



The Works of Edgar Allan Poe

by Edgar Allan Poe

The Raven Edition


Contents

 PREFACE
 LIFE OF POE
 DEATH OF POE
 THE UNPARALLELED ADVENTURES OF ONE HANS PFAALL
 THE GOLD-BUG
 FOUR BEASTS IN ONE—THE HOMO-CAMELEOPARD
 THE MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE
 THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET. (*1)
 THE BALLOON-HOAX
 MS. FOUND IN A BOTTLE
 THE OVAL PORTRAIT




EDGAR ALLAN POE
AN APPRECIATION

   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—never more!”

      This stanza from “The Raven” was recommended by James Russell
      Lowell as an inscription upon the Baltimore monument which marks
      the resting place of Edgar Allan Poe, the most interesting and
      original figure in American letters. And, to signify that
      peculiar musical quality of Poe’s genius which inthralls every
      reader, Mr. Lowell suggested this additional verse, from the
      “Haunted Palace”:

   And all with pearl and ruby glowing
    Was the fair palace door,
   Through which came flowing, flowing, flowing,
    And sparkling ever more,
   A troop of Echoes, whose sweet duty
    Was but to sing,
   In voices of surpassing beauty,
    The wit and wisdom of their king. Born in poverty at Boston, January 19, 1809, dying under painful
      circumstances at Baltimore, October 7, 1849, his whole literary
      career of scarcely fifteen years a pitiful struggle for mere
      subsistence, his memory malignantly misrepresented by his
      earliest biographer, Griswold, how completely has truth at last
      routed falsehood and how magnificently has Poe come into his own. For “The Raven,” first published in 1845, and, within a few
      months, read, recited and parodied wherever the English language
      was spoken, the half-starved poet received $10! Less than a year
      later his brother poet, N. P. Willis, issued this touching appeal
      to the admirers of genius on behalf of the neglected author, his
      dying wife and her devoted mother, then living under very
      straitened circumstances in a little cottage at Fordham, N. Y.:

      “Here is one of the finest scholars, one of the most original men
      of genius, and one of the most industrious of the literary
      profession of our country, whose temporary suspension of labor,
      from bodily illness, drops him immediately to a level with the
      common objects of public charity. There is no intermediate
      stopping-place, no respectful shelter, where, with the delicacy
      due to genius and culture, he might secure aid, till, with
      returning health, he would resume his labors, and his unmortified
      sense of independence.”

      And this was the tribute paid by the American public to the
      master who had given to it such tales of conjuring charm, of
      witchery and mystery as “The Fall of the House of Usher” and
      “Ligeia”; such fascinating hoaxes as “The Unparalleled Adventure
      of Hans Pfaall,” “MSS. Found in a Bottle,” “A Descent Into a
      Maelstrom” and “The Balloon-Hoax”; such tales of conscience as
      “William Wilson,” “The Black Cat” and “The Tell-tale Heart,”
      wherein the retributions of remorse are portrayed with an awful
      fidelity; such tales of natural beauty as “The Island of the Fay”
      and “The Domain of Arnheim”; such marvellous studies in
      ratiocination as the “Gold-bug,” “The Murders in the Rue Morgue,”
      “The Purloined Letter” and “The Mystery of Marie Roget,” the
      latter, a recital of fact, demonstrating the author’s wonderful
      capability of correctly analyzing the mysteries of the human
      mind; such tales of illusion and banter as “The Premature Burial”
      and “The System of Dr. Tarr and Professor Fether”; such bits of
      extravaganza as “The Devil in the Belfry” and “The Angel of the
      Odd”; such tales of adventure as “The Narrative of Arthur Gordon
      Pym”; such papers of keen criticism and review as won for Poe the
      enthusiastic admiration of Charles Dickens, although they made
      him many enemies among the over-puffed minor American writers so
      mercilessly exposed by him; such poems of beauty and melody as
      “The Bells,” “The Haunted Palace,” “Tamerlane,” “The City in the
      Sea” and “The Raven.” What delight for the jaded senses of the
      reader is this enchanted domain of wonder-pieces! What an
      atmosphere of beauty, music, color! What resources of
      imagination, construction, analysis and absolute art! One might
      almost sympathize with Sarah Helen Whitman, who, confessing to a
      half faith in the old superstition of the significance of
      anagrams, found, in the transposed letters of Edgar Poe’s name,
      the words “a God-peer.” His mind, she says, was indeed a “Haunted
      Palace,” echoing to the footfalls of angels and demons. “No man,” Poe himself wrote, “has recorded, no man has dared to
      record, the wonders of his inner life.”

      In these twentieth century days—of lavish recognition—artistic,
      popular and material—of genius, what rewards might not a Poe
      claim! Edgar’s father, a son of General David Poe, the American
      revolutionary patriot and friend of Lafayette, had married Mrs.
      Hopkins, an English actress, and, the match meeting with parental
      disapproval, had himself taken to the stage as a profession. Notwithstanding Mrs. Poe’s beauty and talent the young couple had
      a sorry struggle for existence. When Edgar, at the age of two
      years, was orphaned, the family was in the utmost destitution. Apparently the future poet was to be cast upon the world homeless
      and friendless. But fate decreed that a few glimmers of sunshine
      were to illumine his life, for the little fellow was adopted by
      John Allan, a wealthy merchant of Richmond, Va. A brother and
      sister, the remaining children, were cared for by others. In his new home Edgar found all the luxury and advantages money
      could provide. He was petted, spoiled and shown off to strangers. In Mrs. Allan he found all the affection a childless wife could
      bestow. Mr. Allan took much pride in the captivating, precocious
      lad. At the age of five the boy recited, with fine effect,
      passages of English poetry to the visitors at the Allan house. From his eighth to his thirteenth year he attended the Manor
      House school, at Stoke-Newington, a suburb of London. It was the
      Rev. Dr. Bransby, head of the school, whom Poe so quaintly
      portrayed in “William Wilson.” Returning to Richmond in 1820
      Edgar was sent to the school of Professor Joseph H. Clarke. He
      proved an apt pupil. Years afterward Professor Clarke thus wrote:

      “While the other boys wrote mere mechanical verses, Poe wrote
      genuine poetry; the boy was a born poet.