Every reader has his or her own take on the poet, some colored by his stormy life, some by his work. Andrew Taylor’s The American Boy shows an inquisitive boy, the Poe who excelled as a student at Stoke Newington, the English prep school where he studied for five years. For Taylor, Poe is a detective manqué, as if Dupin emerged from the writer’s own experiences. Taylor’s Poe is a quick-witted, attractive youth whose presence in the novel helps unravel its Gothic mysteries.
Louis Bayard presents us with an eccentric, mystic young man: The Pale Blue Eye is set during Poe’s few months as a West Point cadet. Bayard’s Poe is obsessed with death, and Bayard's poetic voice is shaped by an unfortunate love affair with the daughter of the Point’s doctor. The madness of the doctor's whole family is macabre in the extreme, and the denouement in the Academy’s icehouse is a staggering episode.
If Poe left the Point in disgrace, it wasn’t too serious—cadets and officers pooled their money to subscribe to his second collection of poems. And he’s still something of a romantic hero at West Point: the cadets love his poetry, and apocryphal tales of his exploits are popular, including the legend that he appeared on parade naked except for his sashes.
For Toni Morrison, it is the issue of color and race that matters in Poe. In Playing in the Dark, Morrison writes:
No early American writer is more important to the concept of American Africanism than Poe. And no image is more telling than [the one at the end of The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket]: the visualized but somehow…unknowable white form that rises from the mists…. The images of the white curtain and the “shrouded human figure” with skin “the perfect whiteness of the snow” occur after the narrative has encountered blackness…. Both are figurations of impenetrable whiteness that surface in American literature whenever an Africanist presence is engaged…. These images of impenetrable whiteness…appear almost always…with representations of black or Africanist people who are dead [or] impotent.1.
Poe lived a chunk of his life in the slaveholding South; at one point, although he wasn’t wealthy, he was in a position to sell a slave. I might read the images of whiteness somewhat differently than Morrison, but not the difficult, demeaning treatment of darkness. I cannot bear to read Poe’s depictions of Negroes, who always speak in the stereotypic language of the obsequious slave and who feel fulfilled in their service of the white master—as Jupiter does in “The Gold-Bug.” Despite his manumission, Jupiter could not be induced by “threats nor promises, to abandon what he considered his right of attendance upon the footsteps of his young ‘Massa Will.’”
Of all the literary and critical responses to Poe—including the critiques of his substance abuse—the one I find most compelling is Argento’s Voyage of Edgar Allan Poe. This opera, composed for the U.S. bicentennial, is an emotional account of Poe’s voyage from Philadelphia to Baltimore, where he died in the kind of mystery that invites conspiracy theories. Argento has a sort of psychological courtroom battle over Poe, with Dupin conducting the defense and Poe’s nemesis, the critic Griswold, attacking Poe for using the events of his own turbulent life as the basis for his creative work. The staging, with its insistent themes of blood, the intertwining of “The Masque of the Red Death,” which alludes to the deaths of Poe’s mother, foster mother, and bride from consumption, is shocking and compelling.
The blood-drenched Poe, the racially charged Poe, the analytic, the poetic—all are aspects of this complicated writer; none explains him fully. When I read Poe, what makes his stories terrifying is a sense of helplessness. I imagine him suffocating—almost literally, in the alcohol he consumed and the blood he saw his consumptive mother cough up—as well as figuratively. His father abandoned him, his foster father never accepted him and ultimately cast him off, his mother died when he was two.
Most children blame themselves for abandonments like these, and in Poe’s fiction it’s the narrator who is almost always the perpetrator when evil deeds are done: “The Black Cat,” “The Education of William Wilson,” “The Tell-Tale Heart,” “The Cask of Amontillado”—all have a narrator who is a knave or a madman. In “The Black Cat,” the narrator goes out of his way to explain how vile he is, torturing the animals who have loved him, degrading himself with drink, beating his wife, and finally driving an ax into her brain.
