Poe's first literary ventures were in verse. The early volumes,
showing strongly the influence of Byron and Moore, were productions of
small merit but large promise. Their author was soon to become one of
the most original of poets, his later work being unique, with a
strangely individual, "Poe" atmosphere that no other writer has ever
been able successfully to imitate. His verse is individual in theme,
treatment, and structure, all of which harmonize with his conscious
theory of poetic art. His theory is briefly this: It is not the
function of poetry to teach either truth or morals, but to gratify
through novel forms "the thirst for supernal beauty"; its proper
effect is to "excite, by elevating, the soul." The highest beauty has
always some admixture of sadness, the most poetical of all themes
being the death of a beautiful woman. Moreover, the pleasure derived
from the contemplation of this higher beauty should be indefinite;
that is, true poetic feeling is not the result of coherent narrative
or clear pictures or fine moral sentiment, but consists in vague,
exalted emotion. Music, of all the arts, produces the vaguest and most
"indefinite" pleasure; consequently verse forms should be chosen with
the greatest possible attention to musical effect. Poetry must be
purely a matter of feeling. "Its sole arbiter is Taste. With the
Intellect or with the Conscience it has only collateral relations."
This explanation is necessary, because the stock criticism of Poe's
poetry condemns it as vague, indefinite, and devoid of thought or
ethical content. These are precisely its limitations, but hardly its
faults, since the poet attained with marvelous art the very effects he
desired. The themes of nearly all the poems are death, ruin, regret,
or failure; the verse is original in form, and among the most musical
in the language, full of a haunting, almost magical melody. Mystery,
symbolism, shadowy suggestion, fugitive thought, elusive beauty,
beings that are mere insubstantial abstractions--these are the
characteristics, but designedly so, of Poe's poetry. A poem to him was
simply a crystallized mood, and it is futile for his readers to apply
any other test. Yet the influence of this verse has been wide and
important, extending to most lyric poets of the last half-century,
including such masters as Rossetti and Swinburne.
"To Helen," a poem of three brief stanzas, is Poe's first really
notable production; it is an exquisite tribute of his reverent
devotion to his boyhood friend, Mrs. Stannard, portraying her as a
classic embodiment of beauty. "Israfel" is a lyric of aspiration of
rare power and rapture, worthy of Shelley, and is withal the most
spontaneous, simple, and genuinely human poem Poe ever wrote. "The
Haunted Palace," one of the finest of his poems, is an unequaled
allegory of the wreck and ruin of sovereign reason, which to be fully
appreciated should be read in its somber setting, "The Fall of the
House of Usher." Less attractive is "The Conqueror Worm," with its
repulsive imagery, but this "tragedy 'Man,'" with the universe as a
theater, moving to the "music of the spheres," and "horror the soul of
the plot," is undeniably powerful and intensely terrible.
"The Raven," published in 1845, attained immediately a world-wide
celebrity, and rivals in fame and popularity any lyric ever written.
It is the most elaborate treatment of Poe's favorite theme, the death
of a beautiful woman. The reveries of a bereaved lover, alone in his
library at midnight in "the bleak December," vainly seeking to forget
his sorrow for the "lost Lenore," are interrupted by a tapping, as of
some one desirous to enter. After a time, he admits a "stately raven"
and seeks to beguile his sad fancy by putting questions to the bird,
whose one reply is "Nevermore," and this constitutes the refrain of
the poem. Impelled by an instinct of self-torture, the lover asks
whether he shall have "respite" from the painful memories of "Lenore,"
here or hereafter, and finally whether in the "distant Aidenn" he and
his love shall be reunited; to all of which the raven returns his one
answer. Driven to frenzy, the lover implores the bird, "Take thy beak
from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door," only to learn
that the shadow will be lifted "nevermore." The raven is, in the
poet's own words, "emblematical of Mournful and Never-Ending
Remembrance."
"Ulalume" has been commonly (though not always) regarded as a mere
experiment in verbal ingenuity, meaningless melody, or "the insanity
of versification," as a distinguished American critic has called
it. Such a judgment is a mark of inability to understand Poe's most
characteristic work, for in truth "Ulalume" is the extreme expression
at once of his critical theory and of his peculiar genius as a
poet. It was published in December of the same year in which Virginia
died in January. The poet's condition has already been described;
"Ulalume" is a marvelous expression of his mood at this time. It
depicts a soul worn out by long suffering, groping for courage and
hope, only to return again to "the door of a legended tomb." It is
true the movement is slow, impeded by the frequent repetitions, but so
the wearied mind, after nervous exhaustion, is "palsied and sere."
