish to enter the army, was accordingly nominated to a cadetship at West Point. But, alas, the “Imp of the Perverse” was ever at his heels, and in less than twelve months he was cashiered “for various neglects of duty and disobedience of orders.”
The loss of his profession—no great matter in itself, for anyone less fitted for the strict discipline of a military life it would be difficult to imagine—was followed by another and far more serious quarrel with his adopted father, with the result that the young man found himself thrown upon his own resources. He had already published a small volume of poems—those comprised in his last collection as “Poems written in Youth”—which included the delightful stanzas beginning “Helen, thy beauty is to me,” and he now determined to turn to literature for a livelihood. Nothing is known of his career for the next two years; but in 1833 with a tale, “A MS. found in a Bottle,” and a poem, “The Coliseum,” he carried off two prizes offered for competition by a Baltimore newspaper, and having attracted the notice of one of the judges—Mr. John Kennedy, a well-known literary man—he obtained through his influence employment on “The Southern Literary Messenger,” at Richmond.
Henceforth, until his death, Poe was intimately connected with American journalism, and more than one moribund periodical was indebted to his eloquent pen for a fresh lease of life. He was an indefatigable worker, pouring forth poems, essays, stories, and reviews with feverish energy; and, at the same time, so fastidious that he never permitted a manuscript to leave his hands until he was satisfied that he had given the public of his very best. Unfortunately in America in those days literary work was very inadequately remunerated, while copyright was a mere farce; so that even for his finest poems and his most powerful tales Poe never received more than fifty or sixty dollars, and generally very much less, and was in consequence seldom free from pecuniary embarrassment. “The Raven,” which appeared in 1845 in Cotton’s “American Review,” brought him immediate fame, and—ten dollars; and while his poem was being read, and recited, and parodied all over the English-speaking world, the author was actually in want of the common necessaries of life. To add to his troubles, his wife, Virginia Clemm, a beautiful and charming girl whom he had married in 1836, and to whom he was most devotedly attached, had soon after their marriage contracted a fatal malady, and was slowly fading away before his eyes; and his anxiety on her behalf thoroughly unnerved him and weakened his power of self-restraint, never at any time very great. It was this, combined with ill-health and the strain of overwork, which drove him to the use of the stimulants which ultimately proved his ruin; but the statement that he habitually drank to excess was a malicious fabrication. The fact was that poor Poe, in common with many other people of a nervous, highly-strung temperament, was, as one of his most intimate friends assures us, unable to take “even a single glass of wine” with impunity.
Mrs. Poe died in 1847, and in the autumn of the following year Poe became engaged to a widow, named Mrs. Whitman, a lady of considerable literary attainments. This engagement, from which his friends hoped much, was unfortunately soon broken off, for reasons which have never been satisfactorily explained, and on October 7th, 1849, the poet died under painful circumstances at Baltimore.
It is frequently asserted that Poe is a single-poem poet—that he is indebted for the niche he now occupies in the Temple of Song mainly to his wonderful poem “The Raven”; and that if “The Raven” had never been written, Poe would now be remembered merely as a skilful weaver of sensational romances, who wrote passable, if somewhat fantastic, verses in his leisure moments. But those who hold this opinion not only do Poe a grave injustice, but admit themselves incapable of appreciating some of the very finest lyrics in the English language. “The Raven,” it is true, is the poem whose artificial qualities appeal most strongly to the fancy of the general reader, and for this reason, if for no other, is entitled to all due respect from the critic; but remarkable as it undoubtedly is, it is open to question whether, considered purely as a poem, it is quite on the same plane with that masterpiece of imagination “The City in the Sea,” the mystical town where “Death has reared himself a throne,” or with that exquisite lyric “The Sleeper,” in which Poe’s inimitable power as a word-painter rises to such a height that we almost seem to see the beautiful dead woman lying pale and still in her “length of tress” waiting to exchange her death-chamber
“For one more holy, This bed for one more melancholy.”
Again, if neither “The Raven” nor either of the two poems we have just mentioned had been given to the world, such productions as “The Haunted Palace,” “Annabel Lee,” and “To Helen,” to say nothing of “Israfel,” “Ulalume,” and “The Bells,” containing as they do passages of the rarest charm, would surely have sufficed to keep their author’s memory green for all time. What can one possibly desire finer of their kind than those lines from that splendid piece of verbal music, “The Haunted Palace,” which no lover of Poe can resist quoting?—