Of course, my response is as partial as Bayard’s or Argento’s. I can’t imagine trying to make such a difficult figure the subject of a novel or a story. In general, I’m uneasy with using real figures as players in a novel—highlighting one facet means overlooking others. Still, with Poe, I can understand the temptation to do so. The opium, the alcohol, the love affairs; the slave owner, the gambler, the writer—not even the masterful Stephen King could have invented such a complex character.
Edgar Allan Poe’s father’s name was David; Sara Paretsky’s father’s name was David. Both their last names begin with the letter “P.” Poe’s and Paretsky’s mothers were both accomplished actresses. Poe died in Baltimore. Paretsky gave birth to Sisters in Crime in Baltimore. Baltimore is in Maryland, abbreviated “MD.” Paretsky’s grandfather was an MD. Poe created Dupin, the earliest male private investigator; Paretsky created V. I. Warshawski, one of the earliest female PIs. Poe was not a drug addict; neither is Paretsky. Coincidence? Hard to believe. Paretsky is clearly a reincarnation of the master of noir. Or perhaps his great-great-great-granddaughter. Or an imposter.
The Raven
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore—
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
“’Tis some visitor,” I muttered, “tapping at my chamber door—
Only this and nothing more.”
Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December;
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow;—vainly I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow—sorrow for the lost Lenore—
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore—Nameless here for evermore.
And the silken, sad, uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me—filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating,
“’Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door—
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door;—This it is and nothing more.”
Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,
“Sir,” said I, “or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore;
But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,
And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,
That I scarce was sure I heard you”—here I opened wide the door;—
Darkness there and nothing more.
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortals ever dared to dream before;
But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token, And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, “Lenore?”
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, “Lenore!”
Merely this and nothing more.
Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning, Soon again I heard a tapping something louder than before. “Surely,” said I, “surely that is something at my window lattice;
Let me see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore—Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore;—
’Tis the wind and nothing more!”
Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter, In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly days of yore; Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped
or stayed he; But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door—Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door—
Perched, and sat, and nothing more.
Then the ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,
“Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,” I said, “art sure no craven,
Ghastly grim and ancient Raven wandering from the Nightly shore—
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night’s Plutonian shore!”
Quoth the Raven, “Nevermore.”
Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly, Though its answer little meaning—little relevancy bore; For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door—Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber door,
With such name as “Nevermore.”
But the Raven, sitting lonely on that placid bust, spoke only That one word, as if its soul in that one word he did outpour. Nothing farther then he uttered—not a feather then he fluttered—
Till I scarcely more than muttered: “Other friends have flown before—
On the morrow he will leave me, as my Hopes have flown before.” Then the bird said “Nevermore.”
Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken, “Doubtless,” said I, “what it utters is its only stock and store Caught from some 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—nevermore.’”
But the Raven still beguiling my sad fancy into smiling, Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird and bust and door;
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore—
What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore Meant in croaking “Nevermore.”
This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom’s core; This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining On the cushion’s velvet lining that the lamp-light gloated o’er,
But whose velvet-violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o’er She shall press, ah, nevermore!
Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer
Swung by seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor. “Wretch,” I cried, “thy God hath lent thee—by these angels he hath sent thee
Respite—respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore;
Quaff, oh, quaff this kind nepenthe and forget this lost Lenore!” Quoth the Raven, “Nevermore.”
“Prophet!” said I, “thing of evil!—prophet still, if bird or devil!—Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,
Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted—On this home by Horror haunted—tell me truly, I implore—Is there—is there balm in Gilead?—tell me—tell me, I implore!” Quoth the Raven, “Nevermore.”
“Prophet!” said I, “thing of evil!—prophet still, if bird or devil! By that Heaven that bends above us—by that God we both adore—
Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn, It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore—Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore.” Quoth the Raven, “Nevermore.”
“Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!” I shrieked, upstarting—
“Get thee back into the tempest and the Night’s Plutonian shore!
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken! Leave my loneliness unbroken!—quit the bust above my door! Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!”
Quoth the Raven, “Nevermore.”
And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon’s that is dreaming, And the lamp-light o’er him streaming throws his shadows on the floor;
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor Shall be lifted—nevermore!