There is no appeal to the intellect, but this is characteristic of Poe
and appropriate to a mind numbed by protracted suffering. It is this
mood of wearied, benumbed, discouraged, hopeless hope, feebly seeking
for the "Lethean peace of the skies" only to find the mind inevitably
reverting to the "lost Ulalume," that finds expression. There is no
definite thought, because only the communication of feeling is
intended; there is no distinct setting, because the whole action is
spiritual; "the dim lake" and "dark tarn of Auber," "the ghoul-haunted
woodland of Weir," "the alley Titanic of cypress," are the
grief-stricken and fear-haunted places of the poet's own darkened
mind, while the ashen skies of "the lonesome October" are significant
enough of this "most immemorial year." The poem is a monody of
nerveless, exhausted grief. As such it must be read to be appreciated,
as such it must be judged, and so appreciated and so judged it is
absolutely unique and incomparable.
About a year later came "The Bells," wonderful for the music of its
verse, and the finest onomatopoetic poem in the language. Two days
after Poe's death appeared "Annabel Lee," a simple, sincere, and
beautiful ballad, a tribute to his dead wife. Last of all was printed
the brief "Eldorado," a fitting death-song for Poe, in which a gallant
knight sets out, "singing a song," "in search of Eldorado," only to
learn when youth and strength are gone that he must seek his goal
"down the Valley of the Shadow."
The tales, like the poems, are a real contribution to the world's
literature, but more strikingly so, since the type itself is
original. Poe, Hawthorne, and Irving are distinctly the pioneers in
the production of the modern short story, and neither has been
surpassed on his own ground; but Poe has been vastly the greater
influence in foreign countries, especially in France. Poe formed a new
conception of the short story, one which Professor Brander Matthews[1]
has treated formally and explicitly as a distinct literary form,
different from the story that is merely short. Without calling it a
distinct form, Poe implied the idea in a review of Hawthorne's
"Twice-Told Tales":
[Footnote 1: "The Philosophy of the Short-Story," Chapter IV of "Pen
and Ink."]
The ordinary novel is objectionable from its length.... As it cannot
be read at one sitting, it deprives itself, of course, of the immense
force derivable from _totality_.... In the brief tale, however,
the author is enabled to carry out the fulness of his intention, be it
what it may. During the hour of perusal, the soul of the reader is at
the writer's control....
A skillful literary artist has constructed a tale. If wise, he has not
fashioned his thoughts to accommodate his incidents; but having
conceived with deliberate care a certain unique or single
_effect_ to be wrought out, he then invents such incidents--he
then combines such events as may best aid him in establishing this
preconceived effect. If his very initial sentence tend not to the
out-bringing of this effect, then he has failed in his first step. In
the whole composition there should be no word written, of which the
tendency, direct or indirect, is not to the one preëstablished design.
This idea of a short story should be kept in mind in reading Poe's
works, for he applied his theory perfectly.
The stories are of greater variety than the poems. There are romances
of death whose themes are fear, horror, madness, catalepsy, premature
burial, torture, mesmerism, and revengeful cruelty; tales of weird
beauty; allegories of conscience; narratives of pseudo-science;
stories of analytical reasoning; descriptions of beautiful landscapes;
and what are usually termed "prose poems." He also wrote tales
grotesque, humorous, and satirical, most of which are failures. The
earlier tales are predominantly imaginative and emotional; most of the
later ones are predominantly intellectual. None of the tales touches
ordinary, healthy life; there is scarcely a suggestion of local color;
the humor is nearly always mechanical; there is little conversation
and the characters are never normal human beings. Although the stories
are strongly romantic in subject, plot, and setting, there is an
extraordinary realism in treatment, a minuteness and accuracy of
detail equaling the work of Defoe. This is one secret of the magical
art that not only transports us to the world of dream and vision where
the author's own soul roamed, but for the time makes it all real to
us.
Poe's finest tale, as a work of art, is "The Fall of the House of
Usher," which is as nearly perfect in its craftsmanship as human work
may be. It is a romance of death with a setting of profound gloom, and
is wrought out as a highly imaginative study in fear--a symphony in
which every touch blends into a perfect unity of effect. "Ligeia,"
perhaps standing next, incorporating "The Conqueror Worm" as its
keynote, portrays the terrific struggle of a woman's will against
death. "The Masque of the Red Death," a tale of the Spirit of
Pestilence and of Death victorious over human selfishness and power,
is a splendid study in somber color. "The Assignation," a romance of
Venice, is also splendid in coloring and rich in decorative effects,
presenting a luxury of sorrow culminating in romantic suicide.