Rantin’ and Ravin’
BY JOSEPH WAMBAUGH
Once upon a twilight teary, while I mourned so blitzed and bleary,
O’er my script which got demolished by a showbiz bloody bore,
Suddenly there came a dinging—“You’ve got mail!”—an e-mail singing,
Much annoyed with ears a-ringing, I decided to ignore,
And swilled another mug of suds, permeating every pore. “’Tis only spam,” I muttered then. This and nothing more.
Presently with breath a-reeking, I chose to do some e-mail peeking,
Which rained on me a host of doubts that pierced me to the core.
For Michael wanted “ruminations,” and that filled me with trepidation,
He wished for thoughts about a scribe from golden days of yore. A testimonial to this titan? But I had demons I was fightin’. At least two hundred words, he urged. This and nothing more.
Now I felt my stomach burning, the hops and malts inside me churning,
As I remembered childhood learning, and volumes I’d explored. Then my guilt it overtook me, Mike’s insistent plea, it shook me, The e-mail I should have deleted could now not be ignored. I thought somehow I must comply, for Poe who’s on a throne so high, Deserves much thanks from such as I, and others gone before.
Thus I set off plodding, spurred by Michael’s “gentle prodding,” Hoping I could yet discover sentiments that soar. I imagined many noble words, and thought I glimpsed a great black bird,
Whose unforgiving glower drove me to an icy shower, To find within the power and draw temperance to the fore. Alas, the water only froze me and made my bald spot sore.
This I say to Michael C., I ask that you envision me, A forlorn wretch no longer musing, in his cups from all the boozing,
Who shall soon be mute and snoozing upon the study floor. Before that swoon I swear to you, I’ll quaff another brew or two, In honor of courageous Poe, who threw open every door. But I won’t open “gentle” e-mails. Not now, and NEVERMORE!
Joseph Wambaugh, a former LAPD detective sergeant, is the New York Times best-selling author of The Onion Field, The Blooding, The Choirboys, and many other fiction and nonfiction works. He has won a number of awards, including the Edgar Award and the Rodolfo Walsh Prize for investigative journalism. He lives with his wife in California.
A Little Thought on Poe
BY THOMAS H. COOK
I was once asked what one-word description of a book would most likely cause me to read it. Without a blink, I answered, “Haunting.” Why? Because I have found to my surprise that although people will often describe a book as “great,” they will, upon further questioning, be wholly unable to recall a single line or scene or even the basic plot of a book that, though evidently “great,” proved to be not in the least memorable. It is just the opposite with Poe, whose greatness, it seems to me, resides in the fact that his readers actually remember him. In poem after poem and story after story, we remember Poe. We remember that “when I was a child and she was a child,” these two children lived “in a kingdom by the sea.” We remember the Raven’s bleak warning that in the end everything dissolves into the oblivion of “Nevermore.” We remember the beating of a tell-tale heart and “the moaning and the groaning” of the bells. To remember a writer in this way is to be haunted by him, to have his words and scenes and characters forever alive in your mind. That is what true literary greatness is, and it is a greatness that was Poe’s.
Thomas H. Cook is arguably America’s shortest male crime writer. Utterly lacking in tough-guy characteristics, he remains the mystery world’s most consistent no-show at sporting events, car races, horse races, and urban marathons. He has never painted his face in anticipation of the Super Bowl and is alle
rgic to beer. His only experience with law enforcement was being pulled over for speeding, at which time he was given only a warning. As a boy, he wanted to be a great writer; then he read some great writers and decided he was nowhere near that good. Since then, he has churned out more than twenty novels and a smattering of nonfiction. He likes writing short stories because they’re short, and he does not like writing long books because they’re long. He has never read Remembrance of Things Past, though on the street he is often mistaken for Marcel Proust.
The Bells
I
Hear the sledges with the bells—
Silver bells!
What a world of merriment their melody foretells!
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,
In the icy air of night!
While the stars that oversprinkle
All the heavens, seem to twinkle
With a crystalline delight;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells
From the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells—
From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.