"William Wilson" is an allegory of conscience personified in a double,
the forerunner of Stevenson's "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde." Other
conscience stories are "The Man of the Crowd"; "The Tell-Tale Heart,"
also depicting insanity; and "The Black Cat," of which the atmosphere
is horror. "The Adventures of One Hans Pfaal" and "The Balloon Hoax"
are examples of the pseudo-scientific tales, which attain their
verisimilitude by diverting attention from the improbability or
impossibility of the general incidents to the accuracy and naturalness
of details. In "The Descent into the Maëlstrom," scientific reasoning
is skillfully blended with imaginative strength, poetic description,
and stirring adventure. This type of story is clearly enough the
original of those of Jules Verne and similar writers. "The Murders in
the Rue Morgue" and "The Purloined Letter" are the pioneer detective
stories, Dupin the original Sherlock Holmes, and they remain the best
of their kind, unsurpassed in originality, ingenuity, and
plausibility. Another type of the story of analytical reasoning is
"The Gold-Bug," built around the solution of a cryptogram, but also
introducing an element of adventure. Poe's analytical power was real,
not a trick. If he made Legrand solve the cryptogram and boast his
ability to solve others more difficult, Poe himself solved scores sent
him in response to a public magazine challenge; if Dupin solved
mysteries that Poe invented for him, Poe himself wrote in "Marie
Roget," from newspaper accounts, the solution of a real murder
mystery, and astounded Dickens by outlining the entire plot of
"Barnaby Rudge" when only a few of the first chapters had been
published; if he wrote imaginatively of science, he in fact
demonstrated in "Maelzel's Chess Player" that a pretended automaton
was operated by a man. "Hop Frog" and "The Cask of Amontillado" are
old-world stories of revenge. "The Island of the Fay" and "The Domain
of Arnheim" are landscape studies, the one of calm loveliness, the
other of Oriental profusion and coloring. "Shadow" and "Silence" are
commonly classed as "prose poems," the former being one of Poe's most
effective productions. "Eleonora," besides having a story to tell, is
both a prose poem and a landscape study, and withal one of Poe's most
exquisite writings.
Although Poe was not a great critic, his critical work is by no means
valueless. He applied for the first time in America a thoroughgoing
scrutiny and able, fearless criticism to contemporary literature,
undoubtedly with good effect. His attacks on didacticism were
especially valuable. His strength as a critic lay in his artistic
temperament and in the incisive intellect that enabled him to analyze
the effects produced in his own creations and in those of others. His
weaknesses were extravagance; a mania for harping on plagiarism; lack
of spiritual insight, broad sympathies, and profound scholarship; and,
in general, the narrow range of his genius, which has already been
made sufficiently clear. His severity has been exaggerated, as he
often praised highly, probably erring more frequently by undue
laudation than by extreme severity. Though personal prejudice
sometimes crept into his work, especially in favor of women, yet on
the whole he was as fair and fearless as he claimed to be. Much of the
hasty, journalistic hack work is valueless, as might be expected, but
he wrote very suggestively of his art, and nearly all his judgments
have been sustained. Moreover, he met one supreme test of a critic in
recognizing unknown genius: Dickens he was among the first to appraise
as a great novelist; Tennyson and Elizabeth Barrett (Browning) he
ranked among the great poets without hesitation; and at home he early
expressed a due appreciation of Hawthorne, Lowell, Longfellow, and
Bryant.
Poe's place, both in prose and poetry, is assured. His recognition
abroad has been clear and emphatic from the first, especially in
France, and to-day foreigners generally regard him as the greatest
writer we have produced, an opinion in which a number of our own
critics and readers concur. One's judgment in the matter will depend
upon the point of view and the standards adopted; it is too large a
subject to consider here, but if artistic craftsmanship be the
standard, certainly Hawthorne would be his only rival, and Hawthorne
was not also a poet. The question of exact relative rank, however, it
is neither possible nor important to settle. It is sufficient to say,
in the words of Professor Woodberry, "On the roll of our literature
Poe's name is inscribed among the few foremost, and in the world at
large his genius is established as valid among all men."